"First, it was recorded on Rachmaninov's own Steinway, housed at his Swiss villa; second, it contains two premiere recordings. The new works are a recently discovered Fugue in D minor (1891) and the piano version of the Suite for Orchestra in D minor (1891). These rarities are flanked by a handful of preludes and etudes-tableaux, plus the rip-roaring Second Sonata, Op.36."Hats off to Denis Matuev.
"The Steinway Legends Grand Edition. The entire series is offered in a unique boxed set crafted in the shape of a Steinway Grand Piano. The box includes 10 2-disc sets each one featuring a separate artist; Vladimir Horowitz, Claudio Arrau, Maurizio Pollini, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Mitsuko Uchida, Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, Wilhelm Kempff, Emil Gilels, Martha Argerich, and Alfred Brendel, plus a deluxe booklet and a bonus CD."Very nice indeed. link
"Acclaimed British pianist Stephen Hough (huff) is the 2008 winner of the Northwestern University School of Music's Jean Gimbel Lane Prize in Piano Performance."One of my all time favorie pianists. Link
"Oscar-winner Anthony Hopkins has unveiled plans to embark on a major world tour - as a concert pianist."Details here. And if you can't make to one of the performances, don't worry there is apparently a CD in the works.
Hopkins has a CD, featuring his compositions for new film Slipstream, coming out and he has suddenly become a composer of note.link
He adds, "I've been asked if I would write symphonic music for a symphony orchestra in Australia. Also I've been invited to Prague to write some music there."
The Public Piano Peace Tour has kicked off, or more accurately rolled off, in the Morongo Basin. Public Piano Peace is not the name of an alternative rock band whose music defies description; however, music is intrinsically related to the process. It is also an athletic endeavor.Linky
"Lebrecht faces a fall from grace after losing a defamation battle with the head of Naxos, the largest independent classical record label, Klaus Heymann. This week Penguin agreed to pulp all copies of Lebrecht's book, which criticised Mr Heymann."Deets here.
"When I was in my early 20s, I got a phone call from one of my old piano teachers," says Cho. "It was very surprising to me, because the lessons were such a long time ago. She was just calling to see how I was doing, but at the time, it seemed odd. I didn't know what to say, and I remember there was a slight feeling of discomfort through the conversation. As time has gone on, I have the memory of that phone call, and it's so clear to me why she called. It seems so human to reach out and want to speak to your former students to see what kind of effect you had on them. And I felt sad, because my realization and understanding was coming so many years too late."From an interview with playwright Julia Cho on the topic of her phenomenal play "The Piano Teacher". Read the rest here.
...Bach left us with no instructions on how they should be played – loud, soft, fast or slow. So finding the "right" interpretation has been a Holy Grail of classical music. People follow their favourite pianist (or harpsichordist) as they would a knight in armour.Read the rest here.
First we had the "roll-up piano (seen here)Infinite Response recently unveiled the new VAX 77 keyboard. It weighs just 25 pounds and folds in half, zipping into a shoulder bag, which means you can realistically carry it from one music gig to the next without accidentally sending it through any windows.Deets here.
"It's really a question about inspiration ... what is it that Beethoven sees in this 32 bars of nothing?" says Kaufman. "I always say it would be like if Philip Glass found a song by Britney Spears and decided to spend the next four years of his life studying and making variations on it."
Devoted to the Franco-Polish composer, his music reverberates around the tiny bar while drinks and décor are devoted to the great man, too.
Now, for the first time, we know that the intensely private Gould carried on an affair for five years, beginning in 1967, with a married German-American painter named Cornelia Foss. She left her husband Lukas, himself a prominent pianist and conductor, and moved her two children to Toronto at the height of the affair. A year before her move, Gould had asked her to marry him.
1. What's the best quotation of a piece of music within another piece of music?
Definitely the acidic handling of a Shostakovich's 7th in Bartok's "Concerto for Orchestra".
2. Name the best classical crossover album ever made.
Wendy Carlos's Switched-On Bach.
3. Great piece with a terrible title.
Sorabji's Opus Clavicembalisticum
4. If you had to choose: Benjamin Britten or Michael Tippett?
Benjamin Britten. The "Scottish Ballade" alone seals the deal for me.
5. Who's your favorite spouse of a composer/performer? (Besides your own.)
"My father made me neurotic and my husband made me crazy"
- Wanda Toscanini Horowitz
6. Terrible piece with a great title?
Daugherty's "Le tombeau de Liberace"
7. What's the best use of a classical warhorse in a Hollywood movie?
Love the use of the Delibes' "Flower Duet" in Five Corners. Or how about Mahler in Herzog's "Lessons of Darkness"?
There are so many great films with effective use of classical music it's not really possible to pin it down to one.
