tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33737749662433260092009-07-10T21:28:04.063-07:00Reflections and musings by James Bash and others on the classical music scene in the Pacific Northwest and beyondJames Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.comBlogger1256125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-4598403900927311212009-07-10T13:42:00.000-07:002009-07-10T14:04:40.815-07:00

(Photo of Daron Aric Hagen)A couple of weeks ago, the Seattle Opera announced that it will a $500,000 grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to help underwrite costs involved in producing "Amelia," a new opera with music by American composer Daron Aric Hagen with a libretto by American poet and writer Gardner McFall, and a story by Stephen Wadsworth. In addition, The Charles Simonyi Fund for

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-72773797249015667262009-07-10T12:42:00.000-07:002009-07-10T12:48:52.244-07:00

Henri Weiniawski (1835-1880)Carl Orff (1895-1982)Ljuba Welitsch (193-1996)Ian Wallace (1919)Josephine Veasey (1930)Jerry Herman (1931)Arlo Guthrie (1947)Graham Johnson (1950)Béla Fleck (1958)andMarcel Proust (1871-1922)Saul Bellow (1915-2005) Alice Munro (1931)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-63848565522909603922009-07-09T09:59:00.000-07:002009-07-09T10:34:08.484-07:00

Gregory Vajda has been named the new artistic director and conductor of Music in the Mountains, which is a classical music organizaiton that serves Grass Valley and Nevada City, California (both are located north of Sacramento). Music in the Mountains offers concerts throughout the year, but each series is short. So, this will not be a full-time gig for Vajda. He is still the resident conductor

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-20528815621279933432009-07-09T09:41:00.000-07:002009-07-09T09:50:15.752-07:00

Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936)Dame Elizabeth Lutyens (1906-1983)David Diamond (1915-2005)David Zinman (1936)Paul Chihara (1938)John Mark Ainsley (1963) andOliver Sacks (1933)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-479378312949498322009-07-08T18:01:00.000-07:002009-07-08T19:34:16.092-07:00

Tuesday July 7th saw a performance by a number of well-known musicians at the Catlin Gabel School as part of Chamber Music Northwest's summer festival. Mandolin expert Chris Thile and violinist Leila Josefowicz, among others, took part in a program entitled the 'Bach-Haydn-Mendelssohn Loop,' the title a reference to 'looping,' a technique used in electronic music.The night opened with a

Lorin Wilkersonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14964969679770591434lorinwilk@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-72260244242527958142009-07-08T12:41:00.000-07:002009-07-08T14:59:23.620-07:00

This summer many Portland area instrumentalists are performing at summer festivals. Here's a partial list:Oregon Bach Festival OrchestraDavid Buck - principal flute Todd Kuhns - clarinet Aaron LaVere - principal tromboneKaren Strand - oboeBrenda Liu - violaGrand Teton Music Festival OrchestraJulie Coleman - violinGregory Ewer - violinJoël Belgique - violaJaTtik Clark - TubaandAmy Schwartz Moretti

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-76376831833973819862009-07-08T09:13:00.000-07:002009-07-08T09:19:15.887-07:00

Percy Grainger (1882-1961)George Antheil (1900-1959)Billy Eckstine (1914-1993)Susan Chilcott (1963-2003)Raffi Cavoukian (1948)Zhou Long (1953)andPhilip Johnson (1906-2005) J. F. Powers (1917-1999)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-87247965158571676022009-07-07T15:35:00.000-07:002009-07-07T21:39:54.897-07:00

The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) announced direct grants to 631 nonprofit arts groups totally almost 30 million dollars. The Oregon Symphony will receive $50,000 and the Portland Youth Philharmonic will receive $25,000, and the Eugene Symphony will receive $50,000. For the complete list of awardees, click here.I received notice of these awards because I'm a member of the Arts Action Fund

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-80242999052014947052009-07-07T13:52:00.000-07:002009-07-07T14:01:32.921-07:00

The Vancouver Symphony has just announced that it is the recipient of a $40,000 grant from the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation. That's a major boost for this orchestra, which supports 65 professional musicians on a part-time basis. The Vancouver Symphony was the only classical music organization to receive a grant this year. Portland Center Stage was awarded $45,000.For more information on the

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Cappella Romana will sing the music of Estonian composer Arvo Pärt in a series of concerts that lead up to performances at Music Fest in Vancouver, British Columbia. Entitled "Odes of Repentance," Cappella Romana's concert will feature Eastern Orthodox hymns that Pärt has set as well as a selection of his English and Slavonic works. The program includes:- Triodion- The Woman with the Alabaster

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-7575330873341564812009-07-07T09:23:00.001-07:002009-07-07T09:28:38.315-07:00

Gustav Mahler (1860-1911)Gian Carlo Menotti (1911-2007)Cor de Groot (1914-1993)Doc Severinson (1927)Joe Zawinul (1932-2007)Ringo Starr (1940)Michaela Petri (1958)andLion Feuchtwanger (1884-1958)Marc Chagall (1887-1985)David McCullough (1933)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-38802314480370800282009-07-06T11:28:00.000-07:002009-07-06T11:41:49.591-07:00

