Latest news with #musicdirector
CBC
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- CBC
National Youth Orchestra of Canada anniversary concert makes Vancouver stop
The National Youth Orchestra of Canada is in Vancouver for its 65th anniversary concert. The event highlights Vancouver's role in fostering cultural excellence and showcases the inspiring achievements of young musicians. We caught up with the orchestra's CEO and music director, both of whom are from B.C. Take a look.
BreakingNews.ie
7 days ago
- Entertainment
- BreakingNews.ie
Defence Forces musical bands cost taxpayers to the tune of €15.7m since 2023
The Defence Forces School of Music has cost taxpayers to the tune of €15.7 million since the beginning of 2023, including a €250,000 spend on ceremonial uniforms for members of the state's three military bands. The school is organised as a corps of the army, and its 113 professional musicians are assigned ranks such as captain, commandant and sergeant, although they have no military role and the only training they receive is a six-week basic induction course. Advertisement The bands performed at a total of 661 events during the past two-and-a-half years, excluding rehearsals, according to records released under the Freedom of Information Act. These included state funerals, international sports fixtures, and national commemorations; but also included a large number of school concerts, and some performances required only a single musician. Pay and allowances for the school's 113 full-time musicians and 10 other staff cost almost €15.3 million during the period, while a further €364,645 was spent on transport, equipment, and ceremonial uniforms. This included €13,525 on sheet music, €5,726 on a new PA system and accessories, and €6,844 on a soprano saxophone with a case, mouthpiece, and harness last October. Advertisement A total of €253,785 was spent on ceremonial uniforms since the start of 2023. It was the largest investment in the bands' attire since a major overhaul in 2003, when the music director decided a change of colour was required because 'we just didn't look the business'. Last year, the 261 engagements attended by the Defence Force bands included the state funeral of former Taoiseach John Bruton, a number of rugby internationals, St. Patrick's Day parades in Dublin, Cork, Offaly and Athlone, and a state dinner at Áras an Uachtaráin. A bugler from the School of Music also played at a number of military funerals, and one of the bands was required to play at a marching exam for army personnel at Cathal Brugha Barracks in June. Musicians join the Defence Forces School of Music by direct entry, which is the same process by which medical doctors and engineers are recruited. They must have experience in several musical styles and be aged between 18 and 28. Advertisement They are asked to audition, playing two contrasting pieces and undertaking a sight reading test. 'Standards of fitness' are also required, but recruits are provided with the 'time, facilities and resources' to achieve these standards on the job. Last April, five of the personnel attached to the school held the rank of captain, 45 were privates, 22 were corporals, and 31 were sergeants. Other ranks included commandant and company sergeant. The school, which comprises three military bands, is currently headed by Lieutenant Colonel Margaret Bannister, who became the first female director of music when she took over in 2023. A spokesman for the Defence Forces said the three bands provide musical support to the military and the state. Advertisement 'The No. 1 Band has performed at all major ceremonial occasions since the foundation of the state, including all presidential inaugurations from that of President Douglas Hyde to the present day,' he said. 'The band's engagement schedule now includes attendance at Áras an Uachtaráin for presentation of credentials ceremonies of newly appointed ambassadors, the provision of music support for state visits… and high-profile state engagements such as the National Day of Commemoration. 'Concert engagements at the National Concert Hall, recitals in St. Stephen's Green, and a highly successful Schools Concerts programme are a regular part of the band's life. The band has performed at festivals and military tattoos in Italy, Holland, Germany and France,' he added.
Telegraph
28-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
English National Opera's new director takes job share in New Zealand
English National Opera is facing calls to cancel the contract of its incoming music director after it emerged that he has also accepted another music directorship in New Zealand. ENO announced in May that André de Ridder, a German conductor, would be its music director designate from September, taking up the post in Autumn 2027. The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra (NZSO) announced this week that Mr de Ridder would be its music director designate, formally starting in September 2027. 'I am very excited and feel truly honoured to have been chosen to become this orchestra's next music director and to learn about and contribute to New Zealand's unique musical and cultural scenery,' he said in a statement posted on the NZSO's Facebook page. But Norman Lebrecht, a leading music expert and former Telegraph columnist, dismissed the dual appointments as 'absurd' because of the huge distance and an 11-hour time difference. He told The Telegraph: 'New Zealand is the other side of the clock. Basically, you can't communicate. 'With a company in crisis, as ENO is, you absolutely need a firm hand on the tiller. You've got to have a decision-maker there.' If the second job was in the same time zone, ENO could call its music director, Mr Lebrecht said, adding: 'But if he's in New Zealand they can't actually have proper discussions because it'll be 11 o'clock at night there or 11 o'clock at night our time. 'The whole position is absurd.' Writing on his Slipped Disc website, Mr Lebrecht said: 'This ought to be an easy commute, right? And if something goes wrong in London or Auckland, Ridder will be right there to put it right… ENO should terminate his contract before they look like a total shambles.' 'Unmitigated piffle' Observers argued that although international conductors take different posts, an opera company leaves little time for a second job. ENO has lurched from one crisis to another, despite the award-winning excellence of many of its productions. Years of turmoil have seen strikes and protests over cutbacks, while fears for its survival were sparked by Arts Council England 's plan to pull its funding unless the company found a base beyond the capital. ENO's forthcoming season, beginning in September, will feature 12 productions and concerts in London and Manchester, both new productions and revivals. Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's political satire, Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny, will be staged in 2026, marking Mr de Ridder's first engagement as music director designate. He is currently general music director of Theater Freiburg in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. He previously conducted for ENO the premieres of Gerald Barry's The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant in 2005, described by The Telegraph as 'a repellent opera', and Michel van der Aa's Sunken Garden in 2013, dismissed by this newspaper as 'unmitigated piffle'. Mr de Ridder's representative, Anna Wetherell of HarrisonParrott, the classical music agency, said the two jobs 'don't really coincide'. She added: 'New Zealand have their winter festival, which is in August each year, when ENO is not operating. 'With New Zealand, he has signed up to three seasons - [from] March to December 2027, 2028 and 2029 - so he probably will do… two weeks at the start of the year, three in the middle and three at the end.' Asked where his home will be, she said: 'It's unclear for now. He might move somewhere in the UK.' Mr Lebrecht described ENO as 'a shadow of its former self' and noted that the previous music director had said the job is untenable: 'This is the music director of English National Opera. English. 'Yet ENO had to go to Germany because we don't have any conductors who are unemployed and rather good.' John Allison, the editor of Opera magazine and a Telegraph music critic, said: 'People may say that running a national company leaves little time for anything else. Sadly, through little fault of their own, ENO is not exactly the busiest national full-time opera company. 'But it's not a vote of confidence either in where André de Ridder thinks ENO might be in a couple of years time when he starts in New Zealand. It's not impossible for him to do both jobs, but it's not necessarily an ideal look. 'ENO hasn't been out of crisis for a very long time. It's a different kind of a crisis at the moment because nobody quite knows where it's going, allegedly to Manchester. But, who knows if the Arts Council, which imposed this on them, will still be here in 2029 when the move is supposed to take place? It's certainly got an identity crisis and it needs vision.' 'Strong leadership' An ENO spokesman said Mr de Ridder was appointed 'following a rigorous process', adding: 'We are all looking forward to working together with him over the coming years. 'It is absolutely standard for leading conductors to have more than one post internationally. 'It is simply not true that ENO is in a state of crisis. With strong leadership in place, and a clear plan for the future delivering programmes in both London and Greater Manchester, as we announced in May, ENO is moving forward with an exciting 2025/26 season. 'This includes 12 productions and concerts across London and Manchester, expansion of our work through new broadcast partnerships and learning and participation programmes and the extension of our offer of free tickets for under 21s.'
Associated Press
31-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Associated Press
Domingo Hindoyan to become music director of LA Opera for 2026-27 season
NEW YORK (AP) — Domingo Hindoyan will succeed James Conlon as music director of the LA Opera and start a five-year contract on July 1, 2026. The appointment of the 45-year-old Venezuelan-Armenian, the husband of soprano Sonya Yoncheva, was announced Friday night. Conlon has been music director since 2006-07 and said in March 2024 that he will retire after after the 2025-26 season. 'LA is a city that is known by innovation, taking risks in productions and musically,' Hindoyan said in New York, where his wife is currently singing at the Metropolitan Opera. 'The idea is to do new pieces, commissions and modern pieces, something to really have a balance between what is classic and go further as much as we can.' Hindoyan will conduct two productions in 2026-27 and three in each of the following four seasons, LA Opera President Christopher Koelsch said. Koelsch hopes Hindoyan can lead works with Yoncheva, who has not sung a staged production at the LA Opera. Like other companies, the LA Opera has struggled with increased costs following the pandemic and scrapped a planned pair of world premieres over finances. Tenor and conductor Plácido Domingo was a key figure in fundraising for the company as general director from 2003-19. 'Part of my job as a music director and the job of any musician is to really take care of the art form as much as we can,' Hindoyan said, 'not only on stage, not only studying at home (but also) the connection with the community and the connection to the donors.' Hindoyan was born in Caracas, played violin and is a product of El Sistema, the Venezuelan music education system that was instrumental in the careers of Gustavo Dudamel and Rafael Payare. He was an assistant to Daniel Barenboim at Berlin's Staatsoper unter den Linden. 'Given Barenboim's extremely exacting standards, I was impressed that he had that job and held onto that job,' Koelsch said. 'And then I saw a performance of 'Tosca' and was kind of immediately struck by the elegance of the baton technique and just the sort of the absolute clarity of what he was conveying.' Hindoyan has been chief conductor of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic since the 2021-22 season. He first conducted the LA Opera last November in Gounod's 'Roméo et Juliette.' 'There's a kind of a natural warmth and charisma to him. In my experience, he almost always coaxes the best out of people,' Koelsch said. 'The 'Roméo' run for me was kind of a test run of how those qualities resonated inside our building, how it worked with the orchestra and the chorus and the administration and the audiences.'
Wall Street Journal
26-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Wall Street Journal
‘Faust' Review: Heartbeat Opera Deals With Gounod's Devil
New York Heartbeat Opera's radical adaptations of classic titles can soar or fall flat, but one constant has always been music director Dan Schlosberg, whose ingenious maverick arrangements—such as February's 'Salome' for eight clarinetists and two percussionists—never fail to stimulate. Until now.
