I'm normally not at all a cynical person

says the assistant principal viola of the Oregon Symphony.
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Songs of freedom

Alex Ross turns to the Venezuela problem, and quotes Canadian composer R. Murray Schafer: "Art within the constraints of a system is political action in favor of that system, regardless of content." I can only agree and re-run this post:


The role of the artist in a society where human rights are denied is a recurring theme On An Overgrown Path. As I write Maria Farandouri sings To Yelasto Pedi from Mikis Theodorakis’ sound track for the 1969 film Z (poster above). This legendary film was a barely fictionalised account of the assassination in 1963 of the Greek socialist politician Gregoris Lambrakis MP, and the film and its soundtrack, became an international symbol of opposition to the Greek military junta. This dictatorship savagely suppressed human rights until its overthrow in 1974, and brought tanks onto the streets of Athens, as is shown below.


The junta was established in April 1967 when right wing army colonels led by George Papadopoulos seized power under the pretence of preventing a communist takeover. The dictatorship received the initial support of King Constantine II, although the King went into exile in December 1967 following the failure of a counter-coup. The King had failed to win support from the US who regarded the military junta as an ally against the nearby Eastern European Soviet bloc. With the Colonels firmly in power human rights were denied, political parties were outlawed, and opponents imprisoned, with Amnesty International estimating that more than 2000 prisoners were tortured. Symbols of western youth culture were banned including rock music, long-hair and atheism.

Mikis Theodorakis was no stranger to opposition and the political left. He had worked in the resistance against the occupying Italian and German forces in World War 2, and was exiled in the subsequent Greek Civil War. After these conflicts he studied music at the Athens Conservatoire, and in Paris with Olivier Messiaen. Following the military junta in 1967 Theodorakis (below) went underground, and his music was banned by military decree. He was imprisoned for five months until an international pressure group including Dmitri Shostakovich, Leonard Bernstein, Arthur Miller, and Harry Belafonte achieved his release, and he went into exile in April 1970. Theodorakis continued his opposition in exile through concerts and by enlisting the support of international leaders, and his sound-track for Z became a rallying call for opponents of the military regime. The film, which was directed by Constantin Costa-Gravas, was hugely important in drawing attention to the junta’s denial of human rights, and I remember it as one of the cult films of my post-university years.

Following the suppression by tanks of a student uprising at Athens Polytechnic in November 1973 (seen in the photo above) popular opposition to the junta gathered momentum. Papadopoulos was overthrown by General Dimitrios Ioannides, who then unsuccessfully attempted to depose the President of Cyprus. This debacle triggered the collapse of the Greek military junta, and democracy was restored with elections in November 1974.

Greece lies on the edge of the Middle Eastern political fault line, and the cataclysmic upheavals in the region since 1974 mean that the dark days of the Colonel’s rule are now largely forgotten. The CBS LP of Theodorakis’ music played by John Williams and sung by Maria Farandouri, and including the Theme from Z, was part of the soundtrack of my life in the 1970s. Seven of the songs are settings of Greek translations of poems by Federico Garcia Lorca, while the Theme from Z sets words from the verse-drama 'The Hostage' by the Irish writer Brendan Behan. Maria Farandouri left Greece in 1967 when the junta banned Theodorakis' music, and she sung in more than 300 protest concerts around the world.

The recording was made by legendary CBS staff producer Paul Myers, and my vinyl copy still sounds quite wonderful today. But by the time the LP catalogues were being transferred to CD in the late 1980s communism was collapsing and the Greek junta was ancient history, so Songs of Freedom didn’t make it onto CD in the major territories. But Theodorakis remains a folk hero in Greece. He was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize in 2000, and opposed NATO’s involvement in Kosovo and the invasion of Iraq, and has been very critical of George W. Bush. More controversially he was also been critical of Israeli Government policies under Ariel Sharon, and this led to accusations of anti-Semitism.

Mikis Theodorakis’ continuing high profile in Greece thankfully means that Songs of Freedom remains in the Sony catalogue in that country, albeit sadly without the original beautiful sleeve art which is reproduced above. But in a chilling timewarp the original English sleeve notes are retained for the CD version, so they read as though the Colonels are still in power! It is available online from the splendid Studio52 in Thessalonika; my copy arrived speedily and cost €12.50 plus shipping.