Starting this week, you can join members of the Portland Symphonic Choir in open rehearsals of great choral works by Stravinsky, Brahms, and Bach. The rehearsal-events are called "Summer Sings" and they are held each Wednesday at 7 pm in the Moriarty Arts and Humanities Building on the Cascade Campus of Portland Community College (at the corner of Killingsworth and Albina).Here's the schedule:

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-75641302913526970062009-07-06T09:13:00.000-07:002009-07-06T09:18:03.368-07:00

Hans Eisler (1898-1962)Dorothy Kirsten (1910-1992)Ernst Haefliger (1919-2007)Bill Haley (1925-1981)Maurice Hasson (1934)Vladimir Ashkenazy (1937)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-68167219770343847412009-07-05T18:46:00.000-07:002009-07-06T07:40:25.175-07:00

Leave it to the French to whip up a new musical instrument that looks like a trumpeting flower blossom. The Sireole was invented in 1997 Franz Clochard, and it combines turbines and electronics. For the past ten years the Sireole has been refined and promoted by Mecanique Vivante, and you can experience the sounds that this instrument generates by clicking here. I think that we could benefit from

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-82742081515572469702009-07-05T17:03:00.000-07:002009-07-05T17:17:26.215-07:00

Wanda Landowska (1879-1958)Jan Kubelík (1880-1940)Gordon Jacob (1895-1984)George Rochberg (1918-2005)János Starker (1924)Matthias Bamert (1942)Alexander Lazarev (1945)Isabelle Poulenard (1961)andJean Cocteau (1889-1963)Barbara Frischmuth (1941)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-33631554068005141322009-07-04T16:46:00.000-07:002009-07-04T16:49:53.209-07:00

Louis-Claude Daquin (1694-1772)Stephen Foster (1826-1864)Roy Henderson (1899-2000)Louis Armstrong (1900-1971)Flor Peeters (1903-1986)Mitch Miller (1911)Tibor Varga (1921-2003)and Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864)Lionel Trilling (1905-1975)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-77280671700444590012009-07-04T07:50:00.000-07:002009-07-05T19:27:03.607-07:00

Chamber Music Northwest presented a satisfying, varied program of Americana on Thursday, July 2 in the Kaul Auditorium at Reed College. A number of artists were featured on this night that celebrated American music in honor of our Independence Day weekend.Opening the program was John Williams' new work Air and Simple Gifts (2009), composed and arranged for (and famously pantomimed during)

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As a member of the Portland Symphonic Choir, I sang several times at the Cascade Music Festival in Bend, Oregon. That festival, which went out of business last year, used a huge tent for its performances, and I once asked the festival's leaders where they got that tent. They told me that it was Michael Jackson's prep tent at the 1993 Super Bowl. This is a huge tent that can seat several hundred

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Leoš Janáček (1854-1928)Carlos Kleiber (1930-2004)Brigitte Fassbaender (1939)adnFranz Kafka (1883-1924)Sir Tom Stoppard (1937)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-81657557332305501362009-07-02T23:11:00.000-07:002009-07-02T23:17:41.965-07:00

The audience filled every seat at the Cabell Center on the campus of the Catlin Gabel School in eager anticipation of an all-Mozart concert that took place on Tuesday (June 30). This performance ushered in the second week of concerts presented by Chamber Music Northwest with a program consisting of music for string quartet, a quintet for piano and winds, and a quartet for piano and strings. The

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Christoph W. Gluck (1714-1787)Earl Hawley Robinson (1910-1991)Frederick Fennell (1914-2004)andFriedrich Gottlieb Klopstock (1724-1803)Hermann Hesse (1877-1962)

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-5939891920130333742009-07-01T22:08:00.000-07:002009-07-01T22:27:21.359-07:00

Oregon Bach Festival audiences were treated to a very rare treat on Monday, June 29th at the First United Methodist Church in Portland. The Portland Baroque Orchestra, one of the nation's premier early music orchestras and a guest ensemble at this year's festival, presented all six of Bach's famous Brandenburg Concertos under the sterling direction of Monica Huggett (who did triple duty as

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The Oregon Symphony is adding a new vice president and a director of major gifts in its quest to get on better financial footing. Here's what the press release says:While simultaneously cutting administrative staff costs by more than 5 percent over the season that ended yesterday, the Oregon Symphony has announced two changes to its senior administrative staff aimed at improving management

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-2454214927214839672009-07-01T13:08:00.000-07:002009-07-01T13:16:37.079-07:00

Chamber Music Northwest, the Oregon Bach Festival, and Portland Piano Internation invite you to become a crossover artist - at least with your ticket stub. If you attend any concert presented by one of these organizations, you can redeem that ticket for 2-for-1 tickets at either of the other festivals. You must call in advance to arrange your reservation, and show your ticet stub to the box

James Bashhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02313639615830815219james.bash@gmail.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3373774966243326009.post-27696734746980328482009-07-01T09:15:00.000-07:002009-07-01T09:21:45.734-07:00

Thomas Andrew Dorsey (1899-1993)Hans Werner Henze (1926)Andrae Crouch (1942)Philip Brunelle (1943)Sioned Williams (1953)Nikolai Demidenko (1955)Paul Daniel (1958)andGeorge Sand (1804-1876)William Strunk Jr. (1969-1946)Twyla Tharp (1941)

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