Honey I shrunk the pension fund

There has been quite a lot of interest in the fate of my (and a lot of other people's) EMI pension following my post in October last year. Another letter arrived from the EMI Group Pension Trustees today which says:

'In mid December we reached an agreement in principle with EMI and its ultimate investor, Terra Firma, that the Fund would be granted a meaningful amount of watertight security, which would rank equally with the security granted by EMI to Citi, the bank that loaned Terra Firma the money to take over EMI.

Since that agreement, however, detailed discussions have revealed that the form of security offered does not rank equally with the bank's in certain important respects and is not sufficiently robust in its terms for the Trustee to be able to rely on it in circumstances where it would be needed to support the Fund. In the absence of meaningful and watertight security, and as EMI is not prepared to put forward an alternative funding package, the Trustee has concluded, with regret, that it has no option other than to inform the Pensions Regulator that there is no reasonable prospect of reaching agreement with EMI and Terra Firma on funding.'

As EMI's new owner Guy Hands, whose personal wealth with his wife is estimated to be £200m, said in a recent interview - 'We will fight to come up with a solution to the problems that face the entire recorded music industry'. It's a pity that the solution doesn't seem to include staff pensions.
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At last - music treated as music

In the week when the BBC, EMI and UK media decided that Nigel Kennedy is the future of classical music I greatly enjoyed a new CD from an independent Belgian label that proves that there is still life beyond the celebrity circus.

Llibre Vermell from the Ricecar label is an imaginative realisation based on these anonymous words in the famous medieval manuscript in the Abbey of Monserrat: "Sometimes the pilgrims who are holding vigil in the church of the Holy Virgin of Montserrat wanted to sing and dance, but they were only allowed to sing respectable and pious songs". The CD brings together the Namur Chamber Choir as the pilgrims, the Psallentes as the monks and the excellent boys choir Les Pastoureaux as the choirboys of the Abbey together with period instrumentalists under the direction of Christophe Deslignes. The boy's choir are, for me, the real stand-outs on an exceptional disc, how refreshing to hear young voices in early music.

The recording, which derived from a 2007 Festival de Wallonie concert, is a total delight from start to finish. It combines musical scholarship (which is more than can be said for Kennedy's cadenza in the first movement of his new Mozart concerto recording) with more exuberance and sheer joy in music making than I have heard for years. A mixed programme, which moves between Gregorian Chant, music from the Le Llibre Vermell and dance, avoids the inherent monotony of so many early music discs, while producer Jérôme Lejeune and engineer Philippe de Magnée make the magnificent space of the Église Saint-Apollinaire in Bolland an integral part of the performance.

Research carried out some time back reported that the average classical CD is played 1.3 times after purchase, so the five playings that my copy of Llibre Vermell has received in three days must prove something. I can't offer higher praise than saying I am sure David Munrow would have been delighted with this new release.

EM Forster mused in Howards End - "I wonder if the day will ever return when music will be treated as music". This highly recommended recording is welcome proof that the only thing that needs to spin in classical music is the CD.

More young voices in early music here.
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EMI - here are my thoughts

Email received - Hi, EMI Classics are running a competition on their site where you can win CDs of your choice from their catalogue if you submit a review of one of their albums. I thought this was something the readers of your blog might be interested in. Please have a look at the link below (deleted) and let me know your thoughts? If you would like to include some information I can send you some assets.

Thanks! Naomi Snuggs
http://www.headstreampr.com/

Naomi, here are my thoughts. You sort out my EMI pension and I'll plug EMI Classics' competition? A deal?
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Handel's Suites are miracles

'Interesting to listen once again to this 'historic' recording. I know the general public didn't really take to it, so that the people who sell these things clearly didn't make any profit (will it suffer the same fate as Berg's Concerto?.) And why? Audiences (in every country) prefer to buy Bach - out of habit - and because, in doing so, they think they are showing 'greater musicality'. They undervalue Handel or else they ignore him completely. During their own lifetimes, it was exactly the opposite. Handel travelled everywhere in a carriage, while Bach humbly played the organ at the Thomas-Kirche.

