ArtsJournal: Arts, Culture, Ideas

MUSIC

Music Festivals With No Assigned Seating Aren’t Very Safe At All

Deaths are rare, but they're hardly unknown; however, music promoters like Live Nation, for instance, say that the rarity "proves that most shows are perfectly safe." - The New York Times

Why Are Some Classical Music Institutions Resisting Broadening Their View of Music?

Joshua Kosman: How long can an artistic culture survive and thrive on the work of the same circumscribed set of a dozen or so dead white European males? - San Francisco Chronicle

Strathmore, Baltimore Symphony’s DC-Area Home, Finally Settles With IATSE

"After a two-year stalemate that sparked a feud with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra," — which cancelled several concerts this fall because of the standoff — "Strathmore has reached a tentative agreement with its unionized box office staff that extends their contract through June 2024." - MSN (The Washington Post)

Music Is What It Is – You Have To Meet It There

David Finckel: "People have a hard time sitting still. Attention spans are getting shorter. The only thing this doesn’t change is the length of a Schubert trio. You can’t make it shorter, and you can’t play it faster. You can’t cut sections out of it." - The New York Times

How Peter Gelb Is Handling The Most Difficult Job In Opera, Now Even More Difficult

A longread on how the Metropolitan Opera's general manager is handling the company's reopening and its long-term problems, what people inside and outside of the Met think of him, and what he thinks of what they think of him. (He's fairer than you might expect.) - New York Magazine

Ludovic Morlot Appointed To Lead Barcelona Orchestra

Morlot, born in Lyon in 1974, will replace Kazushi Ono. The contract with the OBC is for four years, with a minimum of eleven weeks of work with the orchestra each season, of which eight would be for seasonal concerts, two for recordings and one for festivals. - Ara Balears

Musicians: Suffocating In The Gig Economy

Many musicians have watched, cringing, as the term “gig economy” has become a defining term of the national economic Zeitgeist. Not just because the word “gig” is our word—it originated with jazz musicians in the 1910s—but because, in a larger sense, we are the original gig workers. - Brooklyn Rail

How Can Today’s Piano Students Learn To Improvise? The Same Way They Did In The 18th Century

John Mortensen has made a thorough study of how music students in Baroque-era Naples were taught to improvise harmony and counterpoint, then a basic skill. And he's seeing interest from present-day students who don't want to play the same hundred pieces everyone else does. - Early Music America

Chinese Composers Are Making Western Classical Music Their Own

In fact, there have been composers in China writing for European instruments for over a century. Since the end of the Cultural Revolution, though, the country has produced several generations of accomplished composers — and developed an audience eager to hear new scores. - Prospect

Study: Listening To Familiar Music Boosts Brain Function

"We have new brain-based evidence that autobiographically salient music -; that is, music that holds special meaning for a person, like the song they danced to at their wedding -; stimulates neural connectivity in ways that help maintain higher levels of functioning." - News Medical

Diagnosis: What Would It Take To Make Victoria BC A Music Center?

Research was completed by an organization that specializes in analyzing local music scenes — Sound Diplomacy — which has come up with strategies for major music cities such as London, England and New Orleans. - CBC

The Vinyl Crisis Is Getting Worse

There's massive stress on the resurgent medium, and for Adele's new album, producers ordered half a million LP discs. (Who could have predicted this in, say, 1990?) - FADER

A Fresh New Generation Extends UK’s Jazz Revival

These players developed their talents in small venues across the UK capital in the 2010s, from Total Refreshment Centre in Dalston, east London, to Mau Mau in west London’s Ladbroke Grove. - The Guardian

For Windsor Musicians Who Work In Detroit, The U.S. Border Reopening Is A Massive Relief

Musicians missing their bands and gigs are finally getting the chance to get back in touch. "There's been many tearful reunions," one says. - CBC

For Some Music Lovers, It’s Still Better To Enjoy Concerts From The Comfort Of Home

"Even before the digital age you could access the World of Music through recordings, via the radio or the local music shop or even the Columbia House Record Club." And now? Livestreaming! - Oregon ArtsWatch

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