This can’t be good. Here’s hoping he still performs at the Lucerne Festival. AP has also picked up the story.
Category Archives: Classical Music News
Yvonne Loriod, 1924-2010
Roger Muraro has confirmed to the NY Times that Yvonne Loriod has died in Saint-Denis. Best known as Olivier Messiaen’s muse and the most prominent champion of his piano music, she was also one of the greatest French piano pedagogues of the later 20th century.
David Randolph, 1914-2010
David Randolph was a dynamic figure in New York City’s local classical music scene, best known as a choral conductor, but also an erudite and affable presence on WNYC for decades. The NY Times‘ Margalit Fox has a detailed obituary. Randolph was a frequent concertgoer, and one would frequently see him chatting with multiple colleagues, friends, and singers before concerts and during intermission. As one can easily discern from the obit, he was much-beloved not only here in New York but around the region.
He needs to watch some vintage footage of Fritz Reiner
The Los Angeles Times reports that hyperkinetic maestro Gustavo Dudamel injured himself Thursday night while conducting the finale of Dvorák’s Cello Concerto with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The orchestra is about to embark on a national tour, and here’s hoping Dudamel recovers in time for departure. In the meanwhile, he might consider reviewing some vintage action footage of Fritz Reiner, whose economy of movement is almost as legendary as his notorious podium temperament, which could run the gamut from withering to tyrannical.
Arthur Winograd, 1920-2010
The NY Times obituary is here. Winograd conducted the Hartford Symphony while I was in college, and guest conducted the Hartt School Orchestra on one occasion during my undergraduate years, getting impressive results with his authoritative, patient approach.
MET names Fabio Luisi their Principal Guest Conductor
Covering classical radio as if the Internet simply weren’t there…
I do most of my classical music radio listening via the Internet: BBC Radio 3, WCPE, BR-Klassik, WWFM and WFMT are all regular destinations. So imagine my surprise…
Continue reading Covering classical radio as if the Internet simply weren’t there…
Alan Rich, 1924-2010
Rich was a terrific writer and an enthusiastic booster of LA’s dynamic classical music scene. Here’s the obituary from the OC Register. (Hat tip: Christopher O’Reilly)
UPDATE: Here’s Allan Kozinn obit, just posted to the NY Times Web site.
NPR looks at the Philadelphia Orchestra
… and its continuing financial woes. It’s worth pointing out that the final section of the article puts perhaps too much of a link between the orchestra and their venerable former venue. The lion’s share of the orchestra’s recordings made during Eugene Ormandy’s tenure as music director were made not at the acoustically uneven Academy of Music but at other venues, notably Philadelphia Town Hall, which yielded a far different sound than the orchestra created on their “home turf.” Additionally, the orchestra’s “Ormandy” sound had changed drastically before the move from the Academy to Kimmel Center under Ormandy’s successors Riccardo Muti and Wolfgang Sawallisch.
Musicians as citizens: Ilona Oltusky on Evgeny Kissin
Somehow I managed to miss Ilona Oltusky’s fascinating take on Evgeny Kissin’s outspoken opposition to what he sees as increasing anti-Semitism “in some of the prominent British media in general and the BBC in particular in the last few years.” Ouch. The post makes for provocative reading — as does Kissin’s scathing open letter to the Beeb.