What a surprise!

An announcement came today that the new director of the Proms will be Roger Wright, controller of Radio 3. Nicholas Kenyon, who's leaving to head the Barbican, was controller of Radio 3 before he took over the Proms. John Drummond, Proms supermo for years before that, was also controller of Radio 3 first. So we're really, really surprised. I wonder if they'd ever considered anybody else?

Still, gut reaction is that Wright's a good bet. His innovations at Radio 3 have been a willingness to embrace technology, the offering of groundbreaking downloads - they proved too popular for their own good - and occasional saturation bombing with whole weeks devoted to one composer. He has a feel for the big gesture, the grand style and the pushing out of technological boats, all of which go down like hot muffins at the Proms if they're carried off well. Perhaps he'll bring a breath of comparatively fresh air in to the arena.

That is, if he has the time - he's staying on at R3 as well.

John Tusa speaks out

John Tusa, the chief of the Barbican Centre and one of the biggest, most intelligent, heavyweight, tell-it-like-it-is visionaries in British arts administration, has an important article in The Times today about how sick he is of mealy-mouthed government arts policy, the 'meddling bureaucrats' who make the rules, and the idiotic justifications that are constantly demanded for continued support - usually at pathetically low levels - of our world-class cultural institutions.

Here's an extract:

"...I’m sick to death, too, with justifying the arts as if there was something specially problematical about doing so, as if funding the arts is irrational or even unnatural. Thinking about the arts, judging their value, explaining particular trends in the arts — this is an essential part of a human activity that takes itself seriously. What is a waste of time is being required to justify the arts as if millennia of arts activity required justifying anew, as if a failure to justify them could — or should — lead to the end of the activity altogether..."

Read the whole thing here.

Meanwhile, The Guardian the other day ran an article about how 35 per cent of opera chorus singers suffer from 'wet burping'.

Commodities market

In other words, the London International Book Fair. I was going to write a long, philosophical post about how one grows up studying literature at school and revering the great authors past and present, then goes into the seething mass of languages and deals that make up the event in (this year) Earl's Court only to find that a book isn't seen as a work of art but as a commodity and how, as a writer, one suddenly understands that one is a commodity too, and how one does technically know this already but actually experiencing it is different..... But it's quite fun being a commodity, and I had some excellent meetings. So, fine.

Meanwhile, a big 'Indy-panic' the last couple of days, which has been even more fun than being a commodity! Watch this #.

Korngold update #3

Korngold enthusiasts should get themselves to West Norfolk in September. Yes, the West Norfolk Music Festival is running one of the most astonishing Korngold bonanzas I've come across. It's to be held in Stoke Ferry, Norfolk, from 8 to 15 September. I haven't yet tracked down any further details on the internet, eg box office phone number, but will update this as soon as I can. Here's a small selection of the festival's content, as sent to me by Brendan Carroll.

Songs & Arias from Die tote Stadt and the other operas to be given by Swedish tenor Jan Stromberg
Violin Sonata in G major, op.6 to be given by Swedish Artist - Fredrik Paulsson;
Cello Concerto - soloist tbc;
String Sextet in D major, op.10;
The 3 String Quartets to be given by the Solaris String Quartet;
The Piano Quintet - the same quartet with pianist Raphael Terroni;
The 3 Piano Sonatas & other substantial solo piano works (including some premieres) to be given variously by artists including Raphael Terroni, Martin Sturfalt, Vadim Peaceman;
Further songs to be given by the contralto Phillida Bannister
The Piano Trio Opus 1.

That should keep them busy! More soon.

Mayerling, yet again

W-h-e-w!!!!!!!!

Went to Mayerling at Covent Garden last night, starring the one and only Carlos Acosta as the crazed Crown Prince Rudolf of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (pic above not from this ballet, but hey...). Feel teh power. It's not just the jump, the stage presence, the technique, the body - this guy can convey character through movement with one gesture, the dissolution of a whole psyche in a single step. His Mary Vetsera was Leanne Benjamin, transforming from ditzy 17-year-old to breathtaking sexpot in the flash of a toe, her limbs as free as flames. Supporting roles - surely as demanding as any lead - included more of the Royal Ballet's finest, Mara Galeazzi, Gemma Bond, Zenaida Yanowsky and plenty others. The only weak spot was the orchestra, which had a bit of an off-night, but let's forgive them this once.

I wonder if Mayerling is deliberately a twisted inversion of The Sleeping Beauty? Instead of awakening the heroine, the prince kills her and himself. He's led to her by another woman - this Lilac Fairy is his ex-mistress. The Rose Adagio? No, the Mephisto Waltz: stunning choreography for sought-after woman - a prostitute - and four lovers. The Wedding pas de deux at the end of Act I is effectively a rape, in which the woman is horrifically complicit, and features a fish-dive pose. The young girl grows up - Mary is a child with her hair in ribbons at the beginning - but her fulfillment is a suicide pact. The King and Queen - Emperor and Empress - are at it too, both with lovers attendant. There's a hunting scene...in which the prince accidentally kills a member of the court. The opening scene is called 'prologue', and it's not a christening but a funeral.

When Mayerling was first performed, back (if I remember right) in the 1980s, it got a lot of stick from the critics. Too many characters - how do you keep track of all Rudolf's women?! [you read the story]. You can't convey in dance that Countess Larisch is his ex-mistress! [you can, very effectively]. What are those Hungarians doing, whispering in Rudolf's ear? You can't do separatist politics in dance! [never mind the whispering, watch 'em dance!] And all those prostitutes parading their wares, yeuk! [ref Schiele, with Mitzi Caspar looking fresh out of Klimt?]. What a very nasty story! [so's Romeo and Juliet]. Twenty-five years on, or thereabouts, this ballet is clearly one of Kenneth MacMillan's masterpieces.