Musical America Blogs

Jenny Bilfield talks with Eugenia Zukerman and Emily Ondracek-Peterson of Noted Endeavors about the best investment that a performer can make – a promotional video. Jenny Bilfield, the President and CEO of Washington Performing Arts, works to create profound opportunities that connect community and artists, in both education and performance. Using 11 venues that criss-cross […]

By Brian Taylor Goldstein, Esq. Dear Law and Disorder: We are a dance company who is going to perform in March in the United States. We gave the list of names for Visa purposes last September to the venue. Now we have some changes, we have to replace two technicians who are essential for the […]

By ANDREW POWELL Published: February 24, 2015 MUNICH — Fourteen months ago irate journalists confronted Valery Gergiev at a news conference here amid his preparations for a Stravinsky program with the Munich Philharmonic. The confrontation wasn’t over music, rather politics, but it did lead to questions for the orchestra’s management about his hours and pay, […]

By Sedgwick Clark We last convened in this space in late October when I wrote in dismay about the exalted Berlin Philharmonic’s dismal showing under Simon Rattle at Carnegie Hall. I promised (rather optimistically, as it turns out) that I would report the following week on an orchestra at the top of its form. That […]

Noted Endeavors founders Eugenia Zukerman and Emily Ondracek-Peterson ask Linda Chesis of the Cooperstown Summer Music Festival how she did it. Flutist and festival artistic director Linda Chesis saw Cooperstown, NY as an ideal location for a music festival. With its picturesque lake setting, small town charm, restaurants and attractions, including the National Baseball Hall […]

By ANDREW POWELL Published: February 14, 2015 MUNICH — After four straight days on the road, the Russian National Orchestra looked decidedly bushed for its Jan. 26 MünchenMusik concert at the Gasteig: not the smartest way to play this demanding city. The all-Tchaikovsky program emerged tired-sounding, also somewhat stale interpretively, despite conductor Mikhail Pletnev’s manifest […]

By Brian Taylor Goldstein, Esq.    We were in the process of booking one of our singers with an orchestra, when we encountered the following Force Majeure clause in the orchestra’s contract: “If, as a result of any event beyond the control of the Orchestra, including, but not limited to, war, national calamity, strike, labor […]

Cellist Wendy Law, founder and artistic director of Classical Jam, talks with Eugenia Zukerman and Emily Ondracek-Peterson of Noted Endeavors about piquing audience engagement through the use of teaching artist principles. Classical Jam is a movement founded on the belief that music bridges cultural and societal differences. Classical Jam’s vision is to expand arts advocacy, […]

Perhaps we are returning to the era of dance as a solo act. That’s what I was thinking while watching the 16-member Nederlands Dans Theater 2. In three of the four works presented at the Joyce Theater on February 7, the ensemble dances devolved into a series of solos. This trend occurred for no apparent reason. Insiders know, however, that it’s a lot easier to make solos than group choreography

By ANDREW POWELL Published: February 8, 2015 ERL — Conceivably for the first time someone has conducted Wagner’s Ring and Bach’s Weihnachts-Oratorium, complete, in the same year. Gustav Kuhn, the someone, brought stylistic fluency to both cycles, apparently unfazed and undiminished by the chasm in between. The Bach opened the Tiroler Festspiele’s winter activities in […]