The Year in Music: International

By Keith Clarke

It was the year we went to war, and if there was a battle on for the hearts and minds of the people of Iraq, it looked like musicians would take a bit of convincing, too. Simon Rattle, Gerd Albrecht, and Riccardo Muti all made speeches from the podium, variously arguing the cause of peace. In the Ukraine, a student orchestra made an anti-war protest at the American Embassy in Kiev in what it called a “requiem for the victims of aggression in Iraq.” Daniel Barenboim stepped into another conflict, dodging verbal flak as he played a concert for Palestinians.

Before the Iraq war, another monster with possibly worldwide consequences raised its head, the SARS outbreak laying waste to concert plans. The BBC Scottish Symphony cancelled an Asian tour; German chamber orchestra Ensemble Moderne made a hurried retreat from Taiwan; the Royal Winnipeg Ballet of Canada gave Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou a miss; the Eugene Concert Choir diverted from China to Australia. The Hong Kong Philharmonic called off many concerts—those that did take place saw audience members wearing surgical masks. The Third Beijing Piano International Competition was postponed when six of its ten international jurors cancelled.

In France it was industrial unrest rather than medical concern that caused cancellations at the Paris Opera and the festivals of Aix-en-Provence, Avignon, and Montpelier. Striking performers took to the streets of Paris, playing instruments and waving puppets, in a protest against government plans to reduce unemployment compensation for part-time and freelance artists.

In London, musicians also took their instruments to parliament but wore gags and stood in silent protest against new licensing rules that they said would silence live music in Britain’s bars and restaurants. The proposed legislation required bar owners to get a license for any form of live entertainment, or face a $32,000 fine or six months in jail. Before, the law applied only if more than two musicians performed.

Two quartets unlikely to be troubled by the performing law were the Lindsays and Anonymous 4, both announcing their disbandment. British groups remaining in the game were boosted by a substantial hike in state funding. Private funder Alberto Vilar let rip at the Association of British Orchestras, annual conference, blasting the media, whose coverage of arts philanthropy he claimed was “misleading at best, and dead wrong at worst.”

Recording and publishing
Record stores remained pleasant places to hang out, but sales graphs continued to point to the floor. Troubled Tower Records pulled out of Mexico and London in a continued search for solvency. An enterprising attempt to revive the market came from Universal Classics, which threatened music journalists’ hearing with a record industry version of “Shock and Awe,” launching the new Super Audio CD carrier at top volume through vast loudspeakers. The notion that music does not count unless it is amplified beyond recognition had been the mainstay of the glitzy Classical Brits Awards, but the 2003 event was rumored to be a toned-down, more elegant event. What this meant was getting rid of the Star Wars stage sets in favor of a leafy English country garden, while the Bond girls, dressed like strippers, shared air time with an amplified Cecilia Bartoli. Fifteen-year-old violinist Chloë Hanslip, named Young British Classical Performer at the Brits, was dropped by Warner Classics, having made just two of a planned five discs.

Hyperion Records, along with the rest of the music business, mourned the death of its founder Ted Perry. An engaging man who had once driven a cab to help fund his company, he was renowned for his unerring sense of what would sell and his fondness for agreeing to major projects at the drop of a hat. One of many shocked by his death at age 71 was Brian Couzens of Chandos Records, who decided to step down as managing director and hand the label over to his son Ralph.

In publishing, the mighty New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians found a new owner in Oxford University Press, Macmillan having decided the title did not fit with its global publishing business. Boosey & Hawkes continued to tread a tightrope, but got a $53.63 million bailout when it managed to sell its instrument-manufacturing arm. There was drama for fellow instrument manufacturer Leblanc when a dawn blaze at a French factory destroyed 1,400 clarinets at a cost of $1.8 million.

Orchestras
The Vienna Philharmonic got the year off to a shocking start by hiring a female player—27-year-old violist Ursula Plaichinger—for its traditional New Year’s concert. It had taken a mere 158 years for the Orchestra to admit a woman, but newspapers were not allowed to interview her. Austria’s biggest-circulation newspaper, the Kronen Zeitung, noted: “The first woman with the Vienna Philharmonic may be allowed to play, but she can’t talk.” In neighboring Germany, the Berlin Philharmonic settled comfortably into its Rattle era, though the city’s economic woes resulted in the unlikely spectacle of the august ensemble selling baseball caps to help make ends meet. Another German orchestra raising cash was the Deutsche Akademische Philharmonie, though in this case the beneficiary was one of Sudan’s ancient pyramids, thanks to a performance of Beethoven’s First Symphony in the desert.

