Honey I shrunk the soloist

Youth was the musical 'must have' in 2007. Could marriage be the musical 'must have' in 2008? My favourite Christmas disc this year was Ton Koopman playing Christmas Carols on the baroque Van Peteghem organ in St. Martinuskerk, Haringe, Belgium. Wonderful music from Sweelink, Buxtehude, Bull and Bach, wonderful playing by Koopman on the 1778 organ, with wonderful sound from producer Tini Mathot, who just happens to be Mrs Koopman, and the CD really is a family affair as it is released on Koopman's own Antoine Marchand record label. Tini Mathot is a distinguished keyboard player in her own right, and she is seen above playing alongside her husband. I last heard them together several years ago playing the Art of Fugue on two harpsichords ago in the peerless acoustics of St George's Brandon Hill, Bristol.

Tini Mathot and Ton Koopman are the latest in a distinguished line of couples who have worked together as performers and producers. There are Isabella de Sabata and John Eliot Gardiner at Soli deo Gloria, and Montserrat Figueras and Jordi Savall at Alia Vox (photo below), like Mathot and Koopman both couples work in the early music field, what is it about gut strings? They were preceeded by Joan Sutherland and Richard Bonynge, and of course Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Walter Legge. Reminders of other husband and wife performer and production teams please. And yes, I know about Joyce Hatto and William Barrington-Coupe, while Carla Bruni and Nicolas Sarkozy don't count, even if the bling-bling President's son is a hip hop producer.


Judging by the number of mentions in recent weeks Belgium is the 'must have' country for 2008. Check out these links, and we are off there next month for John Cage, Morton Feldman et al.
Photo credit Trigonale early music festival. 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

A title given by the Gods

Many musicians have wondered why Boulez used the German title Cummings ist der Dichter for a work based on an English poem. Here is the answer; "I was commissioned to write a piece for the festival at Ulm. I couldn't find a title for the work when they asked me what to print on the program. In a letter in German - my German was not very good at that time - I wrote: 'I have not chosen a title yet, but what I can tell you is this: Cummings is the poet.' A reply came from a German secretary who had misunderstood my letter: 'As for your new work, Cummings ist der Dichter....' I found that mistake so wonderful that I thought, well, then, that's a title given by the Gods" ~ from Boulez - Composer, Conductor, Enigma by Joan Peyser (Schirmer ISBN 0028717007)

Pierre Boulez (above) will be one of the composers in my Overgrown Path webcast on Sunday August 19 on Future Radio. I am playing his Rituel in Memoriam Bruno Maderna bookended by Bach. The opening work is Webern's orchestration of the Ricercara from the Musical Offering, BWV 1079/5, and the closing work is the cantata for the fourth Sunday after Easter, BWV 108, in a performance by the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists conducted by John Eliot Gardiner. The webcast is from 5.00 to 6.00pm British Summer Time on Sunday August 19, click here for the audio stream.

For the full story of Rituel in Memoriam Maderna follow this path.
Convert webcast times to your local time zone using this link. Windows Media Player doesn't like the 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 happen to be in the Norwich, UK area tune to 96.9FM.Photograph credit Richard Oliver. 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

Soli Deo Gardiner

The BBC Proms welcomes Sir John Eliot Gardiner on Sunday. Or do they? Former Proms director and BBC Controller of Music, the late John Drummond, takes up the story:

" John Eliot Gardiner (left) had a strong personal following. For me, both Roger Norrington and Nikolaus Harnoncourt were much more impressive conductors, but Gardiner’s Monteverdi Choir Prom would usually sell out and give us our annual chance to have a falling out with Gardiner himself, whose lofty attitude to colleagues and the BBC did not endear. One year he proposed Gluck’s Orfeo. I took it largely to obtain the Proms debut of the American soprano Sylvia McNair, whom I had much admired since hearing her at St Louis. She made a dramatic entrance at the top of the side stairs, dressed in a brilliant lemon-yellow dress. Slowly descending the staircase, she reached the stage for her entrance aria. At this moment, Gardiner stopped the orchestra and retuned. I was furious: it was so grotesquely offensive and unmusical. When I went round to commiserate with Sylvia, she told me he had done it at every one of the preceding performances.

One year Gardiner persuaded me to accept a performance of the Bach B minor Mass without soloists, using members of his own excellent Monteverdi Choir for the solos. Much as I admired the choir, I was not entirely sure that individual members could carry such major parts in such a big building. However, I need not have worried. Without reference to the Proms office or any regard for the financial implications, Gardiner changed his mind and booked a roster of five distinguished soloists which cost me thousands. He was quite unapologetic, and I was considered impertinent to have questioned his judgement. His judgement was probably correct; his manner of achieving it was unacceptable.

Gardiner’s extraordinary arrogance was admirably demonstrated at a Gramophone magazine awards ceremony when, claiming he had to get back to Paris for rehearsals, he insisted that his award should be presented separately and before the celebratory lunch. He was nevertheless still in his place at table when the ceremony ended some three hours later."

