Vijay Iyer: Mutations

March 7th, 2014

Vijay Iyer – Mutations

Vijay Iyer, piano and electronics; Miranda Cuckson, violin; Michi Wiancko, violin; Kyle Armbrust, viola; Kivie Cahn-Lipman, violoncello

ECM Records CD ECM 2372

 

Pianist and composer Vijay Iyer makes his debut on the ECM imprint with Mutations, a recording of three piano pieces (two of them electronically enhanced) and the title work, a quintet for piano, string quartet, and electronics. The electronics involved are triggered from a laptop. Most are samples of stringed instruments making non-pitched sounds which are often used as rhythmic gestures or else as atmosphere.

 

The CD presents both Iyer’s notated music and improvisations. Rather than try to make a seamless transition between these two aspects of music-making, they are placed side by side in Mutations, with concert music for quartet in the spirit of Ligeti and Reich abutting jazz piano solos. All of the various elements – notated composition in modern and minimal veins, electronics, improvisation – dart in and out of the proceedings, creating a stylistically kaleidoscopic effect. What unites these disparate elements is the abundant musicality with which Iyer deploys them.

 

Other projects on ECM have been announced to follow Mutations, including recordings with small jazz groups and large ensemble. But leading with this CD is an audacious move that signals a new, ands thus far fascinating, chapter in Iyer’s body of recorded works. Recommended.

 

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ICE Clarinetist Rubin’s New Recording

March 6th, 2014

there never is no light

There Never is No Light

Joshua Rubin

Tundra TUN 002 CD

 

On There Never is No Light, International Contemporary Ensemble’s clarinetist Joshua Rubin presents a program of new music for clarinet, bass clarinet, and electronics by a diverse group of composers, both elder statesman and those of the thirty/forty-something generation. The Soul is the Arena, a piece for bass clarinet and electronics by Mario Diaz de Leon, crackles with incendiary energy, its synthetic photon bursts offset by growling multiphonics and Eric Dolphy style wails. Rubin also nets the premiere recording of Mario Davidovsky’s Synchronism No. 12, for clarinet and synthesized sounds. As with all of Davidovsky’s Synchronisms, coordination is key. Rubin’s rhythms are spot-on and his responsive playing creates an animated colloquy with the electronics.

 

Suzanne Farrin’s Ma Dentro Dove, for clarinet and resonating body, is a reverberant meditation rife with trills, repeated notes, and angular melody. Salto Cuántico, a work by Ignacio Baca Lobera for prepared clarinet and electronics, juxtaposes bumptious riffs and altissimo cries with percussive interjections and cascading crescendos of electronic sound. Cory Smythe’s Toast includes piano as well as electronics and has an avant-jazz cast that alternates with Webernian post-tonal melodies. Upon hearing it, one is impressed with Rubin’s seamless maneuvering between styles and playing demeanors.

 

The album closes with Olly Wilson’s 1974 work Echoes. While very much a period piece, technologically speaking, it is nearly as successful as the Synchronisms at providing the illusion of a dialogue between the tape and performer. Rubin again provides an animated performance that furthers this impression. Excellently performed and thoughtfully curated, There Never is No Light is a fine recording.

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US VISA WARNING: Beware of the Vermont Service Center! Abandon All Hope Ye Who File There!

March 6th, 2014

By Brian Taylor Goldstein, Esq.   

Dear Law and Disorder

We filed P-1 and P-1S visa petitions at the Vermont Service Center for a group we have been touring regularly for the past 5 years. This would have been their sixth P-1 visa. Last year, we were getting petitions approved in about week. This time, after waiting 4 weeks, we got a notice asking us for a copy of our contract with the group, among other items. We’re the agent and never had to provide this before. They also wanted our contract with the group’s tour manager. We don’t have a contract with the group’s tour manager. We explained that and the P-1S petition got denied. But this same tour manager was approved last year and we supplied the same evidence this time that we did last year. What’s going on?

I wish I knew. After a period of uncharacteristic, but welcome, efficiency and competency for almost a year, the USCIS Vermont Service Center has imploded. Whether they were hit by a radioactive meteor, unearthed a demonic spirit living beneath the mail room, or were attacked by brain-eating zombies (who doubtlessly left disappointed and hungry), we may never know. What we do know is that we have been receiving multiple reports from all sectors of the performing arts reporting major problems with the Vermont Service Center, including significant processing delays, inane RFEs (Requests for Evidence), and even outright denials for O and P artists who have previously been approved for O and P visas.

The League of American Orchestras, in collaboration with the broader performing arts community, is submitting a formal complaint, as is AILA (the American Immigration Lawyers Association). In the meantime, here is a list of some of the most serious problems we have encountered and some suggestions on how to address them:

1. Processing Delays.

As many of you may recall, USCIS entered into a voluntary commitment to improve processing times for artist visas and, as recently as December 2013, regular processing times for O and P visa petitions were averaging 2 weeks or less. For the last year, our clients rarely had to pay the extra $1225 for premium processing. However, as most of you know all too well, the problem with anything “voluntary” is that you can’t force a volunteer to do anything. While the USCIS website continues to list an average timeframe of 14 days for regular processing of O and P visa petitions, the reality is that it is currently taking 30 days or longer. In some instances, VSC has taken over two weeks just to issue a receipt notice.

