Can You Plan to be Remarkable?

May 2nd, 2013

By: Edna Landau

To ask a question, please write Ask Edna.

In the past few weeks, I was pleased to be invited twice to speak to students at the Juilliard School. My first visit was to performance psychologist Dr. Noa Kageyama’s Performance Enhancement class and the second was to Assistant Dean Dr. Barli Nugent’s Career Development Seminar. In both instances, I was extremely impressed by the creative approaches taken by the teachers in hopes of stimulating and inspiring their students to listen to their inner voice and to begin to identify concrete steps that they could take towards their personal goals. Dr. Kageyama had given an assignment to his class to read bestselling author and marketing expert Seth Godin’s book Purple Cow. The subtitle of the book is: “Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable”. (It is based on the premise that a purple cow in the middle of a herd of Holsteins would be truly remarkable and never go unnoticed.) Inspired by an actual visit to the class by Seth Godin, the students had been thinking about how to apply his advice about standing out by being remarkable in their young lives and very early careers. They were leery of embarking on projects motivated simply by a desire to be different or to stand out from the crowd, for fear that their efforts would not be genuine and their projects would appear “gimmicky”. Fortunately, I was able to share with them examples from my own experience in artist management, such as violinist Hilary Hahn’s pioneering efforts, while still a teenager, in getting to know and expand her audience through her great dedication to her online journal and to post-concert record and program signings that often kept her at the hall well over an hour following the actual concert. (Such signings were not the norm in those days.)There was one year during which she communicated regularly with a third-grade class in Skaneateles, New York, for whom she had performed a residency activity. They were doing a social studies project that involved asking everyone they knew to send them postcards. When a card would arrive, the students would learn about the city it came from. Hilary saw a way to help and ended up sending 23 postcards from 20 different cities that she played in during the remainder of that season. She was passionate about these activities and they contributed to her being viewed as a remarkable person, in addition to being an extraordinary artist. The students and I also discussed groundbreaking projects that have already been undertaken by fellow students while still at Juilliard, such as Music Feeds Us and Chamber Music by the Bay (featured in my earlier column about the ACHT studio at Juilliard), and even by a student of Dr. Kageyama’s in that very class, violist Kim Mai Nguyen. An avid believer in arts education, Kim Mai has visited Guatemala to teach and perform with the children of the El Sistema Orchestra there and participated in the Afghanistan Winter Music Academy in Kabul, working with students of the Afghanistan National Institute of Music. It quickly became apparent that there are many ways for not only businesses, but also individuals, to become “purple cows” and that some of the necessary ingredients are courage, ingenuity, determination, passion, good taste and perseverance – all perfectly attainable by young, highly gifted musicians with their whole lives ahead of them.

My preparation for Dr. Nugent’s class was based on the awareness that her students had recently been asked to compose a bio for themselves in the year 2053 and to identify five steps they were prepared to take at this time towards making it a reality. What a stunning idea! As I did the math and thought back to where I was forty years ago, I was fascinated to discover that 1973 was a major turning point in my career. I was completing my master’s degree in musicology at the City University of New York and also my fifth year of teaching at the High School of Music and Art. While I very much enjoyed teaching, I was beginning to think that I should change my professional focus and find a job that would bring me closer to performing artists. Could I have then written a bio predicting that during the next forty years I would discover the exciting and rewarding world of artist management and be privileged to become managing director of the world’s biggest international agency? Absolutely not! However, as I look back and reflect on how things developed, I see that that certain key decisions and approaches to my professional growth (some of them equivalent to the first steps Dr. Nugent coaxed her class to ponder) propelled me successfully to the next level. I think they may have some resonance with those who are just starting out in their careers:

1)      Fight to realize your passion. My first job in artist management was as Assistant to the Director of Young Concert Artists. They wanted a full-time person. I convinced them to let me work part-time so that I could be home a bit more with my one-year-old son.

2)      Learn everything you can wherever you are. I convinced the director, Susan Wadsworth, to let me attend the annual international auditions and the annual trade conference in New York, even though my job was purely clerical. This taught me about the industry as a whole and ignited my passion for booking concerts and helping artists develop their careers.

3)      When you’re ready for a change, take the plunge and associate with the best. Since there was no opportunity for me to book concerts at YCA, I joined forces with Charles Hamlen, who I met at a trade conference. He took me into his six-month-old management and with our mutual ideals and much hard work, we began to secure engagements for a roster of relatively unknown artists and to build a favorable reputation for ourselves as Hamlen/Landau Management.

4)      Don’t be afraid to ask for help. When you need to capitalize your business or embark on a new project, all you need is to believe completely in what you are trying to accomplish, think of everyone you know who might help, and put a compelling and accurate financial proposal together. People want to be part of a growing success story. These realizations kept Hamlen/Landau Management going during some very challenging financial times.

5)      Always keep an open mind. Charles Hamlen and I never really knew why the sports conglomerate IMG, whose clients in those days included Martina Navratilova and Arnold Palmer, would want to acquire a very small artist management firm with substantial debt and an insignificant profit margin. Thankfully, we never dwelt on that. We saw a chance to pay back all of our investors, grow our business, and to learn from experts in client management (albeit in sports) on an international scale. When Itzhak Perlman became our client in 1986, we knew we had made the right decision.

Charles and I never really knew where our initial adventures were leading us and we didn’t set out to be “purple cows”, but we did spend a lot of time thinking about how we could distinguish ourselves in a field of super agents and still remain faithful to our goals, standards and ethics. Even if the Juilliard students achieve only 25% of what they project in their 2053 bios, their teacher is inspiring them to be confident to dream in tune with who they are today, and that is the most important contribution she can make on the eve of their graduation and entry into the professional world.

To ask a question, please write Ask Edna.

© Edna Landau 2013

 

 

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When To Negotiate A Contract

April 30th, 2013

By Brian Taylor Goldstein, Esq.

Dear Law and Disorder:

A successful duo I represent has recorded a CD which is being released by a record company. Although the artist made attempts to obtain a contract, because of time restraints, according to the record company, it was only possible to give a contract AFTER the recording was made. The terms include exclusivity universally for several-year options, and although the company paid for the recording and manufacture of the cd, these costs will come out of the royalties.  The company controls the cd universally with power of attorney from the artists. To obtain copies, the artists buy the cd at a reduced price.  The company insists these are normal terms which are standard practice and always given after the recording is made.  This is news to me.  Can this be true?