The Royal Liverpool Philhar- monic predicted job cuts in the face of a $2.4 million deficit, but the band can look forward to some high-profile work when Liverpool becomes European Capital of Culture in 2008. The BBC Philharmonic broke new ground with a performance in a local supermarket, culminating in a giant conga round the store. The London Symphony unveiled a state-of-the-art performance, recording, and rehearsal venue created out of a formerly derelict 270-year-old church.

China National Symphony got a new chief conductor in Xiao-Lu Li, and former civil servant Paul Leung was named chief executive of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra amid criticism about his alleged unsuitability for the job. “I have a CD collection,” he told reporters, making his case.

In a round of orchestral music chairs, Antonio Pappano, who had made a great impression as music director of London’s Royal Opera House, was named Myung-Whun Chung’s successor as principal conductor at Rome’s Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia from 2005; 27-year-old Daniel Harding decided to give up his post at the head of the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen to take over the Berlin-based Mahler Chamber Orchestra; Michel Plasson stepped down as director of the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse after 35 years. Christoph Eschenbach renewed his contract at the Orchestre de Paris. The same city’s venerable L’orchestre des Concerts Lamoureux was threatened with disbandment as funding dried up.

Perhaps the most remarkable orchestras for pure survival against all odds were Iraq’s National Symphony Orchestra and Babylon Orchestra, which emerged from the rubble to play their first concerts since the Allied invasion. Everything from music scores to instruments had been looted or destroyed, but the players hid instruments at home to protect them.

Opera
The continuing financial crisis in Berlin put a question mark over the city’s three opera houses, with Deutsche Staatsoper Artistic Director Daniel Barenboim reported to be “mad as a hornet” at talk of a merger. During the summer the federal government rode in like the U.S. Cavalry, throwing the lifeline of a last-minute bailout, but pundits remained skeptical about how a cash-strapped city could maintain long-term operatic extravagance. The local operatic scene was little enlivened by Luciano Pavarotti’s farewell to the city, a Tosca that a newspaper reviewer summed up as “An obituary.”

In Bayreuth, the 83-year-old Wolfgang Wagner demonstrated that there was life in the old dog yet by appointing controversial director Christoph Marthaler for the festival’s next Tristan. There was more amusement when Wagner reneged on a promise that Pierre Boulez could have his choice of director—the equally controversial Austrian Martin Kusej—for the 2004 Parsifal. The old man put the cherry on the cake by naming as director of the next Ring Lars von Trier, a provocateur who claims he has never seen an opera.

The Bavarian State Opera had some moves of its own to announce, Christoph Albrecht being named as successor to Intendant Sir Peter Jonas in 2006 and Kent Nagano taking over from Zubin Mehta as Generalmusikdirektor. Mean- while, the Komische Oper presented a Peter Grimes so appalling that it was pulled early. Munich mounted a major festival to celebrate 350 years of opera in the city.

If all the best operatic dramas happen behind the scenes, that was certainly the case for English National Opera, which spent an uncomfortable year struggling with a deficit in a manner that was seen as maladroit at best. Faced with substantial job cuts, the chorus made their case in song outside the Arts Council headquarters, council chairman Gerry Robinson commenting: “I think that was the most beautiful protest I’ve ever heard.” The dispute grew ever more bloody, forcing the cancellation of a performance of the first part of Berlioz’s The Trojans, but eventually a peace of sorts was found before the company headed for an autumn residency at the Barbican Center before heading back to its refurbished London Coliseum home. Along the way, Sean Doran climbed aboard as new artistic director, joining at a time when things could only get better.

Looking on, though contractually silent, was ousted general director Nicholas Payne, who landed on his feet with an appointment as the first salaried director of Opera Europa, a trade organization formed in June 2001 by the merger of Eurolyrica and the European Opera Network.

