“The radio announcer for Classic FM informs his audience that Vaughan Williams’ ‘The Lark Ascending’ has landed, by popular vote, the number one spot in the station’s classical ‘Hall of Fame.’ The background is established: that Vaughan Williams is widely understood – sometimes loved, sometimes loathed for it – as the greatest representative, even as […]
Tag: Music the Industry
Posted inReport
Welcome 2 Shorworld
In 2024, we reported on the meteoric rise of a composer named Alexey Shor. His music, which resembled the kind of music theory homework that gets Bs and Cs (and that multiple musicians compared to material produced by AI) was suddenly everywhere: in Valetta, Yerevan, and Dubai, but also in London, New York and Amsterdam. […]
Posted inReport
The Numbers Game
It begins with Timothée Chalamet’s recent offhand remark about opera, because of course it does. Things have moved quickly since I began my journalism career in 2020. That was a time of near-instant internet news. Since then, Buzzfeed died a death, news brands have pivoted to video, Google AI has allowed users to sidestep news […]
Posted inReport
Stand By Your Man
“If you want to be an opinionated columnist or a partisan campaigner on social media,” the BBC’s director general Tim Davie wrote in October 2020, “then that is a valid choice, but you should not be working at the BBC.” When Davie took over from Tony Hall as director general in 2020 (and in the […]
Posted inReport
Low Note
In a video on the social media page High Note, an account launched on July 29 featuring “street interviews with classical music icons,” the tenor Freddie De Tommaso stands outside a pub drinking a Guinness, joking with a female interviewer about whether his favorite composer is Verdi, Puccini, or Sean Paul. In about 40 seconds, […]
Posted inEssay
Energy and Attention
They’re tapping you thrice on the shoulder, sneering and full of disdain. Look out: It’s the etiquette police! Etiquette can be the trivial stuff of lace doilies and debutante balls, but it is also laced with the potential to oppress. Shared etiquette can set us on equal footing with one another, while imposed and restrictive […]
Posted inBreaking
Ashley Wass announces his departure from the Yehudi Menuhin School
On Monday, Ashley Wass, director of music at the Yehudi Menuhin School, announced that he will be stepping down from his position at the end of the academic year. In an email sent to parents, Wass said that it felt “strange” to inform them of his decision. Though being part of the YMS community was […]
Posted inOpinion
Your Tiny Hand Is Invisible
Last week, English National Opera’s plans for Greater Manchester were unveiled in the Holden Gallery of Manchester Metropolitan University. The room was filled with many of the city region’s most powerful players. Sir Richard Leese, the former council leader who oversaw Manchester’s rapid regeneration after the IRA bombing in 1996, received a shoutout from the […]
Posted inOpinion
Classical Music in the Enshittocene
I guess the moment it hit me was when Classic FM’s Alexander Armstrong was revealed to be getting into “NFTs tickets.” Whether or not these NFTs are just glorified QR codes—Curved Music, the company behind his new shows, didn’t respond by the time of publication—mere mention of those initials was enough to zap me back […]
Posted inReport
Is Cleveland Institute of Music Still a Good Environment for Students?
On October 1, less than a week after faculty at the Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM) voted in favor of unionizing with the American Federation of Musicians, CIM board chair Susan Rothmann announced in an all-faculty email that CIM’s faculty senate would be replaced by a temporary governing body, effective next month. CIM’s faculty senate […]