As told by John Drummond's in his autobiography Tainted By Experience (Faber ISBN 0571200540).

Now playing – Haydn’s The Creation, with John Eliot Gardiner conducting the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque soloists. He may be ‘extraordinarily arrogant’ but Gardiner can make some extraordinarily moving music. This recording won Gramophone and CD Compact (Barcelona) awards when it was released in 1997. It was recorded in All Saints Church, Tooting by producer Karl-August Naegler and Tonmeister Rainer Maillard. The performance is superb, and the sound is also superb. It has recently been re-released in Archiv’s new Grand Prix mid-price series and is highly recommended. John Eliot Gardiner went on to have a spectacular bust-up with Deutsche Grammophon, a split which resulted in the creation of his own label Soli Deo Gloria. It seems tantrums are written into the score in the early music world. As John Drummond recalls Sylvia McNair may have found Gardiner’s treatment of her in Orfeo “grotesquely offensive and unmusical”. But she went on to sing the role of Gabriel in his recording of The Creation.

Now read John Drummond on another high profile maestro.
Any copyrighted material on these pages is included for "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

Forty part feast is BBC Proms highlight

Read all BBC Proms posts via this link.


The BBC Proms season starts on Friday, July 13. Here are Pliable's personal picks from the first week's concerts. This fallible selection will be a regular weekly feature through the summer, detailed programmes and broadcast times for every concert are available from the BBC web site - enjoy.

* July 15, 7.00pm - a welcome multi-cultural performance with the Buskaid Soweto String Ensemble joining John Eliot Gardiner, the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists in Campra's Messe de Requiem and a feast of Rameau. More on JEG in tomorrow's path.

* July 16, 7.30pm - Berio's Sinfonia from the Chorus and Orchestra of the Academy of Santa Cecilia and the Swingle Singers under Antonio Pappano.

* July 17, 7.00pm - Bernstein's Symphony No. 2, The Age of Anxiety and Ives' Symphony No. 4 from the BBC Symphony Orchestra under David Robertson.

* July 17, 10.15pm - one of my highlights of the whole season. Striggio, Lassus and Tallis sung by The Tallis Scholars. Includes Striggio's 40 part Ecce beatam lucem, which will be the subject of a separate feature here.

Now follow this path for another forty part feast
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

Music-like-water

A world where music is available via the latest technologies for a single monthly subscription charge. A world with unlimited access to a huge range of music. A world where the music business will explode and reinvent itself. A world where listeners are empowered, and the reach of new music is limited only by your own imagination. A world where the major record companies aren’t invited to the party. A world where music becomes a utility on tap, just like gas and electricity. A world where music is like water.

No, Pliable hasn’t been on the wacky backy again. Music-like-water is the title of a really thought provoking paper from Gerd Leonhard published on New Music Box, the web magazine of the American Music Center. (And many thanks to Garth Trinkl who blogs at Renaissance Research for bringing it to my attention). Leonhard is the founder of ThinkAndLink, a consultancy working in the area of convergence between the entertainment and technology sectors. When he is not future-gazing Leonhard is a pretty mean guitarist and composer, and winner of a Quincy Jones Award. His blog is also worth a visit.

The main thrust of Leonhard’s paper is that consumers are now taking charge of their own entertainment, and the borders between performance and copy, and access and ownership have been crossed. He says the music business is rapidly moving towards a flat charge for access, and away from the historic, and clumsy, pay per performance model. A flat charge for access is how utility providers operate, and is where his catchy music-like-water moniker comes from. Leonhard predicts that once distribution is no longer a barrier to entry, the music market will explode. And the traditional record companies will be left for dead as new players control the flow of music-like-water.

Fanciful? Unlikely to happen in our lifetime? Harmless crystal ball gazing? I don’t think so. Music-like-water has already arrived. Just last week mobile (cell) phone operator T-Mobile announced an 18 month deal with Robbie Williams, which will make some of his songs and concert footage available exclusively over the phone network - presumably music will follow.

I have already written about Naxos Radio. This subscription service is pure music-like-water. It has 60 channels of different classical music genres, with each offering 100 hours of unduplicated music at 64Kpbs, which is pretty close to CD quality. All channels are commercial free, and new recordings are added at around 50 per month. And now Naxos are starting to loan recordings through public libraries. They are already a global force with a dominant share of classical CD sales in most major markets worldwide as the following figures show: UK - 15%, Finland - 40%, Sweden - 50%, Norway - 50%, Denmark -30%, Canada - 25%, Greece - 45%, South Africa - 45%, Spain - 20% and Germany - 20%. In the United States, Soundscan lists Naxos as the leading independent classical music label. Naxos’ business model is music-like-water, and it is here today.