Now for Gavrilov and Richter. As soon as I started to listen, Gavrilov struck me as infinitely more interesting (in spite of a certain irreproachability to Richter's playing). Everything about his playing is fresher, more alive, freer. There's nothing studied about it. Only occasionally does he allow himself to be carried away by the fortissimo passages, and here he has a tendency to bang.'

Oddly, the friends who were listening with me and to whom I didn't say who was playing what, often thought that Gavrilov was me and vice versa. If I'd not known, I two could have mixed the two of us up. Clearly there's a reciprocal influence here. Be that as it may, these Suites are veritable miracles, laminated in gold but with virtually no patina.

From Sviatoslav Richter's Notebooks and Conversations edited by Bruno Monsaingeon. Richter, who was the mystery source of my Xenakis quote, kept detailed notes on concerts and recordings he heard by a wide range of performers and composers. There is an almost Zen like avoidance of duality in his observations on music ranging Bach to Boulez and Stockhausen. His detachment and openmindedness is a lesson to us all. I wouldn't mind playing the piano like him either.

The recordings of the Handel Keyboard Suites that he made in 1982 with Gavrilov are indeed veritable miracles. Despite his lack of confidence in their longevity they are still in the catalogue here and here. But given the current shenanigans at EMI that may not last. If they are not in your collection buy them while you can.

Now read what happened to Andrei Gavrilov.
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Proud to be a music anorak

Nice to see classical vinyl generating excitement in today's Guardian, but not sure about the headline - 'A music anorak's treasure trove' which suggests classical music is some kind of nasty habit. Also it appears from the piece that the Guardian (and BBC's) Tom Service doesn't have a record deck. I'll let you into a secret. I don't have an iPod, but I do have a Thorens TD125, which I guess also makes me a turntable anorak.

Elsewhere in the Guardian a late tribute to Herbert von Karajan adds little original but is good for a laugh with my old EMI colleague Peter Alward describing Karajan as 'very shy, a simple man with simple tastes'. Which is the best description of a very large yacht and Falcon 10 executive jet I've ever come across.
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The pilgrim enters the celestial city

The sad news comes from America of the death of the baritone John Noble after a long illness. He was born in 1931 and studied mathematics at Cambridge University. While still a student at Cambridge in 1954 he sung the part of Pilgrim in Ralph Vaughan William's The Pilgrim's Progress and went on to a professional career which included singing the role in the EMI recording under Sir Adrian Boult in 1970/71.

The header photo above was taken in the Kingsway Hall control room during the recording and John Noble is in the centre foreground with, from left to right, Ursula Vaughan Williams, Christopher Bishop (producer), Sir Adrian Boult, Ian Partridge, Gloria Jennings, Christopher Parker (balance engineer), in front John Alldis (chorus master) and Sheila Armstrong.

John Noble's other recordings included Britten's Albert Herring for Decca, Verdi's Macbeth and Don Carlos for HMV, and Finzi's In Terra Pax for Lyrita. He also frequently sung the role of the Christus in the Matthew Passion and movingly passed away on Good Friday. His funeral is on April 8, which quite appropriately is Sir Adrian Boult's birthday.

Lead me, Lord, make my ways straight before my face.
And let all men that put their trust in Thee rejoice.
From Act 3 Scene 2 of Ralph Vaughan Williams' The Pilgrims Progress

With thanks to Mr. J. Vaughan. Photo credits Godfrey McDominic/EMI. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

No flowers please for Herbert von Karajan

Few musicians have generated such a mixture of respect and revulsion as Herbert von Karajan. It takes Richard Osborne 851 pages in his masterly biography to capture the essence of this extraordinary conductor, entrepreneur and opportunist, and it would be impertinent to even attempt to cover the same ground here. So instead, with the centenary of Karajan's birth falling on April 5, I offer this personal vignette from my time at EMI, which I hope in some small way illustrates the conundrum that was this extraordinary man.