SOLUTION: Do not rely on the projected processing times listed on the USCIS website! File petitions as far in advance as possible or seriously consider premium processing any petition where the artist needs to arrive in less than 2 months from the date of filing.

2. RFEs Asking For What Seems Obvious.  

For example, orchestras have reported receiving RFEs on petitions filed for internationally known conductors (many of whom have been approved for prior O-1 visas) where USCIS asked for further evidence on how a conductor is critical or plays a lead role in an orchestra. USCIS has also been issuing RFEs asking for an explanation of why an Executive Director provides “essential support” to a group on tour or asking for a list of the duties of a Stage Manager or Lighting Designer.

SOLUTION: We have always recommended that, when it comes to preparing visa petitions, never assume that the USCIS examiner has any familiarity with the performing arts. This seems to be the case now more than ever. Always err on the side of over-explaining everything—What does a Concert Master do? Why is a specific award important? Covent Garden is an opera house, not a plant nursery. Etc. USCIS seems to be particularly focused on petitions for P-1S and O-2 support personal. As such, it is no longer sufficient simply to list the names and jobs of support personnel. Provide a brief biography for each person, along with a short, but specific explanation of their duties and experience working with the O-1 artist or P-1 group.

3. RFEs Asking For Employment Contracts For Support Personnel.

In yet a further attempt to thwart O-2 and P-1S petitions, USCIS has been issuing RFEs asking for evidence of who will be employing each support person. For example, if your petition includes engagement letters or contracts from presenters booking the O-1 artist or P-1 group, USCIS also wants to see the employment terms for each O-2 or P-1S support person.

SOLUTION: Provide either a statement from the O-1 artist or P-1 group explaining who will be paying the fees or salaries of each support person or provide a very basic deal memo or term sheet for each O-2 or P-1S support person outlining the fees they will be receiving and who will be paying them.

4. Unsigned Contracts

USCIS has recently been rejecting blank or unsigned contracts. USCIS wants either a signed engagement contract or written summary of the terms of an engagement.

SOLUTION: Do not send USCIS anything with a signature line on it which is not signed, especially contracts. If you have an unsigned contract, either get it signed or don’t send it. Instead, submit a copy of an email confirming the engagement terms, a written summary of the engagement terms, a letter to or from a venue confirming the engagement terms and signed by the sender, or a deal memo listing all the terms, but with no place for anyone to sign anything.

5. Truncated Classification Periods. 

In the past, USCIS has been willing to approve visa petitions to cover additional time before and after a performance to accommodate rehearsals, extra performances, and unanticipated activities. More recently, however, USCIS has been issuing approval notices only for the specific time reflected in the engagement contracts or confirmations. For example, if your petition asks for a classification period of March 1, 2014 through February 28, 2015, but the performance contracts only reflect performances between March 11, 2014 and February 20, 2015, USCIS is issuing the approval notice only for March 11, 2014 through February 20, 2015.

SOLUTION: Make sure that the contracts and written confirmations you supply in support of your classification period reflect the actual dates you need. For example, if the performance is on March 11, 2014, but the artist or group wants to enter on March 6, 2014, make sure that the contract or written confirmation reflects that the artist is required to enter the US on March 6, 2014.

While the bulk of this madness seems to be coming from the Vermont Service Center, there is every reason to believe that the California Service Center will not be far behind. Until this sorts itself out, file early, provide as much supporting documentation and details as you can, and continue to check www.artistsfromabroad.org as well as our own website for further updates.

__________________________________________________________________

For additional information and resources on this and otherGG_logo_for-facebook legal and business issues for the performing arts, visit ggartslaw.com

To ask your own question, write to lawanddisorder@musicalamerica.org.

All questions on any topic related to legal and business issues will be welcome. However, please post only general questions or hypotheticals. GG Arts Law reserves the right to alter, edit or, amend questions to focus on specific issues or to avoid names, circumstances, or any information that could be used to identify or embarrass a specific individual or organization. All questions will be posted anonymously.

__________________________________________________________________

THE OFFICIAL DISCLAIMER:

THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE!

The purpose of this blog is to provide general advice and guidance, not legal advice. Please consult with an attorney familiar with your specific circumstances, facts, challenges, medications, psychiatric disorders, past-lives, karmic debt, and anything else that may impact your situation before drawing any conclusions, deciding upon a course of action, sending a nasty email, filing a lawsuit, or doing anything rash!

 

 

 

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Posted in Agents, Artist Management, Arts Management, Law and Disorder: Performing Arts Division, Touring, Visas | Comments Closed

The Road to a Grammy Nomination

March 6th, 2014

By: Edna Landau

To ask a question, please write Ask Edna.