8. Name the worst classical crossover album ever made.
Has Rufus Wainwright finished his "opera" yet? No? Then put me down for "Saturday Night Fiedler". Why? Four words: "Night on Disco Mountain". Nuf said.
9. If you had to choose: Sam Cooke or Marvin Gaye?
Sam Cooke.
10. Name a creative type in a non-musical medium who would have been a great composer.
Gustave Flaubert.
EXTRA CREDIT:
For opera nerds: If you had to choose:
a) Lawrence Tibbett or Robert Merrill?
b) Amelita Galli-Curci or Lily Pons?
a) Robert Merrill
b) Lily Pons.
For early-music nerds: Name a completely and hopelessly historically uninformed recording that you nevertheless love.
Edwin Fischer's WTC.
This dexterity approaches that of a native arm, which can make 30 motions, and trumps the previously most agile bionic arm, the Proto 1, which could bend at the elbow, rotate its wrist and shoulder, and open and close its fingers. A person wearing a Proto 2 could conceivably play the piano.
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If any other 60-year-old musician put on a show as self-congratulatory as this, you'd guess they were about to retire. Not Elton John. He is inexhaustible.
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Powered by ScribeFire.
Alexander Ghindin of Russia, age 30, has won the 2007 Cleveland International Piano Competition. He receives $50,000, an Alice Tully Hall recital, a compact disc recording on the Naxos label, two years of concert management, and engagements drawing up to $100,000 in income.By all accounts a pianist to keep on your radar.
The starting price is $250,000 but we hope to sell it for somewhere around $2 million,” the company selling the piano on the auction website eBay, said. The online auction of the white Knabe baby grand began this week and runs until August 18.
"I do think it would be an incredible experiment to shut down the whole internet for five years and see what sort of art is produced over that span," he said.
Fray concludes with the Boulez Incises, a kind of etude after Ravel - Scarbo's personal hallucination. Three and one-half minutes in length, it keep Fray's fingers active and energies focused. As a foil to Bach, it has given us something--and someone--to think about.
The Tacoma Mall Transit Center, the first bus stop to receive an upgrade, is having speakers installed and will start blasting hits by the likes of Beethoven, Mozart and Bach this week, the Tacoma News Tribune reported Tuesday.
The young Russian won with the seal of two juries, earning both the $1,000 audience favorite prize and honors from a professional panel that had heard him perform three recitals in a week.Link
" They have demonstrated for the first time that neural activity recorded from a monkey's brain can control fingers on a robotic hand, making it play several notes on a piano."
A deepening mutual respect between the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and the people of China has caught the attention of the Chinese national television network. They network dispatched a four-person video crew to create a documentary about this week's 13th Annual Oberlin International Piano Competition and Festival.
A few years ago I had this idea of building a monstrous instrument that would be played with giant wire-bound gloves and big copper bars. After making the prototype I accidently grabbed one of the bars with my hand and realized that the sound went through me!. That led to the idea of a whole piano made up of human hands
"In 1994, when Tony Cicoria was forty-two... he was struck by lightning. He had an out-of-body experience. 'I saw my own body on the ground. I said to myself, 'Oh shit, I’m dead.' …Then—slam! I was back'... Life had returned to normal, seemingly, when 'suddenly over two or three days, there was this insatiable desire to listen to piano music.' This was completely out of keeping with anything in his past. He started to teach himself to play piano. And then, he started to hear music in his head. In the third month after being struck, Cicoria was inspired, even possessed, by music, and scarcely had time for anything else."Via the always splendid Music Thing, I read with interest that Oliver Sacks has a new book out. This one explore the musical obsessions and transformations of the human mind as brought on by serious brain injury. The book is titled "Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain. You'll find it here.
Read the rest here.
Link.
Meanwhile, Lang Lang is reinforcing his status as a Steinway artist by helping to launch a children's piano now being marketed in China. The "Lang Lang" Steinway comes with a front panel that converts into a whiteboard, and, with 20 million Chinese now studying the instrument, sales will be huge.
"As if that wasn’t enough, the pianist returned following intermission to perform Beethoven’s final piano concerto, “No 32 in C Minor (Op. 111).”"
Sofya Gulyak is the winner of the 2007 William Kapell International Piano Competition. The International Jury awarded First Prize to Ms. Gulyak after the three Kapell finalists performed in the concerto round with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and conductor David Lockington on July 21 in the Center’s Dekelboum Concert Hall to a sold-out house.
There's your "curious factoid" of the day.
"I've suffered a little from stage fright in my time. I started mwanting to play the piano when I was six years old, and my parents finally got me a piano when I was nine. So I was thinking, 'This is what I want to do, be a mconcert pianist.' "I was kind of obsessed. But then I realised I couldn't play in front of people. I went to a couple of recitals and left the bench in the middle of the concert.