During the late 1970s the Machiavellian Karajan had carefully nurtured a deadly rivalry between EMI and his other contract company, Deutsche Grammophon. This meant that EMI had, at very considerable expense, outbid DG for the four act version of Verdi's Don Carlos with José Carreras and Mirella Freni, and Debussy's Pelléas et Méliande with Frederica von Stade and Richard Stilwell. Pélleas was a personal passion of Karajan, and because of this he agreed to make a very rare personal appearance to promote the release of the recording when he was in London in 1979 on a Berlin Philharmonic tour.

It fell to a small team headed by me to organise a 'money no object' Karajan event to prove that anything Deutsche Grammophon could do EMI could do better. At this point I have to confess that several of us were slightly ambivalent about Karajan's personality if not his music making, so we decided that the event should mirror the maestro and be just a little bit over the top. Karajan and his Berlin band were rehearsing in the Royal Festival Hall with one of their 'drive-thru' programmes, including Ein Heldenleben if my memory serves me right. So we booked the Abraham Lincoln Room (yes really) in the outrageously expensive Savoy Hotel directly across the Thames from the hall.

The whole event was organised like a military operation, my plan of action is reproduced at the foot of the article. EMI's Abbey Road Studios provided copy masters of the Don Carlos and Pelléas recordings and tape machines to play them on while KEF supplied monitor speakers. Frederica von Stade and Richard Stilwell also agreed to attend, and eighty leading music journalists accepted the personalised invitation seen below

Our over the top plans included equipping all my team with personal radios (this was decades before cell phones) and communicating with each other military style, with HvK code-named The Eagle. Staff were stationed at the stage door of the Festival Hall to brief us when Karajan was en route, and the company's limo with vanity plates EMI 1 was used to transport the conductor. (Those were the days of company limos, I bet everyone in EMI today has a Tata except Guy Hands). We were explicitly told that the maestro did not eat in public, so the journos were fed the most expensive buffet in company history while Karjan enjoyed a hero's life across the river.

Bang on time the Eagle appeared at the Savoy and Peter Andry, director of EMI's International Classical Division, who was also my boss and a Karajan confidant, chaired a flawless presentation which included the conductor talking passionately about Pélleas, a stunning playback of the love duet from the opera, and questions from the journalists. The header photo was taken at the end of the presentation and Peter Andry is with Karajan; it is from my personal files and may not have been published before.

As the presentation ended Andry thanked Karajan and the conductor left the platform to lively applause. Then came the pièce de résistance. My indefatigable secretary was stationed to the side with a bouquet of the Savoy's finest flowers which probably cost the equivalent of half EMI's current classical recording budget. Only one problem; nobody had told us that as well as not eating in public the maestro did not accept flowers in public. Karajan rudely brushed Rosemary aside and fled for the door leaving a very red-faced secretary clutching a huge bunch of flowers watched by eighty highly amused journalists.

So there we have Herbert von Karajan. Inspired music maker and totally self-serving personality. Even after almost thirty years I can't hear the love duet from Pelléas without thinking of the cost of those flowers.

Happy birthday maestro, wherever you are.


* I will be celebrating the Contemporary Karajan on Future Radio at 5.00pm on April 6 and 12.50am on April 7 with a programme of twentieth-century classics conducted by him. The music is:
~ Alban Berg – Three pieces from the “Lyric Suite”
~ Arthur Honegger – Symphony No 3

Lots more Karajan links here. Peter Andry, who is seen in my header photo with Karajan, master-minded many great EMI recordings including one of my personal favourites, Karajan's 1970 Dresden Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg. Before joining EMI Andry was a Decca producer and his recording of the Ernest Bloch String Quartets should be in every CD collection. Read more about it here.

All images and text (c) On An Overgrown Path 2008 and not to be reproduced without prior written permission. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Free music - so what's new?

'Music industry finds the solution to its pirate troubles - give everything away' - screams a Guardian headline. Sorry folks, but the classical sector has been giving away music for years. Here from my current Visa bill are the prices I paid for CDs online recently including delivery: Messiaen Des canyons aux étoiles (2CDs) - £4.00, Dallapiccola choral works - £3.41, Stockhausen piano works - £4.22, Elgar Dream of Gerontius (2CDs) - £5.67.