Gloria Cheng has always impressed me as someone with very high standards, impeccable taste, and an unerring sense of how to do something correctly. Add to those qualities brilliant artistry, keen intelligence, an inquisitive mind, and a soft-spoken endearing presence coupled with steely determination, and one begins to understand how this artist has won a Grammy (Best Instrumental Soloist Performance, 2009) and been nominated for another (Best Classical Instrumental Solo, 2013) without the benefit of a manager or being signed to a record label. Heartened by this realization, I asked Gloria if she would walk me through the process of creating her latest Grammy-nominated disc, The Edge of Light, from its conceptualization through its release. It is my hope that sharing what I learned will give encouragement to young musicians who would benefit from making recordings but who are still waiting for someone else to take the first step.

My first question to Gloria was why she chose to record music of Kaija Saariaho and Olivier Messiaen. She told me that when she was an orchestral substitute with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and appeared regularly on their Green Umbrella series, Ms. Saariaho was a frequent visitor, as works of hers were held in high regard and performed by the orchestra and its music director, Esa-Pekka Salonen. Gloria was intrigued by the composer and made a point of getting to know her and her music, in particular, her electronic music which she found bold and daring. She began to wonder how she might write for solo piano. A compelling example materialized in the form of a ballade, commissioned in 2005 by Emanuel Ax as part of his larger exploration of this musical form. This Ballade and Ms. Saariaho’s Prelude, written a year later, received their first recorded performances on Gloria’s disc. She is particularly honored that the composer chose to attend the recording sessions. Messiaen is a composer who has figured frequently in Gloria’s concert programs over the years. She saw a kinship in the thinking of these two composers and when she approached Ms. Saariaho to ask about it, she in fact confirmed that Messiaen had been one of her major inspirations. The idea of pairing these two composers now became a plan, with the eight Messiaen preludes (1929) joining the repertoire to be recorded. There was one small challenge still to overcome – the imbalance of 35 minutes of music by Messiaen and only a little over eleven minutes of Saariaho. Knowing that Messiaen had written a work for piano and string quartet (1991) and that Kaija Saariaho had written Je Sens un deuxième Coeur for piano, viola and cello, she invited her good friends and frequent collaborators, The Calder Quartet, to join her in recording these works.

Gloria has never been interested in producing and packaging her own albums. Her earlier recordings were produced and released by Telarc, which had largely wound down its classical recording activities. She knew of Robina Young, Vice President/Artistic Director and legendary producer of Harmonia Mundi USA, through a mutual friend who was happy to assist with an introduction. Although Gloria must have felt nervous walking into the meeting, she was put at ease when Ms. Young said that she had been following her recordings over the years. Gloria appears to have been beautifully prepared for the meeting. She came armed with all of the timings for the music to be recorded and was bolstered by having Kaija Saariaho’s blessing to record her works. She knew that she had a valid concept for the recording and that her most important role was “to speak of the project with love.” She also guessed correctly that the involvement of the excellent Calder Quartet would be a plus. Ms. Young agreed to the proposal, but with the proviso that Gloria would deliver a finished master to Harmonia Mundi, a condition that has become quite common in the recording world today. Gloria quickly proceeded to secure the services of the highly acclaimed recording engineer, Judith Sherman. An additional touch of class was lent to the album when Harmonia Mundi agreed to Gloria’s choice of Peter Sellars to write the liner notes. Her relationship with him also dated from her days as a performer with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and as he had directed operas by both composers, she knew he was the perfect choice. It was actually Mr. Sellars who came up with the title of the album after Gloria told him that it seemed to her as if the music was transforming in some way from sound into color and light.

Gloria devised a budget for the entire album and it came to $15,000 (including hall rental, piano moving and tuning, guest artist fees and expenses, engineering and editing costs, and production of the master). She didn’t feel comfortable mounting a Kickstarter campaign and chose instead to tap into her network of friends and supporters who had come to her concerts over the years, or given donations to organizations with whom she appeared regularly. Knowing that tax deductions could be a significant incentive to donors, she arranged to have Piano Spheres (of whom she has been a performing member for 20 years) act as fiscal sponsor, with the understanding that they would receive a cut from the funds raised. Her next step was to approach dear friends to see if they would host a concert in support of her recording. They had just built a beautiful home and Gloria had helped them choose a Steinway piano. They immediately said yes. The cost of admission was set at $200. One guest contributed $5000. The Calder Quartet graciously agreed to participate and the concert was a complete success. All contributors received thank you notes and, subsequent to the record release, were sent signed cd’s. Following the concert, Gloria was only $1500 short of her financial goal. She secured a small grant from UCLA (where she is on the faculty) and contributed the remainder herself. Gloria was deeply touched by the generosity of her supporters, some of whom she didn’t know personally, and wrote an additional round of thank you notes when the recording was nominated for a Grammy.

I asked René Goiffon, president of Harmonia Mundi USA, about the elements of Gloria’s proposal that had been compelling to them and that had engendered the trust they felt in entering into a special arrangement with her. Apart from citing her wonderful artistry, he said: “Gloria is a good example of an artist who has her stuff together. She is very thorough and driven, and brought in the Calder Quartet (a hot property now), as well as Peter Sellars to write the liner notes. She was able to organize a fundraising party, hosted by an attorney with access to many people of means who are interested in the arts. The whole package was there and it was very well formed.”

