2008 Best-of Publicity and Marketing Very Official Nominations

THE NOMINATIONS ARE IN! Thanks to all for your submissions. I had to tweak some of the category labels slightly – forgive me, it being first year of the Life’s a Pitch Best-of List and all.

And here – we – go:

Best Publicity Move

1. Jeremy Denk interviews Sarah Palin.
2. Hilary Hahn records something unplayable.
3. Lang Lang performs at the Beijing Olympics.

*Super special honorable mention: Alex Ross’ ‘The Rest Is Noise’ multi-year buyer-base-building blog launches his book of the same name to great success.

Best Review

1. Ron Rosenbaum walks out of The Metropolitan Opera.
2. Vivien Schweitzer has a two-night-stand with The Emerson String Quartet.
3. Anne Midgette admits to not liking Brahms, and then reviews it.

Best Artist Interview

1. Angela Gheorghiu goes nuts in Opera News. 
2. Gustavo Dudamel speed dates. 
3. Anne-Sophie Mutter discusses shoulder rests.

Best Feature Story

1. Alex Ross on Bernstein for The New Yorker.
2. Mark Swed on “elitism” for The Los Angeles Times.
3. Jan Swafford on why we like The Art of the Fugue for Slate.

Best Album Art
1. Nico Muhly, Mothertongue (Brassland), for being literal:

 

2. Franco Donatoni, ALGO IV (Stradivarius), for not Photoshopping…anything:

Best Advertisement

1. Pink’s hot dog stand in LA serves up Dudamel Dogs.
2. The Metropolitan Opera’s rollover Doctor Atomic ads.
3. The Metropolitan Opera’s poster campaign for Satyagraha:

Best New (in 2008) Music Blog

1. Mark Adamo Online
   
2. Performance Monkey
3. Scanning the Dial

Best Overall Classical Music Coverage in a Blog or Newspaper

1. The New York Times
2. The one-two punch of Opera Chic and Parterre Box.
3. Sequenza21

*Super special honorable mention: Slate.com, because their coverage is always just so darn interesting.

Overall Best Moment in Publicity and Marketing in 2008

1. New York City Opera gets back in the game and launches “I am City Opera” video campaign.
2. The Washington Post actually hires a classical music critic: Anne Midgette takes over for Tim Page.
3. Classical music community rallies against the Cleveland Plain-Dealer’s decision to reassign Don Rosenberg after Tim Smith breaks the news on the Baltimore Sun blog.

*Super special honorable mention: Barack Obama’s campaign for President.

E mail me here to vote. Winners (”  “) will be announced the first week of January.