It actually gets worse in the stores. Just last week I bought 10CDs of Thomas Tallis' complete works in recordings made as recently as 2004 for £3 a CD, and that wasn't discounted. In HMV stores you can currently pick up 14CDs of the complete Mahler symphonies by classical music's premium brands, Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic, for £1.79 a disc. That means a Mahler CD from our industry's most prestigous band now costs less than a cappuccino, and it's not expanding the market for classical music or filling concert halls at all.

So with prices already at rock-bottom what will be the impact of free downloads from Qtrax and others? Classical music will become just another disposable commodity. Download it, give it a quick listen, it doesn't appeal on first hearing? No problem, delete it and try again. Contemporary composers had better start thinking catchy, and record companies (if any survive) had better start thinking instant gratification.

Benjamin Britten had it nailed when he wrote 'Music demands more from a listener than simply the possession of a tape-machine or a transistor radio. It demands some preparation, some effort, a journey to a special place, saving up for a ticket, some homework on the programme perhaps, some clarification of the ears and sharpening of the instincts. It demands as much effort on the listener's part as the other two corners of the triangle, this holy composer, performer and listener'

So what does a dead composer (European to boot) know about today's market with its MP3s and iTunes? The answer is a lot. Britten wasn't just a composer, he was a musical polymath whose vision created one of the few successful, and growing, classical music communities in the world. Last year Aldeburgh Music sold 91,000 tickets. I wonder how many bargain basement Berlin Philharmonic Mahler boxes EMI has sold in the UK - 5000 perhaps? The solution for the music industry isn't to give everything away. It's the opposite. Think added value, think Glossa, think Soli deo Gloria, but above all think Alia Vox.

Now playing is Jordi Savall's newly released Francisco Javier 1506-1553, the Route to the Orient on Alia Vox. Yes, it comes with 2CDs of lovingly researched and performed music, but there is much more in the form of a 273 page colour book (cover above) which is a work of art in itself. In it there are fascinating and scholarly articles ranging from early music performance, to Erasmus of Rotterdam, Niccolo Machiavelli, Thomas More, and Martin Luther, as well as Francisco Xavier, who was an early Jesuit missionary, himself. And the whole package is worth far more than the sum of the parts. I paid £30 for it in Prelude Records in Norwich, and that is the best £30 I have spent on recorded music for a long time. I didn't get two CDs for my money, I got a unique musical experience. And that is what will rejuvenate the market, not giveaways.

Britten would have approved. The Route to the Orient is about as far from instant gratification as you can go. It demands preparation by reading the book, and it also demands effort to understand the non-Western music that it explores. You must leave your computer and take a journey to a special place called an independent record store to buy it, and you will also need to save up as it is not available online at a discount or as a download. The thoughtfully planned multi-cultural programme needs to be understood, and clarification of the ears and sharpening of the instincts are definitely needed for close encounters with instruments such as the shinobue, nokan, sarod and shakuhachi.

Are added value projects like Francisco Javier, the Route to the Orient and Christopher Columbus, Lost Paradises (below) the future of classical music? Or are they just small ripples in a big pond? Only time will tell. But I haven't heard Alia Vox talking about mass redundancies, and their 2008 release schedule looks pretty healthy. Which is more than can be said for EMI.


It was Philip Glass who said world music is the new classical.
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Swollen orchestral manner and poor taste

'A lengthy, pompous, bourgeois sort of thing; it reflects the complacency and stodginess of the era of the antimacassar and pork-pie bonnets; it is affected by the poor taste and the swollen orchestral manner of the post-romantics' - Olin Downes reviews John Barbirolli's performance of Elgar's Second Symphony with the New York Philharmonic on 23rd March, 1939.