In my ideal world, among other things on my wish list, every artist, manager, agent, presenter, producer, arts lawyer, and arts administrator would have a sign above their desks stating: “Nothing is Standard!” While it is true that there are many terms and practices which are more common than others and while it is also true that certain financial arrangements and commitments will necessarily lend themselves to certain expectations in return, everything is negotiable. This does not, of course, mean that you will get everything you want. Rather, depending on the negotiating strengths of the parties, everyone is free to ask and propose whatever they want. Think outside the box. Get creative.

However, while creative proposals may be limitless, the time to propose them is not. The time to negotiate is before services are rendered, significant time is spent, or money changes hands. Thus, the real issue at the heart of your question is your comment that “because of time restraints, according to the record company, it was only possible to give a contract after the recording was made.” In my experience, I have yet to encounter a situation that was so dire and immediate that at least some basic understandings of key terms could not be mutually agreed upon ahead of time.

Sadly, it’s not uncommon in the arts and entertainment world for the artistic aspects of a project to proceed on a completely separate track and pace from the administrative and business details. New works are created or composed before the commission agreements are in place. Recordings are made before the recording contracts are signed. Engagements are scheduled and sometimes even performed with no engagement agreements. I’ve even known artists to collaborate with one another and then try, almost always unsuccessfully, to negotiate a collaboration agreement after the work has been optioned for production.

Of course, some of this is understandable. Contractual terms can be confusing, especially when the parties are unfamiliar with business practices and terminology. Also, it can take such considerable effort just to coordinate the funding, schedules, and parties that no time is left for negotiating contractual terms. Also, its not uncommon for different individuals and departments within a large organization or institution to address artistic planning and scheduling separate and apart from contractual and business planning without communicating or coordinating with one another. But, whatever the reason, this phenomenon is unfortunate because it makes it much harder to negotiate favorable terms or, at the very least, to manage expectations, avoid potential conflicts, and make informed decisions.

The biggest—and, often, only—power an artist has in a negotiation is the power of “no”—that is, the power to say: “I’d rather pause for a moment, even it means losing the deal or opportunity, than enter blindly into a relationship where I may have no control over my creative services.” Of course, it can be equally bad for record companies, producers, and presenters who can find themselves investing both time and money without getting the rights or return they anticipated. While saying “no” or “stop” can sometimes cause a lost opportunity, the alternative is a bad or unfavorable deal that, ultimately, could prove worse.

Without a doubt, legitimate practicalities, including artist availability and opportunity costs, can often make it difficult for a formal contract to be drafted up in advance of every occasion. However, there is rarely a legitimate reason why parties cannot at least mutually agree upon basic terms, with a more formal agreement to follow. Remember, a contract is a written memorialization of an existing agreement. Until an agreement exists, there is nothing to memorialize. Without terms agreed upon ahead of time, there is no contract to draft.

In any situation, if time is of the essence, never wait for the other party to provide a contract or propose terms. You may need to make the first move. In your situation, if the record company refused to provide a contract, then your artists could have proposed their own terms or set out their own requirements for proceeding with the recording. If your artists are truly as “successful” as you indicate then chances are the record company would have agreed to an outline of reasonable terms. When you say that your artists “made attempts”, that should have included writing:

“Dear Record Company, while we are very excited about the prospect of working together, unless we can arrive at a mutual agreement of some basic terms, we will be unable to proceed with the recording as scheduled. Thus, we are proposing the following…..”

Contractual terms do not, and should not be, a confusing quagmire of legalese. Write your proposals in clear, understandable language. The key is to be detailed, not convoluted. As even the most experienced artist managers can find themselves daunted by the prospect of proposing terms for recording contracts and other multi-media deals and transactions, you would be wise to bring in some specialized help.

Ultimately, in your situation, if the record company paid for the recording without negotiating the contract, then they took the risk that no agreement would be reached and that your artists could simply refuse to permit the recordings to be released. That would leave the recording company with a worthless product. Of course, your artists wouldn’t own recordings they didn’t pay for, so they would have nothing to show for their time. Everyone loses. Hopefully, the potential of mutual self-destruction will force the parties into coming up with the reasonable compromise that should have been agreed to ahead of time.

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For additional information and resources on this and other 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, Copyrights, For Profits, Independent Contractors, Law and Disorder: Performing Arts Division, Licensing, Music Rights, Non-Profits, Presenters, Publishing, Recordings, Touring, Venues | Comments Closed

Whatever Happened to Christian Thielemann?

April 25th, 2013

by Sedgwick Clark

Christian Thielemann is Germany’s most sought-after conductor. Twenty years ago, he was on the hot track to a big U.S. career. He made the customary rounds of the majors and, I can attest, led some impressive concerts over five seasons with the New York Philharmonic between 1995 and 2002, excelling in the widescreen tone poetry of Richard Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony and Ein Heldenleben. When leading Der Rosenkavalier at the Met in 1993, he stood up to Kathleen Battle’s diva demands and her career never recovered. He began recording for Deutsche Grammophon. He conducted Hans Pfitzner’s Palestrina at the Lincoln Center Festival in 1997 and seemed to be connecting with the Philadelphia Orchestra in the mid-1990s. But until last week his most recent appearances locally appear to be at the Met for Strauss’s Die Frau ohne Schatten in January 2002.

He has said that the reason is scheduling, but I wonder. Artistic kerfuffles dot his European posts. A political right winger, he reportedly made a comment to the effect that Germany had no cause to apologize for its past, and a well-known artist manager told me that his career was dead in the U.S.

Now age 53, he conducts at Bayreuth, Salzburg, Berlin, Vienna, and Dresden, where he became principal conductor this season of the Staatskapelle Dresden, which he led at Carnegie Hall on April 17 and 19. The orchestra is 465 years old and boasts a creamy, consonant sonority. I recall a fine concert some years ago conducted by Herbert Blomstedt at Lincoln Center, featuring the Bruckner Fourth. The ensemble’s outstanding recorded symphony cycles of Schumann by Wolfgang Sawallisch (EMI) and Brahms by Kurt Sanderling (RCA) stubbornly resist deletion from my collection.