My last question of Harmonia Mundi concerned the process by which Gloria’s recording of rather esoteric repertoire succeeded in attracting enough attention to capture a Grammy nomination. I suggested that maybe the label’s superlative reputation for top quality could have been a factor. While he didn’t deny that, both Mr. Goiffon and Robina Young commented that as a past Grammy Award winner, Gloria already had a boost in visibility among the voting members of The Recording Academy. It is standard procedure for a recording company to submit their recordings to the Academy for initial consideration. In addition, Harmonia Mundi makes the music available for streaming and features the release in their newsletter. It is then in the hands of the Academy’s voting members to determine the short list of nominations. That is where all of Gloria’s hard work during the course of her career to date paid off. Thankfully, it would appear that the votes are being cast by an increasingly knowledgeable and discerning group of advocates for top quality performances of a wide variety of repertoire, regardless of its general popularity. This bodes well for the future and should give hope to present and future recording artists that there is a level playing field, and that the results of their efforts stand an equitable chance of receiving this important form of industry recognition.

© Edna Landau 2014

 

 

Posted in Ask Edna, When It Comes to Recording | Comments Closed

Ritual in the Philharmonie: Bach’s ‘St. John Passion’ and MusicAeterna

February 28th, 2014

By Rebecca Schmid

In the final scene of Bach’s St. John Passion, staged by Peter Sellars at the Philharmonie on Feb.27, the members of the Rundfunkchor gather in meditation around a spotlight, the rest of the hall submerged in darkness. The body of Jesus has been quietly removed during a lament of Mary Magdalene, his absence hovering in the afterglow. With only ten arias, St. John, J.S. Bach’s first completed Passion, finds its dramatic backbone in choral numbers illustrating both the adulation and persecution that accompanied Jesus’ final days before crucifixion. The chorus can transform from a blood-thirsty mob to a gathering of pleading individuals within one scene.

Sellars relies heavily on pantomime to illustrate their very human plight. The singers, at first lying like corpses, stretch their arms to the heavens during the opening “Herr, unser Herrscher” (Lord, our Lord), only to throw dice at the dying Jesus during “Lasset uns nicht zerteilen” (Let us not be divided). Although it is sometimes a challenge to take the chorus’ histrionic expressions seriously, the director manages to capture the ambiguity, hypocrisy, cruelty and spiritual deliverance of the Gospel while always working within the space of Bach’s transcendent score. The Rundfunkchor, singing its parts from memory, immerses itself completely in the interaction of music and gesture.

Sellars considers his recreations of the Passions not stagings but ritualizations. His 2010 production of St. Matthew with the Berlin Philharmonic and Rundfunkchor was such a success that the ensembles re-joined in St. John with all the same soloists save for the now-retired Thomas Quasthoff, here replaced by baritone Roderick Williams in the role of Jesus. The director opts for an even more raw approach in St. John to externalize the music’s fierce dramatic conflict. As he explained in a recent interview via Skype (see A Hall That Invites the Audience Into the Music-Making), while “Matthew” is filled with “contemplative spaciousness, “John” is “super immediate, super visceral and shockingly realistic, over and over again.”

While chorus and orchestra interwove like polyphony in the more generously scored St. Matthew, with a white tombstone representing Jesus’ ultimate fate, St. John is all flesh and blood, violence and stasis. In one of the most powerful moments, during Pilatus’ aria urging the chorus to make a pilgrimage to the site of Jesus’ crucifixion, the chorus shouts back “where to?” from all corners of the geometric, vertiginous Philharmonie. Even the stage hands, dressed in black like the choral members and musicians, are treated as a homogenous part of the action, blurring the boundaries between theater and life, religion and secularity.

As in St. Matthew, the tenor Mark Padmore grounded the performance with a portrayal of the Evangelist at once dramatically earnest and naturalist. Often seated at the edge of the stage, he narrated with a sense of clairvoyant regret. Extensive recitatives never grew dry due to Padmore’s clear, expressive timbre, impeccable diction and direct engagement with the audience. In the role of Pilatus, Christian Gerhaher was cast as an impotent bureaucrat of sorts, sitting centerstage in empty contemplation that sometimes bordered on the deranged. Yet he brought unaffected, baritonal purity to the aria “Mein teuer Heiland” (My beloved Savior), an intimate dialogue with cello continuo and choral accompaniment that is one of the most memorable numbers in St. John.

Magdalena Kožená, returning as a Mary Magdalene figure—but this time pregnant and in a lipstick red dress—also made the most of her few numbers, conveying quiet devastation in the aria “Es ist vollbracht” (The act is completed) with a velvety, rich tone and clear diction against viola da gamba and continuo. The soprano Camilla Tilling, although blessed with a creamy timbre and commanding presence, was not as well suited to the demands of Bach’s sinuous lines, sounding thin in the extended high notes of “Zerfließe, mein Herze” (Dissolve, my heart) as she wandered among of blanket of collapsed bodies.