Beethoven would be rolling over in his grave if he could hear his Symphony No. 5 "remixed" for Hyundai Motor America's latest sale.My quick take. Lighten up folks. Link
The 'Duh' effort is based on 'the idea that it's a no-brainer to pick a Hyundai,' says Jeff Goodby.
The 'Duh' effort is based on 'the idea that it's a no-brainer to pick a Hyundai,' says Jeff Goodby.
That's because Hyundai's version of the song, along with seven other classics, contains a single lyric: "Duh.
Cuban pianist Rolando Luna won the first prize of Swiss international jazz contest "Piano Solo" recently concluded here as part of the 2007 International Jazz Festival, in which he also got the Audience Award.Link
This doesn't sound good at all.
Pianist Leon Fleisher, who for three decades was unable to play with his right hand, has canceled a performance at Tanglewood because of an inflammation of both hands.
Fleisher was scheduled to play Beethoven's "Emperor" concerto on Sunday _ the day before his 80th birthday _ with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He will be replaced by Marc-Andre Hamelin, the orchestra said Friday.
One day in Brooklyn 77 drumkits gathered. And this is what is looked like: Here
Read the rest hereDr Barry Cheetham, a senior lecturer in The School of Computer Science at The University of Manchester, is seeking to combine his academic expertise in communications, networks and digital signal processing with his love of choral singing.
He is looking for funding to drive forward a project that will bring together amateur and semi-professional singers across Europe for seamless and polished live performances.
This really is a monster of sorts: a piano 164 keys and four pedals. And what's more it's the only one of its kind.
I want this!Joy of Liberace, Retro Recipes from America's Kitschiest Kitchen is the first-ever officially sanctioned book by the Liberace Foundation; complete with many never-before-seen archival photographs and coupled with the brand new concept of Bling Cooking™.Bling cooking? I want to know about bling piano playing. You can get your copy right here.
Nigel Hess, who has composed music for more than 100 television programmes and films, has met with Prince Charles to discuss the piano concerto, which will be premiered next month at a concert dedicated to his grandmotherLink
A recital at Walt Disney Concert Hall by French pianist Hélène Grimaud ended abruptly Sunday evening when an ailing Grimaud walked offstage after only the third piece on her program.Link
Link
"TAKE a classical pianist - Simon Walkenhorst. Put him on honeymoon with his opera singer wife, Beth Williams, through Britain's finest beer country, and you've got a recipe for career change."
Ingrid Fliter, the fast-rising 33-year-old Argentine pianist, has signed an exclusive recording contract with EMI Classics. Her first disc for the label, an all-Chopin recital, is scheduled for release in the spring of 2008
A Polish janitor at Glasgow University is set to launch a career as a concert pianist - after he was caught tickling the ivories on the university's chapel piano when he thought no-one was listening.
Aleksander Kudajczyk, 28, who cleans the law department every day at 6am, became the talk of the campus after he played Chopin on the chapel's grand.
Link
English jazz pianist George Shearing is now a Sir after accepting a knighthood from British monarch Queen Elizabeth II. The veteran musician, who has been blind all his life, brought his wife Lady Eleanor to the ceremony at the Queen's London residence Buckingham Palace on Wednesday.Link
A court has ordered heirs of German composer Richard Strauss to share royalties with the heirs of librettist and poet Hugo von Hoffmansthal for nine collaborations, including the popular operas Der Rosenkavalier and Elektra.Seems fair to me. Link.
...delivering a wide-ranging speech on the uses and abuses of confidence, Kuerti talked of the ability to command the piano, the fearlessness of Mohawk steelworkers and the dangers of over- confidence in foreign affairs -- including the NATO mission in Afghanistan.
"From the moment I conducted the “Saturday Night Fiedler” suite on television in May, I knew the youngsters had done it again: disco–a marvelous, insistently rhythmic dance form to which all manner of music can be adapted from Bach to the Bee Gees. And this span of musical poles truly accents the universality of music"
The New York Philharmonic, hunting for a successor to its music director, Lorin Maazel , has decided to divide up its leadership by adding the new position of principal conductor, orchestra officials said yesterday.
In a meeting with the musicians, the Philharmonic’s president, Zarin Mehta, said the orchestra would create other new positions, including composer in residence; director for a mini-festival; and artist in residence, probably a soloist.
The Schubert Sonata in B flat D 960
8. What aging rock-and-roll star do you wish had tried composing large-scale chorus and orchestra works instead of Paul McCartney?
Brian Wilson
9. If you had to choose: Carl Nielsen or Jean Sibelius?
Sibelius. Is this serious?
10. If it was scientifically proven that Beethoven's 9th Symphony caused irreversible brain damage, would you still listen to it?
No
" The smugglers are suspected of being instrumental in making tens of millions of yuan selling the contraband, giving the illegal ivory trade a whole new meaning."Link
In a scene that could have come straight from the 1932 Laurel and Hardy classic The Music Box, the 9ft 6in long Bosendorfer slipped from the clutches of three removal men, rolled off the back of their lorry and plunged 14ft down an embankment.If you have the stomach for it, read the rest and see the photos here.