Thielemann’s symphony performances have often struck me as wayward, much in the manner of one of his mentors and Furtwängler acolyte Daniel Barenboim, so I skipped the first concert, all-Brahms. But the second concert was devoted solely to Bruckner’s monumental Eighth Symphony, and I figured that a former protégé of Herbert von Karajan might have something worthwhile to say about the work. I was wrong.

Bruckner’s Eighth opens with a pianissimo tremolando in the strings, doubled by sustained horns. One’s ears should prick up immediately in anticipation, but a ragged horn entrance broke the spell before it even could be cast. Perhaps for this reason, the symphony’s ominous, sharply rhythmic primary motive in the lower strings was disconcertingly phlegmatic, and the movement only gained purpose toward the end. The Scherzo was marred by the kind of fussiness New Yorkers endured during Lorin Maazel’s tenure at the Philharmonic, and Thielemann  compromised the movement’s giddy rush to the double bar with a clumsy ritard at the end and a cushioned attack on Bruckner’s final, staccato note. The sublime Adagio began impatiently but broadened expressively by the climax. Overall, the finale was most successful, and he seamlessly integrated the Haas edition’s conflation of the original 1887 version and the 1890 revision. Alas, any positive feelings I had over the performance’s 84-minute duration were obliterated by his grotesque distortion of the symphony’s final four notes.

European speculation has Thielemann succeeding Simon Rattle at the Berlin Philharmonic when the Brit’s contract expires in five years.

Looking Forward

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

4/25 at 7:30. Zankel Hall. Young Artists Concert. Ives: Three Places in New England. John Adams: Shaker Loops. Andrew Norman: Try. Michael Gordon: Yo Shakespeare. (John Adams and David Robertson, instructors.)

4/26 at 8:00. Trinity Church. Choir of Trinity Wall Street; Novus NY; Julian Wachner, cond. (free admission; pre-concert lecture given by Matthew Guerrieri at 7:00). Stravinsky: Sacred works (complete). The Flood. Abraham and Isaac. Threni. Introitus.

4/27 at 8:00. Trinity Church. Choir of Trinity Wall Street; Novus NY; Julian Wachner, cond. (benefit for music education; composers panel discussion at 3:00; musicologists/critics panel discussion at 7:00). Stravinsky: Sacred works (complete). A Sermon, a Narrative and a Prayer. Elegy for J.F.K. In Memoriam Dylan Thomas. Requiem Canticles. Canticum sacrum.

4/28 at 3:00. Trinity Church. Choir of Trinity Wall Street; Novus NY; Trinity Youth Chorus; Julian Wachner, cond. (free admission). Stravinsky: Sacred works (complete). Anthem. Cantata. Pater Noster. Credo. Ave Maria. Symphony of Psalms. Bach (arr. Stravinsky): Canonic Variations on “Vom Himmel hoch.”

4/28 at 7:30. Weill Hall. Yale in NewYork. Claudia Rosenthal, soprano; Boris Berman, piano; Ettore Causa, viola; Jasper String Quartet; members of the Yale Philharmonia/Julian Pellicano. Hindemith: Sonata for Viola and Piano, Op. 11, No. 4 (1919). Minimax (Repertoire for Military Orchestra), parody for string quartet (1923). Overture to The Flying Dutchman as Played at Sight By a Second-Rate Concert Orchestra at the Village Well at 7 o’clock in the Morning, parody for string quartet (c. 1925). Die Serenaden, Op. 35 (1925). Kammermusik No. 2, Op. 36, No. 1, “Piano Concerto” (1924).

4/30 at 7:00. Metropolitan Opera. Handel: Giulio Cesare. Harry Bicket (cond.); Dessay, Coote, Bardon, Daniels, Dumaux, Loconsolo.

Posted in Why I Left Muncie | Comments Closed

From Flower Pots to the Pulitzer Prize

April 25th, 2013

By: Edna Landau

To ask a question, please write Ask Edna.

Caroline Shaw is a typical 21st century musician, except that she just won the Pulitzer Prize in Music  – at 30 years of age, the youngest recipient ever of this prestigious award.  Her remarkable prizewinning a cappella piece, Partita for Eight Voices, was written for Roomful of Teeth, a vocal group with whom she has sung since its founding in 2009. Ms. Shaw is a multi-talented individual who seems to excel in everything she does. Despite her new accolade, she will undoubtedly continue to refer to herself as a musician, rather than a composer. She surrounds herself with friends and musicians who, like her, enjoy multiple musical pursuits. Over the past week, I had the pleasure and privilege of speaking with not only Ms. Shaw, but with Brad Wells, Director of Vocal Activities and Artist in Residence at Williams College in Massachusetts, and also the founder and conductor of Roomful of Teeth, as well as Judd Greenstein, co-director of New Amsterdam Records/New Amsterdam Presents, and a prolific composer. He has written three of the works on Roomful of Teeth’s debut album, which was released by New Amsterdam Records in October 2012. Greenstein and Wells have been friends for over a decade. They are thrilled about Ms. Shaw’s well-deserved recognition and feel that it is a cause for communal celebration for all who were involved.

