Alex Ross's Blog, page 136

Passion at the Armory

Mark Padmore, the Evangelist, is already seated on stage as the crowd files in. A review of the Berlin Philharmonic's extraordinary St. Matthew Passion seems at this stage almost superfluous, but I'll have one a week from Monday.

Carnegie restored

A welcome sight at the corner of Seventh and Fifty-seventh.

An American Requiem

St. Louis protest

Last night at Powell Hall in St. Louis, just before a St. Louis Symphony performance of Brahms's German Requiem, a group of protesters staged a peaceful demonstration tied to the killing of young Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Positioned in various parts of the auditorium, the protesters unfurled banners and sang "Which Side Are You On?" They then walked out, chanting, "Black lives matter." Much of the audience, and some musicians in the orchestra, responded with applause. I've attached a snippet of audio of the broadcast, with commentary by Robert Peterson and Adam Crane, of St. Louis Public Radio and the St. Louis Symphony, respectively. Note the moment when someone in the audience shouts, "Let's have some real music!" Crane thoughtfully adds, "That was also some real music we heard from passionate people in the audience."

Dream on, Mr. President

Dream on

Button collection

To be filed with my I've Got Mahleria button.

"Deafening Silence"

The Atlanta Symphony musicians are holding an event tonight outside the Woodruff Center, where they have been locked out by a management that seems to have learned absolutely nothing from the recent debacle of the Minnesota Orchestra. Meanwhile, John Adams, John Corigliano, and other leading American composers have published an open letter at NewMusicBox; Robert Spano, Altanta's music director, speaks up for the musicians in an interview with the Times's Michael Cooper; and Donald Runnicles, the principal guest conductor, does the same in an interview with the Guardian's Tom Service. For a blistering series of posts on mismanagement in Atlanta, read Mask of the Flower Prince, the pen name of Scott Chamberlain, who sings with the Minnesota Chorale. On a happier note, the Minnesota Orchestra's new season opens tomorrow; Chamberlain conveys the atmosphere inside the building.

Chacona in Baltimore

Judah Adashi, of the Peabody Institute, has put together a program of ground-bass works across the centuries, to transpire on Sept. 30 at Peabody. It includes his beguiling new piece my heart comes undone, inspired by a phrase of Björk's. I'm delighted to have provided a bit of inspiration for the concert, with my old "Chacona, Lamento, Walking Blues" essay.

A Czernowin moment

The score of Zohar Iver can be seen here.

Pop note

The remarkable New Zealand singer-songwriter Peter Jefferies is touring the U.S. for the first time since 1994. I wrote about him in my 1995 survey of New Zealand rock.