Songs of Freedom is a classic of the gramophone. It contains very moving performances by two very fine musicians. But more importantly, it is living proof that creative artists have an important role to play when human rights are denied.

Now read about Mikis Theodorakis' Requiem.
Image credits; That wonderful poster for Z from Filmpostersdownunder.com, tank on Athens street from Wikipedia. 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

The conductor who hated compromise

"Futile to await your letter my decision is final. I have only one way of thinking and acting. I hate compromise. I walk and I shall always walk on the straight path that I have traced for myself in life. Cordial greetings." - Cable from Arturo Toscanini to Bruno Walter about Toscanini's refusal to conduct in Salzburg in 1938 because of the links between the German and Austrian Governments.

Photograph from Berlin 1932 is an interesting case study in compromise. Follow the links to find out how they stood the test. From left to right Bruno Walter, Arturo Toscanini, Erich Kleiber, Otto Klemperer and Wilhelm Furtwängler.
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Just Venezuelan youths waving national flags

Patrick J. Smith writes - 'Pliable's On An Overgrown Path deserves the attention of almost any serious reader and lover of music, and it deserves whatever accolades can be given for his coverage of Hugo Chavez' "Bolivarian Revolution," especially as the musical world swoons over Gustavo Dudamel.

Perhaps my love of Wilhelm Furtwängler should be tempered for this reason, and - as I have said here - some recordings, like that 1943 Bayreuth Meistersinger, are problematic for me - maybe that's right; however, I cannot help but think that Dudamel is a servant of a state verging ever nearer to totalitarianism and repression. Supporting Dudamel, his youth orchestra, and other Venezuelan cultural products is akin to saying that we love the produce of a nascent dictatorship, even if we don't so much care for the dictator.


While Mr. Dudamel should not be made to suffer for being the product and superstar of the music-education program of Venezuela, we should not get in the business of supporting Chavez or the end-results of his projects until it becomes clear the Chavez is committed to democracy and human rights.'


Thank you Patrick for those wise words. The two photos show Venezuelan riot police facing university students during protests against Chavez’s decision to shut down opposition-aligned television station RCTV in May 2007. (Image credits FullosseousFlap). Perhaps DG will use them on the next Dudamel CD sleeve? Meanwhile, many readers have contacted me from Venezuela echoeing Patrick's words. For obvious reasons it is best if I don't give their names. This is typical of the messages though - 'Music will prevail... Chávez will eventually cease ... I hope sooner... We are working to see how...'

Good to see that the music is prevailing, and my article on Venezuelan music beyond the youth orchestras has attracted a lot of attention. One reader from Venezuela writes to point out my omission of Aldemaro Romero, and say 'all the rest have to learn from him'. Romero died on September 15 2007. As well as working in the classical field and founding the the Caracas Philarmonic Orchestra he was the creator of a new form of popular Venezuelan music, known as "New Wave" (Onda Nueva), derived from the joropo and influenced by Brazilian Bossa Nova. You can sample Romero's music on YouTube. The photo below shows happier Venzuelan music making, Aldemaro Romero with guitarist Saul Vera.


Strange how having an opinion is so unfashionable in some parts these days. It didn't use to be that way.
Aldemaro Romero image from Wikipedia.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

Venezuelan youth orchestrates political protest

Tens of thousands of students are expected to march through Caracas and other cities today in protest at Hugo Chávez's move to amend Venezuela's constitution, despite violence which has injured at least eight students.

Masked gunmen opened fire on a university campus in clashes between pro- and anti-Chávez groups in Caracas on Wednesday. The university said the government used thugs to intimidate protesters but Mr Chávez blamed the marchers. "They generally take the path of fascist violence and confront the laws and the people, and they are always looking to the Pentagon, high-ranking generals," he told a summit in Chile yesterday.

Campuses are the focus of opposition to Mr Chávez's referendum on December 2 to permit him to run indefinitely and accelerate what he terms a socialist revolution. Raul Isaias Baduel, a retired army commander and long-time Chávez ally, has joined the opposition to the draft constitution, saying it amounts to a coup.