Caroline Shaw has both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in violin from Rice University and Yale University, respectively. She supported herself for a number of years by accompanying dance classes and was inspired to write some of her earliest pieces for the dancers. She couldn’t project at that time how her professional life might progress and decided that it would be good to have a doctoral degree under her belt. Once she realized that she didn’t want yet another degree in violin, she decided to apply to, and eventually enter, the doctoral program in composition at Princeton University, where she is still a graduate student. Several years earlier, she learned of the formation of a new vocal group of classically trained singers which was dedicated to exploring and mastering techniques of singing from around the world and commissioning and performing works to showcase those newly acquired techniques. Brad Wells called it Roomful of Teeth because he liked the rhythm of it (identical to BANG on a CAN), the allusion to chamber music in the word “room”, and the fact that teeth are the hardest and longest lasting bones in our bodies, symbolizing permanence. He remembers Caroline Shaw’s audition for the group, as he was taken with the fact that she was not a “single-minded singer”, and that she was a most interesting and versatile musician. Due to a close association between Williams College and the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (Mass MoCA), he was able to arrange for a three-week summer residency for Roomful of Teeth, during which its singers, hailing from different geographical locations, could live on campus and delve into the exploration of the new vocal techniques, taught by international experts from around the world. Three composers were invited in the first year (2009) to share the experience and write for the group in “real time”, literally submitting parts of new works within a day of absorbing what they had heard. It was during that first summer residency that Ms. Shaw wrote “Passacaglia”, one of four movements of her Pulitzer prizewinning piece, inspired by Baroque dance. The other three movements were written over two subsequent summers. When she decided to submit the piece to the Pulitzer Prize committee herself (unlike most submissions which are made by a publisher or commissioner of a new work), it was partly because she didn’t want anyone to know. She told me that her main motivation was for the esteemed jury to become familiar with Roomful of Teeth, but she also felt very strongly about the piece and felt that a $50 application fee was reasonable enough. The outcome brings wonderful validation to the efforts of New Amsterdam Records, a label dedicated to promoting a wider awareness of adventurous new compositions, written and performed by highly-trained musicians of diverse musical backgrounds and genres. It must also be a great source of pride to the 238 donors who supported the Kickstarter campaign that helped fund the recording, contributing a total of $14,405, which exceeded the group’s goal. In addition to writing for the group and helping to produce the recording, Judd Greenstein has also invited Roomful of Teeth to perform twice at the Ecstatic Music Festival, of which he is curator and Artistic Director. He commented to me that the world of new music feeds on itself in a most complementary and mutually supportive way, since composers become very involved with the musicians they write for, and the social and musical interaction is their reward for the many hours of solitude that characterize their day to day life.  Caroline Shaw told me that she would never have reached this point in her young career had she not been active in a variety of disciplines. In a time when today’s young musicians are being widely encouraged to think about their particular passion and identify their own unique “brand”, perhaps we should also leave room for those who feel compelled to pursue multiple passions, because the rewards would seem to be great.

How does Ms. Shaw expect her life to change as a result of this prize? Not all that much. She will probably write more music (a work for Roomful of Teeth and A Far Cry is already in the pipeline), but she will also be happy to focus more on her work with the American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME), where she does most of her violin playing. She may not have much time to dedicate to her beloved, imperfectly pitched 50 cent flower pots, for which she has written some irresistible music (listen to “Boris Kerner” for cello and flower pots, performed by New Morse Code, and the more whimsical covers she wrote during the electrical failure brought about by Hurricane Sandy); however, she will have more time to discover new masterworks of art, literature and dance, which inform so much of her work. I personally would hope that she might set aside a little time to speak to today’s young generation of musicians (maybe only a few years younger than she) and personally share the advice she imparted to me for them: follow all of your interests, work hard, and be very kind to everyone. She might also suggest that they get out into the world as much as possible and share their joy of music making. Only two hours after speaking with me, Caroline Shaw was at the Strand Book Store, singing “I Want to Live Where You Live” from the new oratorio “Shelter” by David Lang, Julia Wolfe and Michael Gordon, along with fellow vocalists Martha Cluver and Mellissa Hughes, who together with her comprise Va Vocals. The group, which performs “in styles ranging from baroque to modern to pop”, has been described by radio station WQXR as “utterly unaffected and drop-dead stylish”. Perhaps she left there to play a late-night violin performance. I don’t know, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised.

To ask a question, please write Ask Edna.

© Edna Landau 2013

Posted in Ask Edna, Listening to Your Inner Voice | Comments Closed

A Stirring Evening (and Music)

April 24th, 2013

Lakeside at the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing

By ANDREW POWELL
Published: April 24, 2013

MUNICH — Members of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra venture six times a year to Lake Starnberg, some 20 miles southwest of here, to play chamber music at the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, or EAT, as its website favicon reads. A mid-season program (Feb. 24) paired quintets by Mozart and Schumann in the venue’s airy music room, drawing skilled performances. But extra-musical ghosts disturbed this particular offering: concert tickets include a guided tour of EAT — once a lone lakeshore chapel, later a castle, palace and U.S. Army HQ — and our evening began with docent tales of, among other matter, a 1945 American troop obliteration of the palace library, Dwight Eisenhower’s name being dropped for good measure.

What? The troops fight their way into Bavaria, set up at Tutzing Palace to administer a new basis for democracy, and are remembered for trashing books? So much for perspective. Then again, Tutzing can seem stuck in the 1920s and 30s: Adolf Hitler’s beer-hall putsch buddy Erich Ludendorff is grandly buried there and the former fishing village memorializes “Hitler’s pianist” Elly Ney — Carnegie Hall attraction in 1921, ardent Nazi by 1933 — on its much-visited Brahms Promenade. Physically the town has changed little over the decades.

Our thoughts stirred by the guide’s earful, we crossed the yard for musical respite. Mozart’s G-Minor String Quintet, K516, resounded in handsome proportion and balance. Antonio Spiller, first violin, stressed the cheery second theme of the opening Allegro emphatically enough to prepare for Mozart’s abrupt turn in the closing movement. Leopold Lercher, Andreas Marschik and Christa Jardine partnered him attentively throughout, even if they couldn’t quite match his poise and confidence. Cellist Helmut Veihelmann intoned with care, but the ear craved more of a grounding, more cello volume. In the Schumann Piano Quintet, after a coffee break and snowy stroll by the lake (pictured), unrestrained collegial exchanges and pianist Silvia Natiello-Spiller’s buoyant passagework found color aplenty, even kitschy color. Marschik took the viola part.

EAT’s buildings date to medieval times. The small chapel got wrapped in a castle in the 16th century, its watery and Alpine views appropriated. Sundry owners and architects later morphed the premises into a modest post-Baroque palace. In 1947 the Lutheran Church assumed control, followed by ownership two years later in a 350,000-Mark deal. Tranquil seminars and coffee-table conferences now prevail along with occasional music events, such as those of the BRSO ensembles.

Given the pre-concert assertions and the irksome notion of book destruction, this U.S. listener decided on a little post-concert research. Quick findings: Eisenhower did spend time in Tutzing in the 1940s, returning there repeatedly for off-duty art lessons in 1951, but where he stayed isn’t clear; and the palace library did vanish during the 1939–45 war, but whether the honors fell to the U.S. Army isn’t clear at all. And regardless of what happened to the books, the American presence achieved positive results in Tutzing starting immediately.