The tenor Topi Lehtipuu is also not the ideal choice for baroque music, with a fast vibrato that weakened his arias. Williams, when not bound to the stage floor as the blind-folded Jesus, invested his lines with pain and spiritual depth. Sir Simon Rattle and a 13-strong ensemble struck a balance between introspection and charged energy that was well in keeping with the directorial conception.

MusicAeterna

Sellars received an unexpected homage earlier this month with the arrival of Teodor Currentzis and MusicAeterna. The ensemble brought an ambitious enough program on Feb.16, performing Handel’s Dixit Dominus alongside the Purcell opera Dido and Aeneas. But the young Greek conductor returned to the half-lit Philharmonie and announced that, with Sellars in the hall, the ensemble chorus would like to perform a ritual of sorts. The chorus moved through a sequence of expressive gestures in a number from Purcell’s Indian Queen, which the director staged for MusicAeterna last year in its home city of Perm.

While the classical music world has its pick of superb early music ensembles, from Concentus Musicus to Les Arts Florissants, the origins of MusicAeterna have a stake to originality. Currentzis assembled the ensemble himself in Novosibirsk, Siberia and managed to integrate both the chorus and ensemble into the Perm Opera—over 1,000 kilometers east of Moscow—upon becoming artistic director. The musicians’ non-bureaucratic genesis is still evident in their playing. The energy is high and fresh, if at times bordering on frenetic, and the communication so easy that the players breathe with Currentzis. Phrasing unfurls in shooting but clean lines, betraying hours of intense rehearsal.

This was particularly evident in the fugal seventh movement of Dixit Dominus. In the penultimate “De torrente in via bibet,” the strings’ gripping tension recalled the finest early music ensembles, although the choral soloists did not rise to the same standards. As a unit, however, the vocal ensemble produces an even, musical glow. Even if diction was an issue in the English-language libretto of Dido and Aeneas, the performance’s charm distracted from such details. Sopranos Anna Prohaska and Nurial Rial gave magnetic performances as Dido and Belinda, and Currentzis’ fluid, lanky gestures maintained a perpetual sense of momentum and dramatic intensity.

While dynamic architecture often pushed the boundaries of authentic performance practice, the sense of understatement in the final scene could not have been more effective. Against Prohaska’s florid ornamentation in reprises of “Thy hand, Belinda,” the orchestra’s sustained pianissimo hovered on the edge of an abyss.

For more by Rebecca Schmid, visit rebeccaschmid.info

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Vienna Phil in Carnegie Hall

February 28th, 2014

By Sedgwick Clark

The Vienna Philharmonic is in town for Carnegie Hall’s “Vienna: City of Dreams” Festival. Undoubtedly, music critics ranging from the Times to cub bloggers will swallow the orchestra’s p.r. bandwagon of tradition and aver how its magnificent sonority has remained the same over the years. I first heard the Vienna Philharmonic on April 3, 1976, at Carnegie Hall. The late Claudio Abbado led Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony, and I thought I’d died and gone to heaven (as opposed to the second level of hell that Gennady Rozhdestvensky and the Leningrad Phil had taken me three years before in Tchaikovsky’s Francesca da Rimini, discussed in last week’s blog). The Viennese string players attacked their instruments with a vengeance, but without the scrunching that the New York Phil had accustomed me to, and the brass players’ faces flushed brightly as sheer warmth and resplendent sound enveloped the audience.

That Abbado performance came to mind as the VPO cellos entered quietly in the second bar of Bruckner’s Sixth Symphony on Wednesday, the 26th. The illusion, under conductor Franz Welser-Möst, didn’t last. The fortissimo tutti, when it burst out, was shrill. The Vienna Philharmonic, shrill? Yes, believe it or not, from parquet T1, anyway.

The Sixth doesn’t deserve to be Bruckner’s least performed mature symphony. The first movement strides forward with majestic confidence. The British Bruckner-Mahler scholar Deryck Cooke thought the Adagio the composer’s finest; its eloquent solemnity might have profited from a broader tempo. The Scherzo is uniquely weird—nightmarish, even—among Bruckner scherzos, with the plink-plonk pizzicati of the Trio bringing to mind Franz Waxman’s scoring of the scene in The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) where mad Dr. Pretorius (Ernest Thesiger) toasts a human skull in a crypt. The finale drives ahead with unclouded jollity, the only instance of such abandon in his mature symphonies.

The Sixth is not one of the Austrian composer’s complicated symphonies, and Welser-Möst’s straightforward musicianship is not the place to find Brucknerian mystery or magic. His well-chosen tempos, care over the characteristic Bruckner pauses, and refusal to litter the score with unnecessary unmarked ritards would make for a good introduction to the piece. But not the VPO’s infelicitous strings and crass brass.

The first half of the Vienna Philharmonic’s Wednesday night concert at Carnegie Hall was the essence of elegance and tonal beauty. Mozart’s Symphony No. 28 zipped along with grace and transparency. Authentic practitioners would find the number of players rather largish, but I would gladly hear all of Mozart’s 41 with these artists.

