Tag: sjm

To Increase Access, English National Opera To Reduce Lowest Ticket Prices And Introduce Early Start Times And Relaxed Performances

The London company has held its highest ticket price at £125 and cut its lowest to £10 and is expanding its free-balcony-seats-for-under-18s from Saturdays to Fridays and opening nights. In addition, the company will offer its first-ever relaxed performance (with accommodation for learning-disabled and autistic attendees), and at least one performance in each run of an opera will end by 10 pm. – The Stage

In Minnesota, The First-Ever Opera About The Hmong

For its young people’s training program, Minnesota Opera has commissioned an adaptation of Hmong-American author Kao Kalia Yang’s The Song Poet. Hmong-American playwright/performer composer Nkeiru Okoye will write the libretto, composer Nkeiru Okoye the score; Rick Shiomi, co-founder of the Twin Cities company Theater Mu will direct the production, planned for 2021. – The Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

A Generation Of Women Conductors Is Finally Breaking Glass Ceilings

In England, the US, and elsewhere, a big group of orchestras and opera houses is looking for music directors or chief conductors — and, for the first time, there’s a sizable group of female candidates being seriously considered, “not least, “writes Norman Lebrecht, “because the talent pool has finally exploded with candidates of outstanding communicative power.” – Standpoint

Hawai’i’s Last Monarch Was Also Its Most Important Composer

Queen Lili’uokalani steered her people through the difficult period of annexation and prevented a war — and she was also a highly trained musician who wrote some 200 songs (the most famous of them being “Aloha ‘Oe”) that became the foundation of modern Hawaiian music and a bulwark against the onslaught of mainland American culture. – Smithsonian Magazine

Bournemouth Symphony Started An Orchestra For Disabled People. A Year Later, Here’s What They’ve Learned

One of the aims of the ensemble is to show young disabled people that they can pursue a career in music. As percussion player Philip Howells said: “Don’t lost sight of who you want to be to begin with. When people say that you should be a butcher or a gymnast, just think to yourself ‘what do I want to be deep down?’, that’s my moral.” – ClassicFM

The Recovery Orchestra – Service Organization For Recovering Addicts Starts Ensemble For Its Clients

“The Recovery Orchestra was set up by Bristol Drugs Project (BDP) to help individuals using their services. It encourages people to take up an instrument or use the skills they already had in a joint musical activity. The group, funded by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, will perform at a Bristol church this week.” (video) – BBC

Conductor Thomas Wilkins Works To Get Composers Of Color Into Boston Symphony’s Repertoire (And Into The Canon)

Wilkins, the BSO’s conductor for young people’s and family concerts, makes his subscription-season debut this weekend with a program of music by Florence Price, Adolphus Hailstork, Roberto Sierra, and Duke Ellington. Wilkins is aware of the charge of tokenism: “The easy observation would be to say that this is just a night of box-checking so that we can move on. In reality, it is not. It is, in fact, a launch. … And you know what? You gotta start somewhere.” – The Boston Globe