Music critics will always differ. George Bernard Shaw thought Elgar was carrying on Beethoven's business, and leading musicians had some interesting opinions about Elgar's music.
Sorry about the sleeve. This is one of the first CD releases of Boult's last recording of Elgar's masterly E flat symphony. EMI simply took the original LP artwork and ruined it with that logo. James the joiner is prancing around in Italy so the LP sleeve didn't get scanned in. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Mahler with such human warmth and soul

'A greater triumph awaited (Sir John Barbirolli) in January 1963 when he conducted Mahler's Ninth Symphony. Mahler was not often played in Berlin, and the (Berlin Philharmonic) orchestra frankly confess that they did not particularly like his music - 'but,' said one of the principals, 'Sir John made us love it as much as he did himself and we played it as he wanted.' So well, indeed, that a leading Berlin critic wrote: 'Not since Furtwängler have we heard such human warmth and soul combined with superb musicianship.'

The orchestra themselves asked that Barbirolli should record the symphony with them, the first English conductor to record with the Berlin Philharmonic since Beecham in 1937. During the cold January of 1964 this famous recording was made in the Jesus-Christuskirche, in the suburb of Dahlem' - from Barbirolli, the Authorised Biography by Michael Kennedy.

Sir John Barbirolli's Mahler Nine is currently available in the EMI Great Recordings of the Century Series, and for once the record company hype is more than justified. That Berlin critic really said it all - such human warmth and soul combined with superb musicianship. Barbirolli's account ranks alongside Bruno Maderna's as one of the the greatest performances of the symphony committed to record, and easily overshadows Herbert von Karajan's two later versions with the Berlin orchestra.

It is forgotten today that Karajan's classic EMI recording of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, made in East Germany with the Staatskapelle Dresden, was originally planned for Barbirolli. But in 1968 Rafael Kubelik asked fellow musicians not to conduct in countries which supported the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia. Barbirolli withdrew from the proposed recording, leaving the door open to the opportunist Karajan.

The ghastly sleeve design in the header image is my original 1989 CD copy. Ominously the sound was digitally 're-engineered' in 2002. I haven't heard the result, but I cannot see how the original CD mastering could be improved on, or indeed why it needed 're-engineering'. The recording in Jesus-Christuskirche, Berlin was produced by Ronald Kinloch Anderson, and the sound engineer was Ernst Rothe from the local German EMI company. Glorious sound on my copy, glorious playing, and a glorious interpretation.

Today, Mahler recordings are just another box to be ticked as conductors progress towards superstardom. It was very different in 1964. And there is not much human warmth and soul in EMI these days as new private equity owner Guy Hands prepares to cut up to a third of EMI's 5500 staff. Much has been made in the press of the concerns of EMI's rock artists, but there has been no mention of the priceless classical back-catalogue that is now in the hands of the asset strippers. Snap up Barbirolli's Mahler while you can, and also the new release of Thomas Adès' Violin Concerto before somebody gets their Hands on it.

Too many dead Europeans? Try Glorious John in New York.
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In Memoriam Klaus Tennstedt

+ Klaus Tennstedt, born June 6, 1926, died January 11, 1998. Biography here, discography here.
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If I were predicting the future ...

On July 28, 2007 Overgrown Path ran a story saying 'The BBC is launching “Proms Idol ... the winner of the BBC2 show will take charge of an orchestra during the Last Night Of The Proms at the Royal Albert Hall next year.

Today's Guardian reveals 'The BBC has just commissioned a new reality TV series called Maestro, in which seven celebrity would-be conductors will go head-to-head on the podium before orchestras and choirs. The winner of the series, expected to air on BBC2 this summer, will step up to conduct an orchestra during the Last Night of the Proms at London's Royal Albert Hall in September'.

On February 1, 2006 Overgrown Path ran a story predicting Classical music nightclubs are the way to go, and followed it up on June 9, 2007 with a report about live classical music in nightclub.

Today's Guardian runs a double page spread on how Cool young clubbers in Berlin are flocking to a night with a twist: all the music is classical, and orchestras play live.

On January 7, 2008 Overgrown Path ran a story saying 'If early music is the surprise of 2008 perhaps EMI's new owners will make their acquired assets work for them by releasing a box of the complete David Munrow recordings with decent documentation instead of sub-licensing them for peanuts to other companies while also giving them away piecemeal on their own budget label?

Today's Guardian runs a story headlined Artists' ally makes his exit from EMI.

On January 14, 2007 Overgrown Path ran a story about Taser stun guns headlined The zeitgeist of the YouTube generation.