Of course, he doesn't blame himself for being wrong. He blames the recording industry execs (who certainly do seem to deserve some of the blame). He notes that they never understood the digital world, and had no idea about new distribution technologies. He believes that if they had embraced going digital much earlier, then the DMCA wouldn't be such a disaster.Read the rest here
"Amelia S. Haygood, a former psychologist whose passion for classical music propelled her to found the independent record label Delos in the '70s and become a leader in digital recording, has died. She was 87."
"Ajero has six piano podcasts available at http:///www.youtube.com/mariocast and plans to put more up at the end of the semester. He hopes that through the lessons, more will see how great the music program is at SFA and get a passion for music themselves."Read the rest here
"Begley, who began studying piano at age 6, says the hangar has the best acoustics. He also plays the borrowed organ in the base chapel. Begley said the deaths of fellow soldiers serving under the 10th Mountain Division shook him deeply during his year in Afghanistan and that's reflected in the music. It's fair to describe the composition as "dark," he says. That reflects the conflicting nature of its inspirations — hopes for peace versus the need to tackle threats to peace such as terrorism. "
"Dercourt himself is a viola chamber music professor. Dercourt captures the bizarre conservatory ambiance perfectly - all white walls, open light and slightly off-tune stand-up pianos to practice on. Everything else - that is, related to characters or plot - is stupid but funny, making "The Page Turner" unintentional camp for the NPR set."
"During his heyday, Mr. Grand played at such night spots as Upstairs at the Downstairs, the Village Green, and the Fireside Inn. He also composed tunes for a number of revues, including Broadway's Leonard Sillman's New Faces of 1952 and New Faces of 1956. For the latter, he wrote "Hurry," "April in Fairbanks" and "Rouge." The last two were introduced by Jane Connell."Link
Little Boxes by Malvina Reynolds
Micro Application has announced what they describe as "the first historical and musical game", titled Mozart. For the first time, you can step in the role as the legendary composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the Emperor's protégé, who has travelled to Prague in order to solve his money problems.Don't think for a moment I won't want to check this game out.
"So what store wants customers who can differentiate among Beethoven’s symphonies (other than the Fifth)? Perhaps not surprisingly, Amazon does. The Internet’s catch-all merchant last week opened a classical music discount store — a move, analysts said, that could benefit the company handsomely, since classical fans actually buy, rather than steal, their music."Interesting play by Amazon.com, but there's loads of great places (for pay and free) elsewhere on the net. The more interesting line comes near the end of the piece. Interesting because of what it suggests in the way of possibilities for other musicians/arts groups/specialized labels.
Specifically, he said, Web sites could evolve with on-demand manufacturing capabilities.
“It makes much more sense to store all the music digitally and manufacture it at the point of order than keeping it all in inventory,” Mr. Underhill said. “You could also print whatever supporting material you want, and not be limited by the liner notes of the traditional LP or CD.”
This year, on the 75th anniversary of his birth, Gould's remarkable story will be told in a major exhibition developed by the Canadian Museum of Civilization in partnership with Library and Archives Canada.
Glenn Gould: The Sounds of Genius will trace his development from child prodigy to international concert star to recording and media artist pioneer. Along the way, it will recall his surprising departure from the concert scene, and examine the personal charisma and idiosyncrasies that helped make him a cultural icon.
"He's right in that we've had a handful of worthwhile composers, but never anybody to touch the top-notch greats (I still think Elgar's concertos are top-notch, but I take his point). The question is: if Elgar's mediocre but the best we have (King doesn't appear to mention Britten, let alone Orlando Gibbons), why should that be?"Follow the link to Jessica's blog for more...
"Counterstream Radio is your online home for exploring the music of America's composers. The only principle that defines the music we broadcast is that it's never about following the rules: This is music created without regard for anyone who says, "You can't do that!""Give 'em some blog love, click on over.
Internet radio companies big and small are revving up for a fight with the Copyright Royalty Board that could lead to the halls of Congress and -- some fear -- the end of streaming music stations in the United States.Link
Marcel Proust
Tea-soaked madeleine –
a childhood recalled. I had
brownies like that once
She cuts a very diminutive figure, but last night, wearing a bright pink dress, she tackled Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto with impressive virtuosity and poise. Her playing overall was musical without being mannered, her phrasing lithe, and her articulation exceptionally clean across the acres of rapid passagework. She found some unusual colors in the first-movement cadenza and one can imagine her interpretative voice growing more distinctive with time. Her sound was large enough to be heard above the orchestra without appearing strident. In fact, her temperament seemed rather Apollonian for this very Dionysian work, but she had no trouble drawing in the audience, which was on its feet cheering immediately after the final chord.