Indeed, one life-saving story would well serve EAT’s docent and his Bayerischer Rundfunk (BR) pre-concert narrative. On the night of April 29, 1945, a train of prisoners — Russians, Romanians, Hungarians and Poles — pulled into Tutzing station. 800 in number and mostly men, they had been dispatched from Bavaria’s newly wound-down Mühldorf concentration camp, east of Munich, to the Tyrol, and to slaughter at the hands of waiting SS personnel. But a providential delay occurred — Tutzing is 90 minutes from the Tyrol — attributed variously to a faulty locomotive, a righteous local flagman, and even a prescient German commanding officer.

The next morning, on the same day that Hitler turned the lights out and Munich fell to the Allies, the XX Corps, part of George Patton’s U.S. Third Army, reached the town. Little fighting ensued because Tutzing was a Red Cross safe zone. The troops soon located the Benedictine Hospital crammed with wounded German soldiers, and the makeshift care beds arrayed in the high school and other buildings. Then they found the train, confronting directly the horror of camp survivors and at first wrongly concluding that Tutzing itself had been a camp location. The prisoners were told of their freedom, and the weakest removed from the train for treatment.

Decisive action followed. The American command seized a number of Tutzing homes for emergency use, instructing the locals to double up with their neighbors. The less seriously wounded of the German soldiers now lost their hospital beds to Mühldorf survivors in critical condition, the majority of them Jewish Hungarians. Although educated by the Reich to resist the enemy to the bitter end, many Tutzingers waved white flags for the U.S. troops, engendering whistles of censure from their more determined neighbors.

On May 1 the troops located a Nazi school campus on high ground in the next village, Feldafing, and rapidly commandeered it to serve as a new home and care facility for the former prisoners, now officially “displaced persons.” (Novelist and social critic Thomas Mann had owned a condo retreat in one of the campus buildings. He lived in Munich for 40 years before fleeing the country upon Hitler’s ascendancy in 1933.) On the morning of May 2, a working locomotive having been procured, the Todeszug crept back three miles the way it had come and transferred the survivors, giving them real beds and room to roam. Months later, after it became clear across Germany that ethnic groups among former prisoners did not always get along with each other, each displaced-person facility would become designated for a specific group, Feldafing for Jewish Hungarian survivors. With a population that eventually climbed above 4,000, the site would gain a reputation as “a place … to find missing people.”

The war raged for another five days before tacit German surrender May 7 at Reims. American troops requisitioned Tutzing Palace on June 7, setting up Army of Occupation HQ there three days later. This remained operative until the end of 1945, a pivotal command center at the very start of the 10-year Allied Occupation of Germany. In context, the books seem inconsequential.

Photo © Evangelische Akademie Tutzing

Related posts:
Brahms Days in Tutzing
Tutzing Returns to Brahms
BRSO Adopts Speedier Website
Tonhalle Lights Up the Beyond
Petrenko Hosts Petrenko

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Colin Davis and Adolph Herseth, Inspired Musicians

April 18th, 2013

by Sedgwick Clark

New York music lovers were fortunate to hear many performances by the British conductor Colin Davis and the Chicago Symphony’s longtime principal trumpet Adolph (“Bud”) Herseth in its concert halls. Last weekend the music world lost both artists, who afforded me some of the most inspiring musical experiences of my life.  How lucky we are to have so many examples of their artistry on record and in our memories.

Colin Davis (1927-2013)

How many musicians give their finest performances at the end of their lives? Colin Davis did. When word of his death at age 85 hit the Internet last Sunday, April 14, his revelatory Beethoven Missa solemnis with the London Symphony Orchestra at Avery Fisher Hall on October 21, 2011, leapt instantly to mind. With infinite wisdom, he had conveyed the composer’s emotional message as never before in my experience. It turned out to be his final New York performance. Six years before, he had led the LSO with blinding commitment in Vaughan Williams’s Sixth and Walton’s First symphonies. Indeed, the Walton far surpassed his highly regarded recording on the LSO LIVE label. And on April 3, 2008, he led the New York Philharmonic in a searing realization of VW’s Fourth Symphony that rivaled the composer’s own hellbent 1937 recording.

In the spring of my first season in New York, 1968-69, Davis led Metropolitan Opera performances of Britten’s Peter Grimes, with Jon Vickers and Geraint Evans, and Berg’s Wozzeck, with Evans and Evelyn Lear–thrilling, both of them. On January 19, 1972, I met him for the first time. It was my third day in my new job as p.r. director at Philips, his recording label. He had just conducted the opening night of a new Met production of Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande, and our office took him to dinner afterwards. Eager to engage him in conversation, I asked him (for some reason I can’t recall) what he thought of composers conducting their own works. “Oh, they’re all terrible,” he replied. Astonished, I asked “Stravinsky?” “He’s awful!” he said, rolling his eyes. “Well, what about Britten?” I asked, thinking I had him there. “He’s the worst!” he exclaimed. I shut up.

My boss told me that he was the only Philips artist who never asked, or had his manager ask, for an advertisement in the concert program. He was unfailingly friendly and relaxed to this new kid in the office, and his delightfully British, mock-serious sense of humor could turn boyishly ribald at times. When joining a group for lunch after a Tanglewood rehearsal, one of the men pointed out that his fly was open. Davis thanked him, saying, “Mustn’t let the little birdie out.” Another time, after a winter concert, two attractive young women with markedly plunging necklines came to the Green Room to tell him how much they enjoyed the performances. Apparently they frequented his concerts, and after they left he expressed worry that they “might catch cold”–a concern he repeated several times later in the evening at my boss’s apartment over dinner.

Talking with him about Sibelius after he had led the composer’s Third Symphony in Boston was a great opportunity. I expressed surprise at how slowly he took the middle movement, Andantino con moto, quasi allegretto. “I love the ineffable sadness of the music at that tempo,” he said quietly. I suggested that he should record all the symphonies with the BSO. When I returned to my office I told my boss how wonderful the performance was and that he should record the cycle. Sibelius not being a big seller, she snapped, “Sedgwick Clark, if you ever tell him that, you’re fired!” Of course I remained mum, but she fired me three months later anyway. Davis did record the seven symphonies in Boston, as well as several other Sibelius works, and they were hailed internationally upon their release.

