Category - Miscellaneous

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Subscribe not?
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Might not work for Bruckner
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MPope3
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Times a'changing in the Olde Countrie too
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Leadership by waving something other than a baton
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Found Another One
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Ship-jumping on the rise?
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The arts to subsidize insurance industry profits?
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Let's Form a Union
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Government subsidies, American-style

Subscribe not?

The current economic model for our industry is built largely on the subscription model best described by the late, great Danny Newman in his book Subscribe Now! So this news was shocking even to your been there, done that blogger: Gustavo Dudamel, the new music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, may be the hottest[…]

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Might not work for Bruckner

…but for Tchaikowsky, this kid is amazing.

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MPope3

This caught my eye: His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI will release “Alma Mater– Music From The Vatican” featuring Marian hymns, prayers, chants, etc., including “Regina Coeli”, by California (USA) based record label Geffen Records owned by Universal Music Group (UMG), which is a subsidiary of Vivendi. Pope, accompanied by the choir of the Philharmonic Academy[…]

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Times a'changing in the Olde Countrie too

American orchestras are not the only ones feeling the need to adapt to the new millenium: Traditional concerts with overtures, concertos and symphonies will continue to exist in years to come, according to the managing director of the German Orchestra Association, Gerald Mertens, but not at the exclusion of everything else. “There will also be[…]

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Leadership by waving something other than a baton

There was one of those scary “model your leadership on the collaboration between conductor and orchestra” blog posts in the Baltimore Sun the other day: Musicians took furloughs and pay cuts that came to a 12.5 percent reduction in compensation. Administrative folks took pay cuts of up to 15 percent. But none of this would[…]

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Ship-jumping on the rise?

John von Rhein had a rather odd column in the Chicago Tribune today on principal players moving around: The recent news that Mathieu Dufour, principal flute of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra since 1999, has also accepted that position with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, apparently on a trial basis, for the 2009-10 season, got me thinking[…]

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The arts to subsidize insurance industry profits?

Evidently the fact that nonprofits employ 10% or so of the US workforce has escaped the attention of those in Congress writing health care reform legislation: Nonprofit organizations say they are upset that Congress and the Obama administration have not addressed their rising health care costs in the various health care proposals being floated on[…]

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Let's Form a Union

This past spring I received an email signed by a dozen or so Eastman students. It was sent to Eastman School jazz students and faculty. This group had met out of frustration. It seems that within the student jazz community at Eastman, there has not been much discussion or communication between them about how to[…]

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Government subsidies, American-style

I know we don’t have much in the way of government subsidies for the arts in this country, but this is ridiculous: Officials with art and cultural groups in Philadelphia say they are angered by the state’s decision to expand state sales taxes to their businesses. Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance director Peggy Amsterdam said Pennsylvania[…]

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