Today's Guardian reports it. I wonder how many music blogs will even mention it?

Now playing - Deutsche Grammophon's great recording of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. This is what the Gramophone Good CD Guide said - It has become utterly impossible to keep track of all recordings of Beethoven's music ... So who would predict that anything new could possibly be added to what has so often been done, and done well? Thus we might have reasoned in the mid-1970s, but then the seemingly impossible came to pass. When Carlos Kleiber's recording of Beethoven's Fifth was issued in 1975 ... the great clock of Beethovenian interpretation struck the hour.

Carlos Kleiber's father, Erich, resigned his post as director of Berlin's Staatsoper in December 1934 in protest against the policies of the Nazis. He continued to work in Europe outside Germany, but the spread of Fascism forced him to leave the continent in 1939. Ironically it was to South America that Kleiber fled. He spent the years between 1939 and 1946 conducting less than world class orchestras in Argentina, Peru and Chile, and willingly accepted this as the price of his political beliefs.

In 1951 Erich Kleiber returned to Berlin and to the Staatsoper which was now in the communist sector of the city. The opera house itself had been destroyed in the last months of the war, and performances took place in the Admiralspalast, a former dance hall. Kleiber found post-war East Berlin politically brittle, and the working conditions in the still ruined city were extremely difficult. He resigned in March 1955 on principle after a dispute with the authorities over the removal of an inscription to Frederick the Great on the newly renovated Staatsoper building.

Carlos Kleiber was born in 1930 in pre-Nazi Berlin. In that year the highlights at the Staatsoper included its director, Erich Kleiber, conducting Darius Milhaud's new opera Christophe Colomb, Hans Pfitzner conducting his own Palestrina, and Richard Strauss conducting Intermezzo. So when Beethoven's Fifth finished on the CD player I switched to another DG disc, Christian Thielemann conducting the Orchester Der Deutsche Oper Berlin in three of the preludes from Palestrina and the prelude to Capriccio. Sadly the CD seems to be deleted, but recommended if you can find a copy.

Now read how the East Germans rewrote music history.
Do find a copy of Erich Kleiber, A Memoir by John Russell (Andé Deutsch 1957) if you can. 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

They would be booed off the stage mercilessly

Drew80 has left a new comment on your post "A year of stories that had to be told":

Pliable, I could not agree with you more about the "volatile mix of musical vision, politics and commercialism" with which the Venezuelans are marketed, and I could not agree with you more about the presence of Venezuelan flags at an orchestral concert.

Goodness gracious! If Russian or German or American youth orchestras appeared in London wrapped in their countries' flags, they would be booed off the stage mercilessly, and deservedly so.

Posted by Drew80 to On An Overgrown Path at 4:20 PM
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Musicians setting a good example

Wonderful to see so much enthusiasm for the BBC Prom by the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela and Gustvo Dudamel. But respect also to Alice O'Keefe in the Independent for mentioning the unmentionable.

But with Venezuela fiercely polarised over the "Bolivarian revolution" spearheaded by President Hugo Chavez (above), Dudamel's de facto position as an ambassador for his country is far from easy. Since the government refused to renew the licence for RCTV, the opposition television station, earlier this year, there is increasing unease about restrictions on the freedom of expression.

Dudamel himself was criticised when he conducted the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra playing the national anthem at the launch of TVes, the state-controlled channel that replaced RCTV. One "open letter" circulated on many blogs compared him to Wilhelm Furtwängler, the conductor accused of being a Nazi supporter.

Dudamel is unapologetic. "The launch of TVes was an emotional moment for the country. But if you look at the 30 years of the orchestra, we have recorded thousands of anthems, for both state and private TV and radio channels. The image of the orchestra is made for everyone. ...People ask me what position I take. My position is that I make music, and I am Venezuelan. I want to promote the name of my country – not one political party or another, but my whole country."

Let's not forget that Furtwängler didn't have a monopoly on interesting views about the relationship between politics and music.

Tribunal - "What would you do if Britain were invaded?"

Britten - "I believe in letting an invader in and then setting a good example"

From transcript of Benjamin Britten's appearance before a tribunal for the registration of Conscientous Objectors, 28 May 1942.

