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In the recording business they’re known as sonic artifacts. They’re the non-musical noises that periodically turn up on recordings – and sometimes add to their historical significance. In the May 2021 issue of BBC Music Magazine, I highlight 15 notable examples, from the sounds of war to subway rumbles to coughs, barking dogs, traffic noise, and singing conductors.
Continue reading “When Your Recording Has An Unintended Noise”
Outdoor concerts are a perennial summer pastime for New York City residents, and perhaps none is more beloved than the New York Philharmonic’s traveling summer series to the parks throughout the boroughs. Before the series began in 1965 (and which for a time included visits to Long Island and elsewhere), the Philharmonic held a longstanding residency at Lewisohn Stadium, a Greek-style amphitheater and athletic facility owned by the City University of New York. I looked into its remarkable history in the February 2021 issue of BBC Music Magazine.
Continue reading “Before Arena Rock, There was Lewisohn Stadium”
When characters in “The Crown” attend the opera, one can usually expect some pointed commentary on the fictionalized British royal family. The genre serves a plot device twice during the fourth season of the Netflix series, as Prince Charles and Diana visit the Royal Opera House at various stages in their troubled relationship (I’ve previously looked at the uses of classical music in seasons one, two and three of “The Crown”).
Continue reading “The Crown, Season 4 Puts Opera in the Spotlight”
As concert presenters overhaul their programming amidst the pandemic, several are taking up the works of Joseph Bologne, better known as the Chevalier de Saint-Georges. Bologne’s largely unsung chamber music, symphonic and even operatic repertoire is turning up in advance of a planned Hollywood biopic, and mirrors a larger racial reckoning across the United States.
Continue reading “The Chevalier de Saint-Georges, Composer and Swordsman”
The question has perplexed a lot musicians since the start of social distancing and quarantines: Is it possible to hold an online performance when performers are spread out in remote locations? The presence of latency, or lag, in the video connections makes such collaboration especially difficult. And most video-conferencing platforms (Zoom, Skype, FaceTime) allow only one person to speak or sing at a time.
Continue reading “Long-Distance, Online Performances Without the Latency?”
July 31st was Uncommon Instrument Awareness Day. Yep, that’s a holiday. It’s a moment to reflect on the world’s rare, odd and truly extraordinary instruments. In a video that I produced for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, I look at 10 curious inventions that you may hear at its concerts one time or another. They range from the Stroh violin (pictured) to the heckelphone. Watch:
Continue reading “Celebrating Uncommon Instrument Awareness Day”
In the June 2020 issue of BBC Music Magazine I look at various ways in which composers were impacted by the flu epidemic of 1918-20. The virus, which wreaked havoc for nearly three years and left at least 50 million people dead including about 675,000 in the U.S., impacted music in ways both significant and modest. There were several escapist ragtime songs about “the grip,” and at least one chamber music piece: Darius Milhaud’s Sonata for Flute, Oboe, Clarinet and Piano, which ends with a dirge for the victims of the epidemic.
Continue reading “How the 1918 Flu Pandemic Shaped Classical Music”
Live from his New York City apartment, the pianist Conrad Tao on March 25 performed The People United Will Never Be Defeated, Frederic Rzewski’s epic set of 36 variations on the 1973 Chilean protest song.
Continue reading “Conrad Tao Performs Rzewski’s Epic Protest Work”
Concerts were longer in the time of Beethoven, as were attention spans. But even by those standards, the storied program he organized for Vienna’s Theater an der Wien on Dec. 22, 1808 was over the top. Called the Akademie, it ran from 6:30 to 10:30 pm in two parts and included the premieres of the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies, Fourth Piano Concerto, Choral Fantasia in C minor, and other works by Beethoven.
Continue reading “Louis Langrée on Beethoven’s Mega-Concert”
In listening to several scores to films nominated for Academy Awards in 2020, a particular feature emerges: a prominent cello theme. The instrument has been called on to convey a range of moods and even shaped the plot of at least one film.
Continue reading “Oscars 2020: Year of The Cello”