Today's Guardian runs a full page story headlined 'For those who like a little music with their personal protection: the Taser that plays MP3s'.

As Norman Lebrecht wrote in the Evening Standard on 8 November, 2006 'Until bloggers deliver hard facts … paid for newspapers will continue to set the standard as the only show in town.'

If I were predicting the future ...
Photo of where the Overgrown Path begins (c) On An Overgrown Path 2008. And yes, that is this post on the screens - I was predicting my next article. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Exclusive - David Munrow on the record

My Future Radio programme on Sunday December 30th takes an exclusive look at David Munrow on the record. In the early 1970s the scores for the BBC TV series The Six Wives of Henry VIII and Elisabeth R brought David Munrow’s music to millions. His Pied Piper radio programme was broadcast four times a week for five years, he presented a successful TV series, and wrote the scores for several major feature films including Ken Russell’s The Devils and the film version of HenryVIII (sleeve below).


David Munrow's interest in early music started when he taught in Peru before going up to Cambridge. He combined reading English at Pembroke College with independent studies of Renaissance and medieval music, and went on to form his famous Early Music Consort of London. Under his leadership the Early Music Consort became best-selling recording artists, and David Munrow’s records were considered so important that copies of them were sent to Saturn on board two NASA spacecraft in 1976.


Today David Munrow is remembered by the records he made for EMI that started in 1971 with the LP Two Renaissance Dance Bands. He was brought to EMI by their double Grammy winning recording producer Christopher Bishop (above left) who produced Munrow's first records for EMI, and who also worked with Carlo Maria Giulini, André Previn, Yehudi Menuhin, Sir Adrian Boult and many other great musicians. Christopher Bishop is my guest on Future Radio on Sunday December 30th, and he will be giving listeners an exclusive look at David Munrow on the record. The photo above shows Christopher with me in the Future Radio studios looking at the album Two Renaissance Dance Bands.

As well as discussing David Munrow's work we will be playing his recordings. These will include an excerpt from a rare early tape of Christopher Bishop conducting his own London Madrigal Singers and the Munrow Recorder Consort in a Weelkes madrigal. David Munrow on the record will be broadcast on the Sunday after Christmas, December 30th, at 5.00pm UK time, listen here in real time. The interview will be available as an Overgrown Path podcast after the broadcast.


Playlist for David Munrow on the record, Dec 30, 2007:
* Thomas Weelkes: Hark all ye lovely Saints, 3.00", London Madrigal Singers and Munrow Recorder Consort conducted by Christopher Bishop - BBC Third Programme recording 1970
* Tylman Susato: 12 Dances from the Danserye
La Mourisque, 1.13"
Branle Quatre - Bransles, 1.38"
Rondo & Salterelle, 1.34"
from Two Renaissance Dance Bands LP EMI HQS 1249 (Reissued as Pleasures of the Court)
* David Munrow: Henry VIII and his Six Wives
Pastime with good company, 1.32"
Joust, 2.34"
from Henry VIII and his Six Wives LP HMV CSD 9001
* Johann Sebastian Bach: Brandenburg Concerto No. 4, 3rd movement, Sir Adrian Boult conducting London Philharmonic Orchestra, 5.08" from LP EMI SLS 866
* Giuseppe Sammartini: Concerto in F major, 3rd movement Neville Marriner conducting Academy of St Martin in the Fields, 4.05" from LP HMV ASD 3028

For a range of David Munrow resources follow this link.
Hear David Munrow on the record on Future Radio on Sunday December 30 at 5.00pm UK time (convert to local time zones here). Listen by launching the Radeo internet player from the right side-bar, or via the audio stream. Convert time to your local time zone using this link. Windows Media Player doesn't like the audio stream very much and takes ages to buffer. WinAmp or iTunes handle it best. Unfortunately the royalty license doesn't permit on-demand replay, so you have to listen in real time. If you are in the Norwich, UK area tune to 96.9FM.

