Category: music

The pianist Igor Levit played a livestream of Erik Satie’s famous, mysterious work, consisting of four lines repeated 840 times, on Sunday. And, well: “The fascinating livestream occasionally slid into something more disturbingly voyeuristic, like witnessing a private crisis of faith and bracing for it to all go wrong.” (It didn’t.) – The New York Times

The virus has devastated the jazz community in New York. But “there’s a funny thing about jazz: It keeps roaring back to life. Live music returns to Smalls on June 1, in a socially distant way, thanks to Mr. Wilner’s persistence, the club’s shift into full nonprofit mode and a windfall from a celebrity benefactor.” – The New York Times

Take a look at Taiwan: “A livestream of the May 24 concert offered a possible crystal ball for post-coronavirus concerts: temperature checks, face masks and enhanced disinfection protocols. On stage, adjusted layout created 1.5 meters between musicians. Unmasked musicians used plastic guards.” – The Observer

Well, perhaps not orchestral music in Britain, but with club music of all kinds, “We transcend this realm. It is a secular spiritual experience. The energy with which Britain has pursued that escape has made it one of the global centres of music culture.” So why does a cultural renewal taskforce have no representatives from live music venues? – The Guardian (UK)

“At the Paris Opéra, there were many colleagues to deal with and only the institution’s most successful composers had enough clout to impose their will on a piece. It makes sense that Verdi’s triumph came at the end, when he was no longer just a successful foreigner, but a living legend and someone who had a work history with the company. For Don Carlos, he was the ultimate authority, like a modern movie auteur.” – San Francisco Classical Voice

“In our first performance one of our actors froze in the middle of her big solo. But, fortunately, we had planned for and built that into the piece, so what we did is skip to the next cue, and then when she unfroze she joined up with us again, just as you would do if you were doing a live play or musical or opera.” – American Theatre

Before the coronavirus hit, the Met was going to perform a new co-production of the opera this spring at BAM. David Patrick Stearns went online to revisit the original Opera Philadelphia production, and here’s why he believes that, despite the terrific craft in the score and libretto (and in Kiera Duffy’s performance as Bess), with the cancellation “the Met and Mazzoli dodged a bullet.” – WQXR (New York City)

“Patients and health-care workers at Penn Medicine’s six sites can now access a service that brings them archived performance videos of the Philadelphia Orchestra. … New performances will be added each week, and orchestra leaders hope to expand the pilot program to other health systems.” Says one hospital’s CEO, “Patients have given us feedback that they are utilizing it, that they find it helpful, and that they find it comforting.” – The Philadelphia Inquirer

Well, mostly settled. “A virtual first night in July will see more than 350 musicians play together in a Beethoven ‘mash-up’ [of the nine symphonies] having each recorded their part from home. … The Royal Albert Hall will be home to live performances in the final fortnight of the season, starting from August 28,” with audience numbers to be determined by the social-distancing guidelines in place at the time. Meanwhile, the BBC will air specially selected archive recordings of previous Proms each night for the first six weeks of the festival. – London Evening Standard

Bucking the trend in classical music of often low-quality livestreams, yet not wanting to lay low completely, Timo Andres decided to salvage his Carnegie program by documenting it as a series of videos on the platform. – The New York Times