Boulez saw benefits in the German occupation of Paris. "The theaters were crowded. People could not leave the cities and all of them jammed into concert halls. I went to a concert given by my own piano teacher and could hardly get into it. The Germans virtually brought high culture to France."

From Boulez - Composer, Conductor, Enigma by Joan Peyser (Schirmer ISBN 0028717007)

Now read how a strange mind can produce great new music.
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Gustavo Dudamel - in too much of a hurry

Not my words, but Geoff Brown's in the Times
Jetted to stardom in his mid-twenties, with a post as conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic in the offing, Gustavo Dudamel doesn’t impress all the time. He’s best experienced live in concert, or at least on DVD. Even working with his amazing Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela, as he is here, not all his passion and charisma carries over on to CD. Speeds can be reckless and his handling gauche, either through inexperience or lack of sympathy with his repertoire. Dudamel is a talent that needs careful handling.

So far, he’s not getting it. Deutsche Grammophon, his label, seems keen only on letting him fire the big guns, putting him in competition with history’s finest. His Beethoven release (Symphonies 5 and 7) had its disappointments; so, certainly, does this Mahler Five. This was the work that made Dudamel’s name internationally, when his conducting won him the 2004 Mahler Competition in Bamberg.

Yet as captured by the mikes in Caracas, this interpretation with his youth orchestra misses the bull’s eye. Though not at first. On the strength of the first two movements, Dudamel’s approach appears entirely plausible. Avoiding the “drama queen” style of Bernstein and others, he wrestles soberly with Mahler’s death and despair. The brass gleams; the strings surge with a uniform, slightly husky glow (a special feature of this recording). All good stuff — and, for young musicians with no Viennese traditions in their blood, the playing is quite idiomatic.

Trouble starts to overtake in the scherzo, which sits too heavily on the ears. The electricity isn’t switched on. Then comes the string adagietto, where neither musicians nor Dudamel seem sure how best to handle the music’s long ache or the portamento bowing. There are nervous lurches and heavy-handed dynamics. In the finale, virtues and vices maddeningly go hand in hand.

Only a heart of stone could be left unmoved by the strings’ swinging force in that fugal passage, early on. But the more the notes tumble out, the more dangerous Dudamel’s speeds appear. He doesn’t judge their relationships correctly, or, in the last pages, the music’s weight.

Mahler when he wrote this symphony was in his early forties, and already well knocked about by life. Dudamel conducts like a charmed young man in too much of a hurry.

My children do hate it when I say 'told you so', But youth really isn't a time of life, it is a state of mind.

Listen to Gustavo Dudamel and the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela in Sunday's (August 20) BBC Prom here. 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

Venezuelan music beyond the youth orchestras

Music from Venezuela is big news this week as the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venzuela hits the BBC Proms as part of their eight concert European tour. And later Gustavo Dudamel takes them on an autumn US tour, and then prepares to become music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

Great news for classical music. But in the published programmes of the US and European tour by Dudamel and his Venezuelan youngsters there is not one work by Venezuelan composers, nor is there any music by living or female composers of any nationality, although their box office friendly BBC Prom does include music by the 20th century composers Silvestre Revueltas (1894-1940) from Mexico, Alberto Ginastera from Argentina (1916-1983), Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) and Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975).

Elsewhere on their European tour, and on their first two Deutsche Grammophon releases, Dudamel and the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra move even further back in history, with music from colonial Europe by Beethoven and Mahler. (Did I hear 'dead Europeans'?)

Here, for readers to extend and amend, are some suggestions for contemporary Venezuelan composers that Gustavo Dudamel might include in future tour programmes with his Venezuelan orchestra and Los Angeles orchestras. Although I have a feeling that Askonas Holt and Universal Music's Deutsche Grammophon may not be that keen.

Josefina Benedetti (b. 1953) - American born (New Haven, Conn.) Venezuelan composer, who studied piano both in Caracas and London. Extensive range of compositions including electronica, her compositions are frequently programmed in Venzuela and elsewhere. Founded her own record label Música y Tiempo.