With thanks to Future Radio for making the programme possible, and in particular to Dan Nyman editor extraordinaire. Also thanks, again, to James the joiner for the sleeve scans. Studio photograph (c) On An Overgrown Path 2007. Other copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

His Master's Voice and staff pensions

Dear pension fund member,

EMI Group Pension Fund

As you are probably aware, EMI Group plc has been taken over by Maltby Limited, a company set up by the Terra Firma group. The takeover was completed on 17 August 2007 and EMI Group plc has subsequently been delisted from the London Stock Exchange.

Despite its best efforts over a period of months, both preceding and immediately following the takeover, the Trustee Board of the EMI Group Pension Fund has not been able to reach agreement with the new owner regarding the funding of, and security available to, the Fund from 1 April 2006 (31 March 2006 is the date of the last funding valuation). Accordingly the Trustee has referred the matter to The Pensions Regulator who will initiate proper process for resolution under UK legislation. This is the normal procedure when a sponsoring company and trustees of a pension fund cannot agree the valuation basis and the contributions required.

We shall keep you informed as to developments and, in the meantime, please be assured that the Company is continuing to contribute to the Fund on the basis agreed with the Trustee at the previous valuation. This letter is for information only and no action is required on your part.

Yours sincerely
EMI Group Pension Trustees Ltd
3 October 2007

Photo taken in Vaison la Romaine market by Pliable, (c) On An Overgrown Path 2007. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Rostropovich – reaching out for the music

There are three ways of knowing a thing. Take for instance a flame. One can be told of the flame, one can see the flame with his own eyes, and finally one can reach out and be burned by it – Sufi scholar.

Some of us are told of music, some of us can see music, but Mstislav Rostropovich, who died today age 80, reached out and was burnt by it. I first met him after he conducted a wildly exuberant performance of Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony with the Snape Maltings Training Orchestra in 1977. Rostropovich had a long-standing relationship with the Aldeburgh Festival, and with its founder Benjamin Britten, who had died the previous year. This relationship had produced the Cello Symphony, the Cello Suites, and a Cello Sonata, all of which Britten wrote for the Russian cellist.

Back in the 1970s I was working for EMI, and Slava’s relationship with the company went back to 1956 when he recorded the Miaskovsky Cello Concerto. In 1974 Rostropovich and his wife, soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, left the Soviet Union, and the following year he recorded the two Haydn Cello Concertos, with Neville Marriner and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, in the Henry Wood Hall in London for EMI.

At that time EMI’s famous International Classical Division, which had been founded by Walter Legge, was housed in modest offices in Hanover Square, just off London's Oxford Street, I was EMI’s international marketing manager working for the division’s director, Peter Andry, who had masterminded several legendary ‘east meets west’ recordings, including Karajan’s Dresden Meistersinger and the Berlin Beethoven Triple Concerto with Richter, Oistrak and Rostropovich.

For me, an incident away from the recording studio showed the difference between Rostropovich and other superstar musicians. We decided to celebrate the release of the Haydn record by inviting Slava to the EMI offices in 1977 to present him with the lavish EMI-Pathé gatefold edition of the concertos. The visit summed up Slava’s approach to life - energy, enthusiasm, passion, but above all a love for music and a love for the human race. He made sure he spent time talking to all the background staff who rarely came into contact with the artists, yet alone superstars. We were working with many other great musicians at the time, but the prospect of Herbert von Karajan visiting our offices, yet alone hugging a secretary was unthinkable.

Others will document Rostropovich’s career and achievements in more detail, and in particular his work defending human and artistic freedoms. We are fortunate that he leaves such a fine recorded legacy as a cellist. He went on to achieve much as a conductor, but the electricity he radiated from the podium was difficult to transfer to recordings. I can remember discussions at EMI as to whether his 1970s Tchaikovsky Symphony cycle should be remastered, as the pressings somehow lacked the frisson of the actual performances.

In the later years his energy was occasionally misplaced, and his fee as a conductor became an obstacles with some promoters, restricting his appearances at important series such as the BBC Promenade Concerts. The last time I saw him was in London several years ago with the Lithuanian Ballet, when he conducted a staged performance of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet that ended with a bizarre mis en scene with Rostropovich joining the dead lovers on stage in the final bars.

