From the New World, officially

The New York Philharmonic, after much backing and forthing, has accepted the invitation of the North Korean Ministry of Culture to perform in the country’s capital, Pyongyang. Its program, predictably, will include Antonin Dvořák’s Symphony No. 9 in E minor (“From the New World”).

Four of the last five concert performances I’ve heard of the "New World" Symphony were ceremonial or quasi-official in timing or circumstance. The combined Richmond and Virginia symphonies played the piece on the inaugural weekend of the Jamestown 400th anniversary celebration last spring. The Berlin Philharmonic and Vienna Philharmonic played it on tour dates in Washington, where appearances by foreign orchestras tend to be diplomatic as well as cultural events. The National Symphony of Washington played it on the weekend after the 9/11 attacks. (The "unofficial" performance was by the Richmond Symphony in February 2003.)

The NY Phil’s "New World" in North Korea is a throwback to the days when this symphony was almost obligatory for American orchestras’ foreign tours. As was something by Gershwin – and what do you know, the Pyongyang gig also features "An American in Paris."

Some music historians have made the case that Dvořák conceived of his Ninth Symphony as a template for an American school of composition built on the country’s folk and vernacular music. (As it turned out, Charles Ives provided more durable models of this kind.)

But the “New World” as the default musical representation of the U.S.A.? Would Dvořák be flattered or bewildered?

Richmond's Grammy hopefuls

eighth blackbird, the new-music sextet in residence at the University of Richmond, has snagged a Grammy Award nomination in the best chamber music performance category for its Cedille album "strange imaginary animals."

One piece on the disc, Jennifer Higdon's "Zaka," is a best classical contemporary composition nominee. The possibly prohibitive favorite in the category is Peter Lieberson's "Neruda Songs," recorded by Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, the composer's late wife, with the Boston Symphony for Nonesuch. "Neruda Songs" also was nominated for best classical vocal performance and best classical album. The composer recently won the University of Louisville's prestigious and lucrative ($200,000) Grawemeyer Award for the song cycle.

Andrew Imbrie (1921-2007)

Imbrie, the veteran American composer and teacher (principally at Berkeley, where he taught for more than 40 years), is remembered for "the clarity of his thinking, as well as a plain spoken eloquence that infused even the most intricate scores," Joshua Kosman writes in an obituary in the San Francisco Chronicle:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/12/08/BAJITPTL6.DTL

One of Imbrie's last works, the Concertino for violin and chamber orchestra, was introduced in January 2005 by violinist Ariana Kim and the Richmond Symphony, Mark Russell Smith conducting.

Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928-2007)

Stockhausen, the German composer who was among the leaders of the European avant-garde in the decades following World War II, was a pioneer of what's now known as electroacoustic music, combining live voices and instruments with electronic and recorded sounds.

In later life, Stockhausen gained notoriety for his eccentricity and verbal provocations such as describing the 9/11 attacks as "the greatest work of art one can imagine."

Ivan Hewitt's obituary of the composer in The Guardian:

http://music.guardian.co.uk/obituaries/story/0,,2224081,00.html

Lost my job, lost my truck, lost my wife, and then . . .

The more country music, the higher the suicide rate:

http://www.uta.edu/depken/ugrad/3318/music-suicide.pdf

(via Andrew Sullivan, via scienceblogs.com)

The right and the arts

William F. Buckley Jr. endorses music education in Gramophone, the British classical-music magazine. GOP presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee says the arts should figure more prominently in school curricula. Virginia Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, one of the state’s leading conservative Republicans, links his son’s academic success to playing trombone in the Hanover High School Band and Richmond Symphony Youth Orchestra.

Their ideological kindred spirits spent the 1980s and ’90s attacking the National Endowment for the Arts, belittling the fine arts as "elitist" and promoting a back-to-basics curriculum that marginalized or eliminated arts instruction in public schools.

The points that arts education might push back against an increasingly coarse and brain-dead popular culture, and that the discipline of learning to play an instrument, or paint a picture, or write a poem, pays off academically – tangibly, too, in an information economy propelled by creative thinking – were brushed off or ignored.

Do the comments of Buckley, Huckabee and Bolling represent a shift in conservatives’ view of the educational and social value of the arts? Do three celebrants make a party, or just some jaw music in the foyer?

Symphony of 400

More than 300 local musicians have signed up to perform with the Richmond Symphony in "Come and Play," a benefit for the Richmond Public Schools' music education program, at 6 p.m. Dec. 9 at Virginia Commonwealth University's Siegel Center, Broad and Harrison streets in Richmond.

Erin Freeman will conduct at the event, cosponsored by VCU and the Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment. Admission is free; donations may be made at the door or by mail to:

Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment
The Community Foundation
7501 Boulders View Drive, Suite 101
Richmond, VA 23225

Proceeds will be used for instrument purchase and repair in the city schools.

Details: (804) 788-1212, www.richmondsymphony.com