Alvaro Cordero (b. 1954) - born in Barquisimeto, Venezuela. Has worked extensively in the US, and represented Venezuela at the International Rostrum Of Composers in Paris. His music has been performed by the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra. MP3 downloads available from website.

Alfonso Tenreiro (b. 1965) - born in Caracas. Studied in Venezuela and at Indiana University, Bloomington. Widely programmed in Venzuela and US, compositions include a symphony and guitar concerto. Numerous audio samples on composer's website.

Ricardo Lorenz Abreu (b. 1961) - composer and conductor now living in Chicago. His orchestral compositions have gained some acceptance in the US and elsewhere.

Sef Albertz (b. 1971) - best known for solo guitar music, including his suite Homenaje a Joan Miró. Also composes for orchestra, including a guitar concerto.

Federico Ruiz (b. 1948) - composes in genres including electronics. Has written successful opera Los Martirios de Colón (1981).

Beatriz Bilbao (b. 1951) - works with electronic mand acoustic forces. She has represented Venzuela at contemporary music conferences.

Follow this path for a directory of Venzuelan composers, and this one for listings of recordings. And this one for more on both Venezuela and 20th century Latin American composers.

Image (c) On An Overgrown Path. Venezuelan composers in my montage around Gustavo Dudamel are, from top left clockwise, Alfonso Tenreiro, Federico Ruiz, Alfonso Tenreiro, Frederico Ruiz and Josefina Benedetti. 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

Why Simon Bolivar is important

The opera Simón Bolívar by Thea Musgrave was a joint commission by the Los Angeles Music Centre and Scottish Opera. Born in Scotland in 1928 Musgrave studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, knew Benjamin Britten, and has lived in the United States since 1974. For more on Thea Musgrave, and other women composers, follow this path.

Thea Musgrave's two act opera tells the story of the Venezuelan folk hero Simón Bolívar (1783-1830), who liberated six South American countries from Spanish colonial rule. Bolívar was a passionate idealist, and brilliantly successful freedom fighter (he is seen in the painting above finalising his campaign). But he failed to unite the liberated countries under one flag, and today they are the independent states of Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Panama, and Bolivia. In the 21st century Simón Bolívar is still revered for defeating the Spanish and liberating the region from colonial domination.

There is no commercial recording of the opera Simón Bolívar. But on Sunday (Aug 10) I will be playing Thea Musgrave's concerto for oboe and orchestra, Helios, in my Overgrown Path webcast on Future Radio, see below for webcast details. It is in another of my programmes of fine music that is rarely broadcast, yet alone heard in the concert hall. After last week's rare American symphonies, the music this week is all by British born composers. As well as Thea Musgrave's Helios there is Edmund Rubbra's Symphony No. 10 (see my post The Year is '72), and William Alwyn's Symphony No 5 'Hydriotaphia' (see my post Brain Music).

* Simón Bolívar, the opera by Thea Musgrave, was premiered by Virginia Opera (in the other Norfolk!) in January 1995. Stephen Guggenheim sung the title role, and the composer's husband, Peter Mark, conducted.
* Thea Musgrave's Two's Company is given its world premiere at the BBC Prom on August 31.
* The Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela, with their conductor Gustavo Dudamel, are at the BBC Proms on August 19 playing Shostakovich's Tenth Symphony.
* The 224th anniversary of the birth of Simón Bolívar was celebrated around the world on July 24 2007.
* On July 22 2007 Venezuelan President Hugo Chavéz said that foreigners who publicly criticize him or his government while visiting the country will be expelled. In May 2007 Chavéz closed down an opposition run TV station.
* Now read about politician Hugo Chavéz and composer Carlos Carlos Chavéz in a tale of two Chavéz

My programme of Brain Music, including Thea Musgraves Helios, will be webcast between 5.00pm and 6.00pm British Summer Time, and is available on web radio. Convert on-air times to your local time zone using this link. Click here for the audio stream. 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.

Painting of the meeting of San Martin(right)and Simon Bolívar(left)in Guayaquil, Ecuador, on July 26, 1822, at which was decided the campaign to liberate South America from Spanish control, from Aceros-de-espana. 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

Flattery will get you everywhere

More F1-related dopiness here. The author writes one of the very best classical-music blogs out there-- in his lucid intervals between spells of fellating Hugo Chavez and bemoaning the training of armed guards - from Australian Tim Blair's blog.