Mstislav Rostropovich will be remembered as a genius with the cello and baton, as a champion of human rights, as a consummate ambassador for music, and above all for his love for humanity. He truly reached out and was burnt by the music, let us celebrate that today.

Slava's Russian roots informed everything he did, now read about Western takes on Russian music.
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A tale of two Chavez

Many column inches here, and elsewhere, devoted to the music education and freedom of press policies of Venezuelan president Hugo Chavéz. Wouldn't some of them be better spent reappraising the music of his namesake, Mexican composer Carlos Chavéz?

Carlos Chavéz (photo above) was born in 1899, and lived to 1978. During the mid-20th century he was a major influence on the Mexican musical scene, and his important achievements include the formation of the Orquesta Sinfónia del Estado de México. His early works coincided with the period of post-revolutionary government in Mexico when Indian music and indigenous culture became a prized national asset. The Sinfonia India is the second of Chavéz's seven symphonies. The single movement work was completed in 1936, and incorporates authentic Indian melodies from the state of Sonora. The scoring is Indian exotic, including maraca, Yaqui metal rattle, water gourd, tenabri (butterfly cocoons), teponaxtles (a member of the xylophone family), a rattling string of deer hooves, tlapanhuehuetl (bass drum) and rasping stick, as well as full orchestra.

I must declare an interest in this symphony. During the 1980s I spent some time in Mexico helping develop the classical music market in that wonderful country. For that project EMI recorded Chavéz's Sinfonia India as part of a two LP project Music of Mexico featuring 20th century works by local composers. The conductor was Enrique Batiz (left), with the Orquesta Sinfónia del Estado de México. The sessions were produced by Brian Culverhouse in the Sala Nezahualcoyotu in Mexico City. The vinyl LP of Sinfonia India plays as I write, and still sounds quite magnificent with all those wonderful percussion colours. If we want to celebrate the musical achievements of Latin America let's pay some more attention to Carlos Chavez and the other Mexican composers featured on those long deleted records.

* Music of Mexico Volume 1 was released in 1981:
Silvestre Revueltas (1899-1940): Sensemayá
José Pablo Moncayo: (1912-1958) Huapango
Revueltas: Homage to Federico Garcia Lorca
Chavéz: Sinfonia India
This release had a gatefold sleeve, and it was used to full advantage to display an allegorical mural by the Mexican revolutionary artist Diego Rivera depicting the independence of Mexico. Those were the days when sleeve art was art! View the mural via this link.

Volume 2 was released in 1984:
Revueltas: Redes
Revueltas: Ocho por Radio
Blas Galindo (1910-1993): Suite, Homenaje a Cervantes
Rodolfo Halffter (1900-1987): Tripartia

EMI departed from their usual practice of shipping the recording equipment and house production team out to Mexico City from England. Instead freelance Brian Culverhouse acted both as producer and balance engineer, and the digital recording equipment was supplied by Soundstream, Inc from the US.

Now read about a composer from Cuba - Odaline de la Martinez
Image credit, from an excellent online biography of Carlos Chavéz. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Exclusive - a little piece of recording history

© C. Bishop & On An Overgrown Path
2006 brings the thirtieth anniversary of the death of early music legend David Munrow. Above, in advance of the article I'm running next week, is an exclusive piece of recording history. The image is scanned from the recording diary of Christopher Bishop who signed Munrow to EMI and produced many of his classic recordings. The second entry down is for the sessions for the Art of Courtly Love in November and December 1972, and December 1973. These resulted in the three LP set that catapulted David Munrow to prominence.

The pencil diary entries haven't reproduced too clearly, but the artists in the other sessions make interesting reading - Perlman, Giulini (including the Missa Solemnis which I wrote about recently), King's College Choir and Sir David Willcocks, Oistrakh, Boult, Evelyn Barbirolli and Menuhin.

Those were the days, now the best EMI can offer us is Wild.

Report broken links, missing images and other errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk
Image credit - © C. Bishop & On An Overgrown Path
If you enjoyed this post take An Overgrown Path to David Munrow and the Voyager golden record