"The Guardian took every Christmas song that had charted in the UK Top 100 since 1952, and selected the 100 most popular of those on Spotify. Two-thirds were released at least 30 years ago." Which is to say: "all we want for Christmas is mid-20th-century nostalgia." - The Guardian
"That complicated history of 'Carol of the Bells' has embodied a grim motif since its inception. ... Then as now, Ukraine was under threat from Russia, a shadow of an anxious past that still extends over the country." - The New York Times
We don’t need more itinerant maestros who draw big salaries in multiple cities. We need more directorships along the lines of ones in which a conductor focusses on a single city and puts down roots. This is how American orchestral culture unfolded before jet travel. _ The New Yorker
"Welsh-born Jo Davies, 52, an award-winning director of opera, theatre and musical theatre in the UK, Europe and North America, will join Opera Australia CEO Fiona Allan in what is believed to be a world first: two women in charge of a major national opera company." - The Sydney Morning Herald
"Classical performance tradition is immediately undermined when the performer enters wearing a sleeveless pink top, red trousers, and a brown messenger bag ... and stands, silent, between a lidless grand piano and a table covered with realistic tree models." - Guernica Magazine
"What makes a room’s acoustics hard to assess is that they depend as much on the music, the musicians, and the listener’s location as they do on the arrangement of surfaces along the way." - Vulture
Commercial radio normalised popular music’s relationship to advertising. But the collapse between content and advertising exemplified by TikTok prompts us to consider how music making and music listening are shaped by promotional contexts. - The Conversation
AI-generated music is already an innovative enough concept, but Riffusion takes it to another level with a clever, weird approach that produces weird and compelling music using not audio but images of audio. - TechCrunch
Gail Samuel, who came to the BSO from the Los Angeles Philharmonic in June 2021, will formally leave the orchestra on Jan. 3 — an abrupt end to a brief tenure. No reason was given for Samuel’s departure. - Boston Globe
A committee of Cardiff's city council has approved in principle an operating lease of St. David's Hall — which hosts the BBC National Symphony of Wales and the Cardiff Singer of the World competition — to Academy Music Group, which manages rock concert venues. - BBC
"The website was restored at around 1:30 p.m. on Thursday, and ticket sales have resumed after more than a week of chaos. Met Opera on Demand, the company's popular subscription streaming platform, has also been restored. ... The Met Opera normally processes more than $200,000 worth of tickets each day." - Gothamist/WNYC
The Orion quartet was formed in 1987 by violinists Daniel Phillips and Todd Phillips, brothers who share the first violin chair equally, and cellist Timothy Eddy with the original violist Catherine Metz. - The Strad
A week after the cyberattack which has paralyzed its ticketing and payroll operations, the company has not missed a single performance. And with its offer of any unsold seat for $50, fans come flocking. The resulting scene is, despite the difficulties and necessary improvisation, rather orderly. - The New York Times
Following the stern directive from Arts Council England, the government funder, to leave the capital, "(Stuart) Murphy said he had been contacted by MPs or mayors in about 10 locations to express an interest in hosting the ENO's new headquarters, but declined to reveal where they are." - BBC
It’s a sobering reality that few of the great artists of the past would be well equipped for the role of a music director working in America today. The door is open for us to redefine our understanding of the artistic leadership we need today. - Symphony