The Royal Opera House was boosted by a 14 percent Arts Council increase over three years and announced a blowout season with nine new productions, including the world premiere on February 10, 2004, of The Tempest by Thomas Adès. Glynde- bourne made history by advertising for the first time, having been faced with the rare vision of empty seats. History of another kind was made when it presented its first ever Wagner, opening the season with Tristan.

Paris Opera’s outgoing general director Hugues Gall thumbed his nose at the critics of Le Monde by withdrawing advertising. The Bastille Opera, which opened just 14 years ago, announced that it may have to close for a year for repairs to faulty stage equipment.

Elsewhere, Opera Australia announced a new music director in Richard Hickox and a new chairman in investment banker Dr. Gordon Fell. Judith Isherwood, former director of performing arts and acting chief executive of the Sydney Opera House, was appointed chief executive of a $166 million arts center being built in the Welsh capital, Cardiff.

Hungarian conductor Iván Fischer left his post as music director of the Opéra National de Lyon reportedly following differences of opinion with general director Serge Dorny. Ingo Metzmacher, artistic director and music director of the Hamburger Staatsoper and Philharmonic Orchestra, was named chief conductor of the Netherlands Opera. Stockholm enjoyed an opera about the life of Sweden’s only saint. There was a rumpus over westernization at Tokyo’s New National Theater; but the Japanese suggested they do have a sense of humor after all by lifting a ban on performances of The Mikado.

Places
There were mixed fortunes for Russia’s theaters, Moscow’s Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Musical Theater going up in flames, St. Petersburg planning a new home for the Kirov, to be designed by French architect Dominique Perrault, and a new arts center announced to be named after Valery Gergiev.

In Venice an arson charge was upheld against two electricians convicted of causing the 1996 fire at La Fenice, which is now due to reopen in November 2004 with a new production of Verdi’s La Traviata, conducted by Lorin Maazel.

London’s Wigmore Hall staged an extensive farewell to
director William Lyne, retiring after 36 years. In Vienna, the Staatsoper was in the news for an outbreak of audience rage, with reports of fisticuffs over anything from big hair blocking the view to “stolen” seats.

Winners
American conductor Marin Alsop was recognized by the Royal Philharmonic Society with an award for “turning the fortunes” of the Bournemouth Symphony. Other artists with a new gong for the display cabinet included Anne Sofie von Otter, winning Sweden’s annual Rolf Schock prize; American pianist Keith Jarrett, picking up the same country’s $117,000 Polar Music Prize; Finnish baritone Tommi Hakala, named BBC Singer of the World; and Daniel Barenboim and the Berlin Staatskapelle, awarded the Wilhelm Furtwängler Prize in Berlin.

The Queen Elisabeth Music Competition in Brussels was won by 25-year-old German pianist Severin von Eckardstein, but it made headlines when third-prize winner Lim Dong-hyek, 18, gave up his prize, protesting that his performances throughout the competition had been demonstrably better than those given by the second-place winner, Shen Wen-Yu, 16, from China.

Composers Mason Bates and Jefferson Friedman were among 31 winners of the annual Rome Prizes awarded by The American Academy in Rome. Musical polymath Thomas Adès won the ISCM/CASH Young Composer Award. Danish architect Joern Utzon, who designed the controversial Sydney Opera House, was named winner of the 2003 Pritzker Architecture Prize.

New music
The BBC Proms made their customary contribution to new music with seven BBC commissions and ten world premieres, among them a percussion concerto from Joe Duddell, a violin concerto by star funk-folk fiddler Mark O’Connor, a song cycle by Judith Weir, and Five Motets by Robert Saxton.

Composer Vladimir Tarnopolski, who refuses to include any of his own music in the Moscow Forum Contemporary Music Festival of which he is artistic director, had his Cinderella, a new music-theater piece based on Roald Dahl, given its world premiere at the Barbican Center. His Russian festival featured the world premiere of Alla Kesselman’s Installations from Silence.

Among featured composers slated for the November 2003 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival were Brian Ferneyhough and Gavin Bryars, both celebrating their 60th birthdays.

Keith Clarke is editor of Classical Music magazine and a regular contributor to MusicalAmerica.com.