Colin Davis was Musical America’s Conductor of the Year in 1997 in recognition of his appointment as the New York Philharmonic’s principal guest conductor.

Adolph Herseth (1921-2013)

Friday, January 9, 1970, is a storied date for untold numbers of New York orchestra fans. On that evening at Carnegie Hall, Adolph (“Bud”) Herseth intoned the stuttering trumpet fanfare that opens Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Georg Solti proceeded to set a standard of all-out orchestral virtuosity that dominates the field still. Solti was called back to the stage 14 times in 15 minutes by a standing, stamping, cheering audience that refused to leave. Many orchestra players, too, were in no hurry to exit, milling about onstage after the hall lights were turned up, looking out in wonderment at the ovation and waving at audience members who remained to shout their praise. For three days hence my throat was so sore I could barely talk. It was the most exciting concert I’ve ever heard.

Herseth was principal trumpet of the most famous brass section in the U.S. from 1948 to 2001, and when he died at age 91 last Saturday his stature as a local hero was fully acknowledged in the press. John von Rhein wrote in the Trib: “For more than a half-century, Adolph Herseth’s distinctive sound and playing style were the bulwark of a brass section whose fabled power and brilliance have long been the sonic hallmark of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He was a legend, in the finest sense of that much-abused word.”

The next time you play one of those fabulous Chicago Symphony Orchestra recordings with Rafael Kubelik (Mercury), Fritz Reiner and Jean Martinon (RCA), or Georg Solti (Decca/London), pay special attention to the trumpet playing. You have seven CSO recordings of Ravel’s orchestration of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition to choose from.

Adolph (“Bud”) Herseth was the first orchestra player to receive Musical America’s Instrumentalist of the Year award, in 1996.

Looking Forward

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

4/19. Carnegie Hall. Dresden Staatskapelle/Christian Thielemann. Bruckner: Symphony No. 8 (Haas edition).

4/24 at 7:30. Zankel Hall. Young Artists Concert. Steven Mackey: Ground Swell. John Adams: Gnarly Buttons. Carter: Double Concerto. (John Adams and David Robertson, instructors.)

4/25 at 7:30. Zankel Hall. Young Artists Concert. Ives: Three Places in New England. John Adams: Shaker Loops. Andrew Norman: Try. Michael Gordon: Yo Shakespeare. (John Adams and David Robertson, instructors.)

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The Art of Booking

April 18th, 2013

By: Edna Landau

To ask a question, please write Ask Edna.

If you ask anyone in the artist management business how things are going these days, they will tell you that everything seems harder than it used to be. Some concert series have ceased to exist or have been significantly cut back, a number of orchestras have also disappeared or have been seriously challenged by budget shortfalls and labor difficulties, and an increasing number of presenters are reluctant to take risks, preferring to book artists who are familiar to their audiences and who are likely to generate a healthy amount of box office income.  In light of all this, what can a manager or self-managing artist do to enhance the chances of securing one of the highly sought after slots in a presenter’s season?

I recently consulted with a few longtime, highly regarded colleagues to see if they had any words of advice. My first call was to Marna Seltzer, currently Director of Princeton University Concerts, but formerly (at the start of her career) a manager and booking agent at Herbert Barrett Management. I felt that her having sat on both sides of the fence would give her a particularly insightful perspective on this subject. A glance at the Princeton University Concerts website revealed significant information about this presenter’s approach toward programming. A beautifully written announcement of the 2013-14 season speaks about the quest for a balanced season “that has the potential to leave the audience not just wanting to come back but feeling that they must come back to hear more”. Ms. Seltzer further writes: “One thing I am sure of is that we don’t want to become predictable. Even though we protect our legacy and try to deliver you the quality and mix that you have come to expect from us, we will never stop taking risks, trying new things.” (Would that there were many more presenters who adopted this approach.) How does Ms. Seltzer keep abreast of these new things and decide which to feature? She told me that recommendations from presenter colleagues carry tremendous weight. This poses a big challenge to managers who may have difficulty getting their artist(s) on the radar screens of major presenters. What are they to do? Ms. Seltzer spoke of the supreme importance of building relationships. Initial contacts might be made at industry conferences or by paying a personal visit to a presenter on their home turf. She loves the opportunity to show off the university’s beautiful and historic Richardson Auditorium and feels that familiarity with the hall can be of great benefit to a manager in deciding which artists to propose. A personal visit also makes a lasting impression on a presenter. What doesn’t make a favorable impression is a manager who launches into a conversation without having taken the time to see what type of artists she presents, or getting a sense of her immediate goals and needs. Their sole mission is to convince her that she must present their outstanding soloist or ensemble, irrespective of any other plans she may have for the season. This manager is less likely to enjoy a long term relationship with her that could lead to a productive booking collaboration in the future.

Evans Mirageas, Vice President for Artistic Planning at the Atlanta Symphony, The Harry T. Wilks Artistic Director of the Cincinnati Opera and a much in demand consultant, told me that he genuinely understands how difficult it is for an emerging artist to “get above the noise”.  He, too, places a lot of stock in what his colleagues have to say. While it is unlikely that he will return phone calls from people he doesn’t know about artists with whom he is not familiar, he does try to respond to written communications, even if only with a few cordial sentences acknowledging receipt of the material.  He encourages managers to organize auditions for their artists with artistic administrators (if they are trained musicians) when they are unable to arrange for the Music Director to hear them. Once he has heard a promising artist in concert or an audition, he adds them to an Excel list that he reviews regularly. He welcomes and values periodic news he may receive about those artists’ successes, either directly or via their managers, and updates the list accordingly. Still, he says, artists and managers must understand that music directors and conductors have their own wish list of artist/collaborators and it can take several  years before regular contact on the part of a manager might bear fruit. It was heartening to hear him say that in addition to the fact that no presenter can afford a season featuring only marquis names, it is important for a presenter to achieve balance in their offerings and to introduce their audience to new faces. They should also leave room for artists who may not have achieved superstardom  but who continue to offer rich artistic experiences while already a few decades into their careers. He responds most favorably to managers who invest time and effort to learn what might be of genuine interest to him and the music director, and whose dealings with him are direct, honest, concise, and “gently persistent”. Another artistic planner at a major orchestra also told me that when he is approached by a manager with whom he does not have an established relationship, he really appreciates if they start a conversation or meeting by asking about the orchestra’s priorities and plans, and then follow up by zeroing in on the two or three artists they think might be most appropriate for the orchestra, rather than running through a whole list of names. He stressed the importance of a businesslike approach in all booking-related communications. It should never get to the point where  a manager personally takes  umbrage when a booking doesn’t materialize right away. Each party has their own agenda at any given time, but managers should trust that proposals that are discussed and are of potential interest to the orchestra remain in their minds and may well result in bookings when the timing is right.