The BBC has one of the three best known brand names in the world. They have a guaranteed war-chest from a poll tax on UK residents (disguised as a license fee) of nearly £3 billion ($5.5 billion) a year. The BBC will have an increasing impact outside the UK as music-like-water flows uninterrupted across geographic boundaries. Inside information leaked from the BBC in the last few days indicates that more than half of the much-trumpeted 1.4 million Beethoven MP3 files went to US downloaders. (Personally I am not convinced that this music giveaway was the best possible use of the £126.50 ($230US) annual license fee I have to pay the BBC. Particularly when 3780 of their staff are being cut to save costs, and domestic programming is full of cost saving repeats.)

The BBC has complete control, including broadcasts, public performances, touring, and programmes, of five leading orchestras, plus the BBC Singers. They also have total control over the world's largest music festival, the BBC Promenade Concerts. This employs musicians ranging from the Berlin Philharmonic to Ravi Shankar.

The BBC has one of the largest commissioning budgets for new music, with an annual spend in excess of £350,000 ($630,000). This commissioning budget is larger than the turnover of many independent record companies. It is quite wonderful that the BBC is able to fund the creation of so much new music, and this year's new music feast at the Proms is an excellent example of money very well spent. But conversely, misuse of their commissioning budget and programming authority can stifle new talent. This allegedly happened to tonal composer Robert Simpson, and others, in the 1970's under the regime of progressive Director of Music William Glock and modernist Principal Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra Pierre Boulez. The BBC is already supplying every channel through which music can flow - live music making, CDs, DVD’s, satellite, FM, AM, web and on-demand broadcasts, music book and magazine publishing and MP3 files. The BBC’s business model is music-like-water, and it is here today.

Gerd Leonhard says that in the new music-like-water order “all music, all artists will be in those pipelines.” And this is where we start to differ. Dream on Gerd. Music-like-water won’t bring a utopia where every recording, of every work, by every composer from Evaristo Abaco to Johann Zumsteeg, is available via the technology of your choice. What will happen, no what is happening, is the new utility companies become gate keepers. And Pliable’s first sonata for prepared piano and vihuela won’t get through the gate unless I cut a deal with the keeper. And financially that means I am better off clearing tables in a fast food joint than composing music. Pessimism on my part? No, fact. Amazon.com, with their world-wide operating companies, are a global gatekeeper in the brave new books-like-water world. Which means if you are a small specialist book publisher they will surcharge your book before they list it. (Believe me I know, I am also a small publisher). And the global gatekeepers are already flexing their muscles in the music-like-water world. I wonder what role Naxos played in Marin Alsop’s appointment in Baltimore?

Music-like-water is here to stay. And I don’t particularly like the taste of it. But the good news is Pliable doesn’t have to exist on water alone. I prefer music-like-Château Latour. And that also is here today. Volume 24 of the John Elliot Gardiner Bach Cantata Pilgrimage has just arrived chez Pliable. This remarkable project was conceived to bypass a global gatekeeper (Universal Music) who wanted to restrict the flow of music-like-water by shelving Gardiner's visionary Bach Cantata project.

I wrote a very positive post about John Eliot Gardiner’s Soli Deo Gloria record company when their first releases came out. Suffice to say their new double CD of the cantatas for the Third and Fourth Sundays after Easter is a work of art in every respect, and even surpasses the outstanding vintage of the first volumes. Exquisite and tactile packaging that revives the long lost art of sleeve design. Informative and entertaining sleeve notes. Perfect bound slip cases. And the music, the music…..the sinfonia from this recording of BWV 146, recorded in the Schlosskirche Altenburg, with its mighty Trost Organ, is music to die for.

Yea, music-like-water is the way to go. And I’ll keep writing about it while I sip my music-like-Château Latour thanks very much.

And here, courtesy of SDG, is your chance to taste some premier cru music making from Volume 24 of the Bach Cantata Pilgrimage. These are decent length extracts, not the Amazon type snippets. My first paragraph talked about music by subscription. And in a wonderful example of the overgrown path coming full circle the complete cycle of SDG's Bach Cantatas is available by subscription. Which just goes to show that, despite what the futurologists may tell us, there is nothing new under the musical sun - cheers!

Freue Dich Erloste Schar BWV 30 - no. 1 chorus.....
Freue Dich Erloste Schar BWV 30 - no 5 aria (Wilke te Brummelstroete, alto)....
O Ewigkeit du Donnerwort BWV 20 - no.1 chorus....
Die Elenden sollen essen BWV 75 - no 7 chorale....

Was Robert Simpson's music unfairly neglected in the Glock/Boulez era at the BBC? Judge for yourself with these two samples from Hyperion's excellent cycle of his complete symphonies:
Robert Simpson, Symphony no.1 (1951), 1st movement (opening) [4'48]...
Robert Simpson, Symphony no.2 (1956), 3rd movement Allegro grazioso (opening) [3'51]...

Do you think music-like-water is the future? Or will the independent specialists like Soli Deo Gloria continue to set the benchmark? Was Robert Simpson's neglect by the BBC justified?Add your views to this post using the comments feature at the foot.

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And if you enjoyed this post there is more like it at Discovered - the online Arnold Schoenberg jukebox