Finally saw Twilight of the Gods, the conclusion of the DC Ring. After being sick for the first performance of it. And most of it was as powerful as the best of what had gone before. One of many stage pictures that stays with me: The Rhinemaidens, at the start of Act 3, trying to clean debris from what’s left of the river, picking up debris, discarded bottles and the like, putting it in garbage bags. Or trying to do all that. Too much debris to cope with. Makes so much sense. If the world is despoiled, after Alberich renounces love (a … [Read more...]

I’ll interrupt my posts about the DC Ring, and some of its implications for the future of classical music. Because I want to tell you something special for me — that video of my April 14 concert — my reemenrgence into the world as a composer — is now online. Jim Robeson, the fine videographer who made the videos, used six cameras, and made an aborbing video production out of the event, more than just a simple document of it. That took awhile. So more than a month after the event, here we go. A video of thee complete concert, including my … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar) Reactions of outsiders to the DC Ring, which I raved about in my last post. By “outsiders” I mean three people outside classical music, three people who all happen to be arts professionals, in different ways, but who don’t normally go to hear classical music. And certainly not Wagner. Each saw just one of the Ring operas. One loved it; don’t know specifics beyond that. Another saw Rhinegold (the DC Ring used the English names of the operas, though they were sung in German). She thought it was silly — … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] I got chills at the end of The Rhinegold (as they called it at the Washington National Opera Ring, though they did the cycle in German). And I cried at the end of The Valkyrie. That’s one way to measure the power of this production, conceived and directed by Francesca Zambello, conducted by Phillipe Augin. Begun a decade ago, shelved for lack of funds, staged complete in San Francisco (with a different conductor), and now done complete in DC. This is also a way to measure the power of the work itself. So … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] We live in such a varied culture. Hard for anyone to keep track of more than a small part of it. But sometimes something comes along that you just can’t miss, and don’t want to… If you’ve been living in our wider culture, you know why I’d be blogging now about Beyoncé. I’ll get to her in a bit. But first something I’ve been pondering for a while. How will we know when classical music is back? How can we tell that it’s roaring back into the center of our cultural world, taking the place we’d like it to have? One … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] So surprising that he’s gone. Or maybe not a surprise — he was so otherworldly. Don’t think I’ve ever known of another musician with such prodigious gifts. Wrote unforgettable hits, and also album tracks that go deep. Not that some of the hits don’t! Wrote music and lyrics, of course. Played all the instruments on many of his records. Sang with such pointed, impish seduction. (To cite only one thing in his singing — “Slow Love,” “If I Was Your Girlfriend,”) His music Created an amazing amoung of music. … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] My concert, last Thursday. My reemergence as a composer. So great a success, more than I ever could have dreamed. So much so that after all the work, all the emotion about coming out of my composing shell after so many years, all the production details, all the promotion I did, all the many details of both the event and my music…after all of this, I had to take some time off, some time when I didn’t think about it, just to get myself on even keel again. I can measure the success with three kinds of audience. … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] My concert — my reemergence as a composer — is just one week away. April 14. 7:30 PM at the Mansion, the warm and intimate performance space at Strathmore, the big performing arts center outside Washington, DC. For those in the area, get tickets here. Some still available! I’ve been in a whirlwind, preparing for this. I’m composer, producer, promoter, music director. The guy in charge of rehearsals, and printing a program booklet (I need one bigger than Strathmore provides). Arranging a video recording. FIguring … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] Hiphop and arts organizations… Suppose the Kennedy Center, instead of naming Q-Tip as its Artistic Director for Hiphop Culture (see my last post), had named Kanye West instead. Or Jay-Z, or Dr. Dre. I’m not saying that, artistically, these would have been better choices, Or that these stars would even want the gig. Kanye, so famously, launched his new album with his own shown at Fashion Week in New York, giving him a more elite audience, and much more media, than the Kennedy Center could ever get. But … [Read more...]

"…Makes we wonder, sometimes, if arts institutions, trying to stretch beyond themselves, take time to ask who they’re stretching to. Which people, which subcultures, what these people and cultures are like, what really goes on the city the arts orgs are reaching to." [contextly_auto_sidebar] The Go-Go Symphony rises from the streets and clubs of Washington, DC, combining pop and classical music. And because of that poses — or ought to pose — a sharp challenge to the Kennedy Center, precisely because the Kennedy Center wants to reach past its … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] There’s something I miss at classical new music concerts, even if I like the music I’m hearing. So yes, many of us in the classical biz think new music is important, crucial to support, deserving any prestige and funding it might get from major institutions. But… I miss a connection to any larger culture. Which I did get when I was a pop music critic, and for a while went to three, four, five shows each week. Of course not every band was good Many were meh. But two good things were always happening. Two … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] My show, aka my reemergence as a composer, with a concert of my music on April 14. At the Strathmore Performing Arts Center, just outside Washington, DC. You can buy tickets now. I’m busy producing, rehearsing, promoting. And, soon, raising funds. Here’s a link to the program. The heart of the first part, as you'll see, is my wife: It starts with triadic music. An arioso from an opera I’m writing, based on Shakespeare’s As You Like It. Soft and wistful, for tenor. Never performed before. My wife is the … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] Had a marvelous time last weekend at the Sunderman Conservatory of Music, a school just 10 years old at Gettysburg College, which is in — where else? — Gettysburg, PA, of Civil War fame. One quick tidbit: a major donor who writes a terrific march! That would be F. William Sunderman, a local physician whose money made the school possible. And who lived to be 104. And who wrote a march played on a gala concert I heard, which turned out to be a spirited, well-written piece. Clearly a man of many parts. Time to … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] An oratorio about lynching! About one of the great horrors of American history. Premiered by the New York Philharmonic in 1940. And now, as far as I can see, largely forgotten, though there’s a recording. And you can hear it all on YouTube. (The link takes you to the first movement, where you'll find links to all the others.) The composer was William Grant Still (1895–1978)(Wikipedia here, website for him here). Still was the first African-American composer with a major career, the first to have an opera performed … [Read more...]

[contextly_auto_sidebar] In my Juilliard course on the future of classical music, we’ve been looking at how classical music was in the past. Why? Because it was looser, more flexible, with the audience applauding during the music, and musicians improvising. This can inspire us today. Not that everything from the past needs to come back, but studying the past can free us from preconceptions about classical music now. Nothing about our present tradition is written in stone. Things were very different when many of the great composers … [Read more...]