To ask a question, please write Ask Edna.

© Edna Landau 2013

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A Visa Substitution Requires an Artist to Substitute

April 17th, 2013

By Brian Taylor Goldstein, Esq.

Dear Law and Disorder:

I have a substitution/visa question for you….We were intending to use someone from the US as the eighth singer for one of our groups coming to perform with a symphony in July 2013. It’s now looking like the group might have to replace the intended US singer with a singer from the UK. The rest of the group have visas that have already been approved and issues. Obviously, the singer from the US was not included in the original visa application, so I’m wondering how it would work if we’re now substituting a singer from the UK for the US singer. Would we have to do an entirely new visa application for the new (UK) singer, or would we still be able to add this new singer to the existing (approved) visa petition as a replacement for the US singer? Any light you could shed on this, either by answering these questions or by referring me to another resource where I might be able to get an answer to these questions would be extremely helpful and very much appreciated. Thanks so much!

I can both shed light and refer you to another resource.

First, the light: If you filed a petition listing 7 beneficiaries and 7 beneficiaries are listed on the visa approval notice, and all 7 will be coming to the US, then there is no one you can substitute. The substitution process is available only if one of the original 7 listed singers were to become ill or otherwise unable to travel to the US. Then, you could ask the consulate to “substitute” one of the 7 singers with a new singer. Its also much hard to substitute a visa that has already been issued as the original artists would need to return his/her passport and visa to the consulate in order for it to be voided before the new visa could be issued.

If you need to add an 8th singer and that 8th singer is a non-US performer, then you will have to file an amended petition where you ask for 8 beneficiaries instead of 7. You cannot file a petition just for the extra singer as you cannot list only 1 person on a P (group) visa petition. You would have to re-file the whole original petition as an “Amended Petition” where you list 8 singers rather than 7 and get a new approval notice for everyone. However, only the new, 8th singer, would need to go the consulate. The other 7 can use the visas already issued. You would also need to provide all of the same supporting materials you provided with the original petition (reviews, contracts, articles, etc.) once again as USCIS does not keep copies of these things. (Well, they do, but they are not easily retrievable as we suspect the files are sent somewhere near a top secret UFO landing site in Nevada.)

As the concert is not until July 2013, you won’t need to pay for premium processing and, if you file it as an amended petition, then you won’t need a new union letter. You’ll just need to pay the $325 filing fee.

Now for the resource: There is a lot of information on the substitution process at www.artistsfromabroad.org. You can also link to that site, as well as fine other resources on immigration, at our own website: www.ggartslaw.com

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For additional information and resources on this and other 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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RCO Anniversary Extravaganza

April 12th, 2013

By Rebecca Schmid

If tradition means not preserving the ashes but fanning the flames, in the words of Gustav Mahler, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra is celebrating its 125th anniversary with one foot firmly planted in the past and the other striding fearlessly into the future. Between a tour of six continents this season, the orchestra gave an anniversary concert on April 10 at its home concert hall, the Concertgebouw, founded the same year as the orchestra, in 1888, with an official opening on April 11. For modern-day residents of the Netherlands, this month also marks an important time in politics. Queen Beatrix will soon cede the throne to Prince Willem-Alexander, making him the country’s first King since 1890. The event honored the royal family, in attendance with Princess Máxima—soon-to-be Queen and the orchestra’s official patron—with red carpeting and black-tie dress. But the RCO, a crowned exception on the Netherlands’ tenuous landscape of budget slashes to the arts, does not take its status for granted. The entire proceeds of the concert, which featured three soloists—Thomas Hampson, Janine Jansen and Lang Lang—in a program of late 19th and turn-of-the-century repertoire alongside a new work by Dutch composer Bob Zimmerman, will be invested in educational outreach.

The RCO, which enjoyed close relationships with Mahler and Strauss under the 50-year tenure of Dutch conductor Willem Mengelberg, has not only kept this music flowing in its veins but performs in a hall which provides an ideal acoustic environment for the luxurious strings, golden brass and sumptuous dynamic architecture that emerges under Music Director Mariss Jansons (winner of this year’s Ernst von Siemens Prize, otherwise known as the classical world’s ‘Nobel’). The Concertgebouw was modelled after the Gewandhaus in Leipzig but, unlike its German counterpart, survived World War Two. Inaugurating a new era for the building, projection screens hung in gilded frames on each side of the stage, providing a canvas for historical images and artists’ commentary much in the style of the Beyond the Score series initiated by the Chicago Symphony or the multi-media presentations of the New World Symphony in Miami.

Hampson, before taking the stage for Mahler songs from the Knaben Wunderhorn cycle and Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, praised the RCO musicians on video for a “desire to be true to the master” that is “hugely more evident than in other places,” referring to composer as “one of their own.” The ambient whirring that opened and closed the footage may have lent his comments a clichéd tone, but the unforced beauty of the orchestra in Ging heut’ morgen übers Feld or the perfectly shaped rubati of Rheinlegenden lived up to the baritone’s elation. Hampson, one of few singers today who is able to capture Mahler’s searing irony, was at his best in the final Lob des hohen Verstandes, supported by the orchestra’s playful woodwinds and the fresh energy of its low strings. The swelling of individual lines that Jansons was able to achieve in Rheinlegenden found an even more powerful outlet in the suite from Strauss’ Rosenkavalier, penned in 1944 with the relationship of the Marschallin and Octavian at its center. Waltzes floated through the hall with warm nostalgia, and slow, tender passages glowed with burning intensity under Jansons’ inviting gestures.