Bravo to Welser-Möst for inserting a contemporary work between Mozart and Bruckner. Austrian composer Johannes Maria Staud’s On Comparative Meteorology (2008-2009; rev. 2010), dedicated to the conductor, was fabulously played. Beginning with echoes of Berg and continuing with Varèse, “a large orchestra is disassembled and re-combined into a continually evolving kaleidoscope of changing instrumental colors, ranging from ethereal delicacy to violent intensity,” writes annotator Janet E. Bedell. Given a performance of this caliber, I wouldn’t mind hearing it again. Whatever happened to the stodgy, old Vienna Philharmonic?

Looking Forward

My week’s scheduled concerts (8:00 p.m. unless otherwise noted):

2/28 Carnegie Hall. Berg: Wozzeck, Op. 7 (concert performance). Vienna State Opera, Vienna Philharmonic/Franz Welser-Möst, cond. Matthias Goerne (Wozzeck), Evelyn Herilitzius (Marie), Herbert Lippert (Drum Major), Norbert Ernst (Andres), Wolfgang Bankl (Doctor), Herwig Pecoraro (Captain).

3/1 Carnegie Hall. R. Strauss: Salome, Op. 54 (concert performance). Vienna State Opera, Vienna Philharmonic/Andris Nelsons, cond. Gun-Brit Barkmin (Salome), Falk Struckmann (Jochanaan), Gerhard A. Siegel (Herodes), Jane Henschel (Herodias), Carlos Osuna (Narraboth).

Posted in Why I Left Muncie | Comments Closed

Celebrating Octogenarian Composers

February 27th, 2014

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Next week, the eightieth birthdays of two very different composers are celebrated in New York. On March 3rd, New York New Music Ensemble fetes English composer Harrison Birtwistle with a portrait concert at the DiMenna Center (details here). Cygnus Ensemble and several soloists perform the music of Mario Davidovsky on the 4th at Merkin Concert Hall (details here). While Birtwistle is best known for his stage works and Davidovsky is known for his Synchronisms, music for electronic tape and soloists, both have written compelling chamber music and this is what will be the focus of these two events. Happy birthday to them both!

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Rattle Sabers, Not Contracts

February 27th, 2014

By Brian Taylor Goldstein, Esq.   

Dear Law and Disorder

We recently had a presenter call us and cancel an engagement “due to inclement weather” because the company’s flight was canceled and they could not arrive the day before the performance as required. The company offered to fly the next day and arrive on the afternoon of the performance.  However, the presenter expressed that they were not comfortable with this because they felt the company would not arrive at the theater in time to run a tech with their team and also had the fear that the company would not arrive in time to perform. The engagement contract has a Force Majeure clause that says:

In the event that the performance of any of the covenants of this agreement on the part of the Company or the Presenter shall be prevented by…act of God, illness, physical disability, acts or regulations of public authorities or labor unions, labor difficulties, strike, war, epidemic, interruption or delay of transportation service, or any other causes beyond the reasonable control of such party, such party shall be relieved of its obligations thereunder with respect to the Performance(s) so prevented on account of such cause.  If the Performance(s) shall be prevented due to a Force Majeure event, neither the Company nor the Presenter shall be under any obligation to present the Performance at a different time, except that if the Performance(s) shall be prevented for any of the foregoing causes, the Presenter shall use its best efforts to re-engage the Company within a twenty-four (24) month period on the same terms and conditions set forth herein, subject however to Company’s availability…In the event that the performance is cancelled due to Force Majeure on the Artist’s behalf, all deposit monies will be returned to Presenter. In the event that the Presenter cancels the performance for any reason other than those described in the preceding paragraph, then the Presenter is responsible for the full fee.

Do we have to return the deposit since the company was willing to fly in the next day, but Presenter decided to cancel anyway? Can we ask for the full fee? We have not yet spoken to the Presenter, but wanted to be forearmed before we do so we can stand our ground.

“Forearmed” for what? Has the Presenter asked for the deposit back? Are you planning on initiating this “battle”? A contract is a tool, not a weapon to be rattled like a sabre. If you approach this as a “battle”, here’s how it will likely play out:

Presenter: Great to see you at APAP. Thanks for the drinks. I’m afraid we’re going to need the deposit back because the artists couldn’t get here due to weather. The force majeur was theirs.

Manager: But they were willing and able to come the next day. You didn’t want to take that risk. So, you cancelled. In fact, you owe us the rest of the performance fee. And, thanks for the birthday card. That cat was adorable.

Presenter: It’s industry standard for the deposit to be returned when there is a cancellation due to weather.

Manager:  But you cancelled and its industry standard that the artist gets paid if the presenter cancels.

Presenter: The company’s flight was cancelled because of the snow. That’s a force majeur.

Manager: The weather prevented the artist from arriving the day before the concert. They could have arrived on the day of the performance. You didn’t want them, so you cancelled and the contract says if you cancel we get to keep the deposit and you owe the full fee.

