Category - Miscellaneous

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When Vampire Squid meets orchestra
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No Time At All
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2013 ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Programming
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Nashville – WTF?
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Flora, Fauna, and Fiddles: Which Ones Require International Permits?
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Île de Saint-Louis: An Homage for Henri Dutilleux (1916–2013)
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New boss same as old boss
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Where no orchestra has gone before
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The AFM is still wrong about the League
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St. Paul settles

When Vampire Squid meets orchestra

One of the best metaphors in recent years was coined by Matt Taibbi, who wrote one of the great articles on the financial crisis of 2008: The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it’s everywhere. The world’s most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face[…]

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No Time At All

Just like Rip Van Winkle, American orchestras have been asleep for twenty years. Season after season of the same repertoire, played again and again for generations until the idea of an orchestra participating in modern musical life seems outrageous. Last week, the League of American Orchestras focused their annual conference around the idea of “Imagining Orchestras in[…]

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2013 ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Programming

The League of American Orchestras announced today the winners of this year’s ASCAP awards for adventurous programming. ASCAP and the League present the awards each year during the League’s conference to orchestras of all sizes for programs that challenge the audience, build the repertoire, and increase interest in music of our time. The winners for[…]

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Nashville – WTF?

The situation in Nashville is beginning to seem worrisome: Foreclosure proceedings have been initiated against the Nashville Symphony Orchestra, and an auction of its landmark Schermerhorn Symphony Center has been scheduled for June 28. Formal notice of the foreclosure was issued by Bank of America, the lead lender on the $82.3 million still owed on[…]

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Flora, Fauna, and Fiddles: Which Ones Require International Permits?

An on-demand webinar is now available providing an introduction to the special permit process required for international travel with certain musical instruments containing protected species, such as ivory, rosewood, tortoise shell, and other material. On May 14th, the League of American Orchestras, in partnership with the American Federation of Musicians, The Recording Academy, and NAMM,[…]

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Île de Saint-Louis: An Homage for Henri Dutilleux (1916–2013)

It was the First Symphony (1951) of Henri Dutilleux, a composer who was entirely new to me then. I came to know the work well and it started me along a road of discovery of one of the finest composers of the 20th Century.

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New boss same as old boss

This really shouldn’t have been a surprise: After a season marred by a bitter contract dispute and a musician lockout, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra got some positive news Tuesday, May 7.The committee looking for a new president for the organization unanimously recommended the return of former SPCO president Bruce Coppock, who was president and[…]

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Where no orchestra has gone before

The Minnesota Orchestra has once again made history; this time with a public threat by its music director to leave unless things are settled very soon: Osmo Vänskä says he will resign as music director of the Minnesota Orchestra if the ensemble loses a prestigious engagement at New York’s Carnegie Hall because of the current[…]

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The AFM is still wrong about the League

It’s hardly a secret that the relationship between the League of American Orchestras and the AFM and its symphonic player conferences has become publicly contentious since the beginning of the Great Recession in 2008. The latest manifestation of that is an article in the March 2013 edition of the International Musician written by Joel LeFevre,[…]

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St. Paul settles

After an extremely confusing few days reading the press coverage of whether or not a deal brokered by St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman would be accepted by the musicians, it appears that it was: The agreement came even as the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra Board was meeting in executive session to discuss canceling the rest[…]

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