He may be the only conductor who could have brought together string players from the Concertgebouw, his Bavarian Radio Symphony, the Vienna Philharmonic, and the Berlin Philharmonic—the latter being the only two orchestras where he guest conducts. The ensemble created an impressive homogeneity of tone in the Elégie from Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings, with a silky pianissimo and crescendi that breathed further and further into celestial rapture. Saint-Saëns’ Introduction et Rondo capriccioso received an affecting performance with Dutch violinist Jansen as soloist, whose fierce communication powers lent fast passages vibrancy and spunk. Lang, having described the third movement of Prokofiev’s Third Piano Concerto onscreen as a “kind of war,” demonstrated a virtuosity so clean as to border on mechanical but created a wild energy with the orchestra in the final stretch.

Zimmerman’s Komt vrieden in het ronden, a neo-Romantic set of variations on a well-known Dutch folk song, fit well with the rest of the program and gave equal spotlight to all three soloists—an occasion that is not likely to be repeated. The audience laughed in amusement upon Hampson’s first entrance, while Lang was the King of Piano Cool as he read through the score. Jansen invested her lines with more personal expression in the music’s circular exchanges built on conventional harmonic schemes. The program opened with the prelude from Wagner’s Meistersinger von Nürnberg, which was performed for the inauguration of the building 125 years ago. Jansons drew a sound that was rich but never bombastic. The conductor’s humility was more than apparent during standing ovations for the extravagant occasion. Despite a high dose of old world charm, the evening was mostly memorable for the RCO’s fresh, exciting musicianship that invested even the most familiar Romantic works with new meaning. Surely this is the essential ingredient for every orchestra—even if it doesn’t bear the title of the “world’s greatest,” as bestowed by Gramophone Magazine in 2008—as its preserves its legacy while forging a path into the complex demands of the 21st century.

rebeccaschmid.info

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The BSO—Helmless but Not Helpless

April 11th, 2013

by Sedgwick Clark

The Boston Symphony Orchestra has taken its time in replacing James Levine, who stepped down as music director two years ago due to a back injury. While two years without a captain at the helm is hardly optimum, at least the orchestra has avoided Philadelphia’s precipitous mismatch of Christoph Eschenbach (2003-2008). Last week in the two concerts I heard of the three it performed at Carnegie Hall, the BSO demonstrated that it remains close to the top of its game, with its traditional warmth, tonal elegance, and ease of virtuosity firmly in place.

Wednesday’s concert (4/3), under Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, the orchestra’s favorite guest conductor and Musical America’s 2011 Conductor of the Year, is close to my favorite program of the season. The BSO “owns” two of these works, both commissioned by its enterprising music director from 1924 to 1949, Serge Koussevitzky. The first, Hindemith’s Concert Music for Strings and Brass, Op. 50, deserves to be heard more often. It was one of several works the Russian conductor commissioned for the orchestra’s 50th anniversary in 1930—others being Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms, Roussel’s Third Symphony, Hanson’s Second Symphony (“Romantic”), Prokofiev’s Fourth Symphony, Copland’s Symphonic Ode, and works by Honegger, Respighi, and himself (anonymously). After hearing Koussevitzky reprise the Concert Music eight years later, Hindemith wrote in his journal, “I was pleasantly surprised by the piece, for I hardly remembered it. It is serious and very fresh, and not at all ugly.” He adds that the BSO is “the best orchestra in the world,” and one imagines that Frühbeck’s energetic, witty, deeply felt performance would only have bolstered the composer’s estimation.

The second BSO commission on the program, Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra, needs little comment. It may be the last large orchestral work to enter the basic repertoire. Frühbeck received notably impassioned playing from all concerned, with especially pungent contributions from the woodwinds. Only at the very end did the orchestra come a cropper. Many conductors on record, beginning with Reiner, broaden the tempo at bar 616 for the climactic brass fanfare; Bernstein, Boulez, and others too numerous to mention wrong-headedly (in my humble opinion) follow suit, devitalizing the ending. That old literalist Leinsdorf in his 1962 recording—his first as the BSO’s music director—slams the coda home in tempo as Bartók indicates, which never fails to blow the roof off. Frühbeck’s players couldn’t seem to agree, and what should have been electrifying short-circuited.

Sandwiched between the Hindemith and Bartók works was another conservative 20th-century masterpiece, Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, played expressively by Garrick Ohlsson and partnered in kind by Frühbeck. While some might prefer more sec articulation and a slightly quicker pace to evoke the diabolical composer of the title, Ohlsson’s pianism was no less satisfying than in his performance with Atlanta and Robert Spano two seasons ago of the composer’s Third Piano Concerto.

All was right with the world as I left Carnegie after Daniele Gatti had led the second Boston concert (4/4) in Mahler’s Third Symphony (the following night he would lead an all-Wagner program). I was amazed at how easily I was able to suppress my usual Mahlerite niggling and surrender to the glories that Gatti accomplished. I was especially moved by the last movement, which flowed naturally—inevitably—and had just the right “saturated, noble tone” of the brass on the final page that Mahler demands. On the other hand, I felt that the tempo for the third-movement posthorn solo was a bit brisk to achieve the ideal nostalgia. Moreover, many quiet details such as the percussion in the first movement’s introduction were not audible because Gatti took pp marks too literally; recordings can ensure audibility, but live performance in a large space is something else entirely. Overall, however, the Bostonians sounded absolutely resplendent, and one cannot close without noting Anne Sofie von Otter’s evocative singing in the fourth-movement “Midnight Song” from Nietzsche’s Also sprach Zarathustra and the superb violin solos from second Assistant Concertmaster Elita Kang in this and the previous evening’s Rachmaninoff. A Mahler Third on such a high interpretive and technical level at Carnegie Hall makes life worth living.

Looking Forward

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

4/11 at 7:30. Avery Fisher Hall. New York Philharmonic/David Robertson; Pierre-Laurent Aimard, piano. Messiaen: Les Offrandes oubliées. Mozart: Concerto No. 23. Tristan Murail: Le Désenchantement du monde. Beethoven: Symphony No. 2.

4/11 at 7:30. Avery Fisher Hall. New York Philharmonic/Alan Gilbert; Joshua Bell, violin. Christopher Rouse: Prospero’s Rooms. Bernstein: Serenade (after Plato’s “Symposium”). Ives: Symphony No. 4

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