Presenter: But that’s not industry standard

Manager: It’s what’s in the contract.

Presenter: We were forced to cancel the performance and refund the tickets, which didn’t sell that well anyway. I just didn’t want to say anything about that earlier because of our good relationship. We can’t take those kinds of losses. We are a non-profit.

Manager: The artist had losses, too.  And if you weren’t selling tickets, then you should have told me sooner so I could help with the marketing. If you had marketed better, the show sells itself.

Presenter: No show sells itself. Did I mention we are a non-profit?

Manager: We can’t give the deposit back and the company can’t afford to take a loss on this tour. It’s not their fault it snowed.

Presenter: It’s not our fault either, which is why we need the deposit back.

Manager: I spoke with an attorney and we will have to turn this over to legal counsel if we have to. It not personal.

Presenter: I understand. This isn’t personal on my end either, but we have a free attorney on our board and they will sue you to get our money back…and I won’t ever hire any artist on your roster again.

Manager: Fine

Presenter: Fine

…and scene…

Unless you are dealing with the cancellation of the road tour of “Spiderman”, neither of the parties will…or should…be willing to spend the money, time, and energy necessary to sue each other, so they will just stew over this, avoid each other at conferences, and write nasty things about each other on social platforms.

The point of having an engagement agreement, or any contract, much less as force majeure clause, is to identify problems ahead of time and articulate in advance how disputes will be resolved. In your case, based on the engagement agreement, both parties knew that, in the event of snow or other unforeseeable issues, either could be facing losses they might not be able to recover. A force majeure operates like an “excuse.” It gives each party the right to cancel under certain conditions without having such cancellation become a breach. However, because it isn’t a breach, neither party is going to emerge unscathed. Someone is either going to have lost out-of-pocket costs they can’t recover, or a deposit they can’t get back, or both. However, knowing this, hopefully, allows you to budget and plan for various eventualities.

In this scenario, the phrase “due to Force Majeure on the Artist’s behalf” isn’t really defined. However, a reasonable interpretation is that the cancellation of the artist’s flight constituted a force majeur event on the part of the artists—in other words, it was their flight that was cancelled. The fact that the artists were willing to travel on the day of the performance was a reasonable solution, but it was just as reasonable for the presenter not to want to take that risk. The more important issue is that the engagement agreement requires the presenter to use its “best efforts” to try and re-book the date within the next two years. That’s the first place to start. If you can find a mutually agreeable date, problem solved—you keep the deposit and they presenter pays the balance of the fee after the next performance date. (No, you can’t ask for a higher fee if it’s the same performance!) If you can’t find a date within the next two years, then its reasonable for the artist to keep the deposit, but the presenter not to have to pay the remaining fee. “Reasonable” doesn’t mean that everyone will agree or be happy. “Reasonable” usually means that everyone walks away with less than what they wanted, but more than there were probably entitled to, which, for me, is a much better solution any day than mutually assured self-destruction.

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For additional information and resources on this and otherGG_logo_for-facebook legal and business issues for the performing arts, visit ggartslaw.com

To ask your own question, write to lawanddisorder@musicalamerica.org.

All questions on any topic related to legal and business issues will be welcome. However, please post only general questions or hypotheticals. GG Arts Law reserves the right to alter, edit or, amend questions to focus on specific issues or to avoid names, circumstances, or any information that could be used to identify or embarrass a specific individual or organization. All questions will be posted anonymously.

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THE OFFICIAL DISCLAIMER:

THIS IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE!

The purpose of this blog is to provide general advice and guidance, not legal advice. Please consult with an attorney familiar with your specific circumstances, facts, challenges, medications, psychiatric disorders, past-lives, karmic debt, and anything else that may impact your situation before drawing any conclusions, deciding upon a course of action, sending a nasty email, filing a lawsuit, or doing anything rash!

 

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Posted in Agents, Artist Management, Arts Management, Contracts, Law and Disorder: Performing Arts Division, Non-Profits, Presenters, Touring, Venues | Comments Closed

Dessner and Greenwood on DG

February 23rd, 2014

 

Bryce Dessner – St. Carolyn by the Sea

Jonny Greenwood – Suite from There Will be Blood

Bryce and Aaron Dessner, guitars;

Copenhagen Philharmonic, André de Ridder, conductor

Deutsche Grammophon CD

 

That crossover is not a “one size fits all” phenomenon is amply demonstrated by a new recording on DG. St. Carolyn by the Sea features two of rock’s best known guitarists and is out on March 3rd. These are no dabblers or interlopers; they take the development of classical “chops” very seriously. Bryce Dessner, whose regular gig is with the National, and Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood have both written several pieces for orchestra. Their offerings on the DG CD are a study in stylistic contrasts.

 

Dessner’s work hews more closely to the minimalist aesthetic. The three pieces here each clock in at over ten minutes in duration, one closer to twenty, and Dessner uses that time to build ostinatos, textural overlays and passages of contrasting moods. Several of his sweeping crescendos are worthy of John Adams or Philip Glass. On St. Carolyn by the Sea and Raphael, Dessner neatly incorporates clear-sounding electric guitars and percussion writing that give the pieces the impetus of a rock drummer but, when the entire section is going hell for leather, writ large. In the work Lachrimae, there are also more delicate passages filled with sustained strings that are particularly affecting. Although Greenwood’s piece is the one that is a suite from a film score, there is a cinematic quality to passages in Dessner’s music too. Some of St. Carolyn’s more thrilling passages could easily be heard alongside a top notch suspense film.

 

Long fascinated with artifacts of modernism – including instruments such as the ondes martenot, for which he has written in the past – Greenwood draws upon a palette of stylistic resources that is often different from Dessner’s touchstones. Pileups of dissonances, cluster chords, and angular melodies suggest that Messiaen, Stravinsky, Dutilleux, and Ligeti are also on Greenwood’s listening list. In his Suite from There Will be Blood, I’m particularly smitten with the overlaid glissandos and chordal intensity of the movement “Henry Plainview.” Where there is repetition or the use of ostinato, as on “Future Markets,” it is more off kilter, frequently shorn off in dramatic fashion. And even though each movement of the suite is distilled from a film score cue, these aphoristic vignettes are vividly detailed and characterful.

 

So forget your preconceptions about “rock stars” as classical dilettantes: Dessner and Greenwood are the real deal.

 

Posted in The New Classical | Comments Closed

St. Petersburg’s Sound, Then and Now

February 21st, 2014

By Sedgwick Clark

One of Yuri Temirkanov’s goals when he became music director of the Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) Philharmonic in 1988 was to give it a more “international” sound—to smooth over the deliberately edgy sonority cultured by the ensemble’s long-time maestro, Yevgeny Mravinsky (1903-1988).

Why, I wondered? The orchestra’s four concerts of Russian music under Gennady Rozhdestvensky at Carnegie Hall in October and November 1973 had been among the most exciting I’d ever heard. The hair-raising performance of Tchaikovsky’s Francesca da Rimini (at a time when I had some hair to raise) was unbelievably terrifying. The incredibly precise torrent of strings as literature’s most perfervid adulterers writhed in eternal punishment remains equaled in my memory solely by my one and only viewing of the film Fatal Attraction. I couldn’t even think of sex for days. The laser-beam brass cut through but never overwhelmed the huge bodies of strings and woodwinds. And in Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony, the timpanist displayed the kind of flair in the finale that no one in our day of soberer-than-thou music-making would dare, flourishing his sticks in the air on alternate beats as the coda marched to its majestic end. Rozhdestvensky’s performances of Glinka’s Ruslan and Ludmilla Overture, Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky and Scythian Suite, the brand new Shostakovich Fifteenth, and several other works remain among my highlights of four-and-a-half decades of concert going.

So what has Temirkanov’s leadership accomplished? He shaved off the edge, that’s for sure. In a pair of St. Petersburg concerts at Carnegie last week, the conductor conjured a gigantic cushion of sound in excerpts from Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh. This is a huge orchestra, with ten double basses, and correspondingly augmented violins and violas—as sumptuous an orchestral sonority as exists on the planet today, without a hint of the stridency one hears from many American orchestras that force their tone to achieve greater volume.

In Rachmaninoff’s Second Symphony, the pianissimo cellos and double basses in the opening motto sounded like a chorus of Russian basses. Innumerable eye-rolling moments of orchestral beauty enveloped me during the work’s three-quarter hour duration. But my disappointment with this performance had nothing to do with the playing or conducting. It was about Temirkanov’s decision to prune huge chunks of a piece he once honored in toto.

All conductors used to cut this gloriously garrulous piece. In the 1940s, Eugene Ormandy, claiming the composer’s imprimatur, fashioned a heavily trimmed but musically cogent performing version through which most of us prior to 1970 learned the piece. In the late 1960s, Decca/London released the first uncut recording of the work by Paul Kletzki and the Suisse Romande orchestra, followed by André Previn’s highly regarded London Symphony recording from1973 on EMI.

Enter Temirkanov. His 1978 recording of the work with the Royal Philharmonic (EMI) is the Holy Grail of the true Rachmaninoffian. It is a great performance, and it is complete. (Only Rozhdestvensky and Gergiev on LSO LIVE, to my knowledge, gild the lily by including the four-and-a-half-minute first-movement exposition repeat.) Inexplicably, the Temirkanov recording has never been transferred to CD.

He rerecorded a sliced-and-diced version of the Rach2 for RCA at the same time he performed it last in New York with the SPb’ers at Carnegie, on November 5, 1993. Whether the cuts were the same when he last conducted it doesn’t matter; I was equally annoyed.

So is either brand of this Russian band superior? Neither is by any stretch “international.” Fortunately, we have Mravinsky’s recordings—mostly live, as he hated to record—to remind us of the intensely dramatic instrument he crafted. And we can wallow on Temirkanov’s giant davenport.

Posted in Why I Left Muncie | Comments Closed

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