But I can think of more pleasurable experiences than this.
Illustration by Jeff Smith. 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

Is Hugo Chavez really music to our ears?

Venezuela, and its charismatic president Hugo Chavez, have featured On An Overgrown Path several times recently. Back in November I raised concerns about the objectivity of the Guardian's coverage (above) of Venezuela's acclaimed music education programme, and only yesterday I highlighted human rights activist Harry Belafonte's support for Chavez. So today's Observer article Mr Chavez and the death of freedom makes interesting reading. Here is an extract:

"Consider, for it's a looming headline event in 2007, the Hugo Chavez dilemma. On the one hand, many committed media freedom warriors in Britain - including Jeremy Dear, general secretary of the National Union of Journalists - vociferously support Venezuela's totemic president and all his egalitarian works. They raise money for his causes, pass NUJ conference motions of support and generally despise scribblers on the other side who think him a bit of a demagogue.

On the other hand, Aidan White, general secretary of the International Federation of Journalists, wrote recently that the IFJ Caracas office had 'recorded 700 incidents of harassment, intimidation and violence against the media in the last four years alone'. He went on to talk about 'severely compromised conditions for professional journalism', and about how 'Chavez's violent rhetoric' against media owners has put genuinely open-minded commentators 'under constant pressure'. In a country where polarised politics habitually overwhelms much journalism, White observed, 'neither the private sector, and even less the public sector, which many see being transformed into a governmental mouthpiece, pass the test of independent journalism'. Those conclusions are substantially supported by other press freedom organisations from all over the world: the Committee to Protect Journalists in New York, the International Press Institute in Vienna, Reporteurs Sans Frontieres in Paris.

So this isn't just any old spat. It's conflict, and one which is about to grow much rougher as Chavez announces that, when its current licence to broadcast ends in March, Radio Caracas Television - the company's second-biggest media company - is out of business and that its CEO 'had better start packing his bags ... No media outlet will be tolerated here that is at the service of coup-ism, against the people, against the nation, against national independence, against the dignity of the republic'. "

Perhaps we should remember that fascist dictator Benito Mussolini made the trains run on time in Italy? For more on the lifeblood of democracy, freedom of the press, take An Overgrown Path to Blogging for Tibet

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Music can help change the world

The Vienna Philharmonic’s glacial progress towards appointing female players reminds me both of how far we have travelled in the last forty years in the areas of race and equality, and how far we still have to go.

In 1968 Harry Belafonte, whose album Calypso was the first LP to sell more than 1 million, appeared on a primetime CBS television special hosted by British singer Petula Clark. In the show, the two singers performed a duet, and Petula Clark held on to Belafonte's arm, as my still from the programme shows here. After the first take the director asked them to repeat the song, standing apart. It transpired that an executive from the show's sponsor, an automobile manufacturer, saw the first take and ordered it to be re-shot. His reason was that showing a white woman touching an African-American might adversely affect car sales in southern states.

An outraged Petula Clark and her husband Claude Wolff, the show's executive producer, destroyed all the takes except the first one. The transmission went ahead with the original duet, and the programme achieved very high viewing figures following press exposure of the sponsor's attempted inteference. But Belafonte was less successful when he used footage of the violence at the 1968 Democratic Convention in a Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour programme - CBS cut the sequence before the show was broadcast.

Harry Belafonte refused to perform in the southern states of the US between 1954 and 1961, and was an early supporter of the Civil Rights Movement and Martin Luther King. He has been a vociferous opponent of the current Bush administration, and has criticised the African-Americans holding senior positions in it. Belafonte has also controversially supported the regime of Hugo Chavéz, President of Venezuela, a country that has received international praise for its progressive music education.

For more on 1968 read Notes of a College Revolutionary.
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Classical music and the paid-for media

Norman Lebrecht recently roared “Until bloggers deliver hard facts and estate agents turn into credible critics, paid-for newspapers will continue to set the standard as the only show in town”. So on Friday it was good to see a paid-for newspaper setting the standard and covering the wonderful music education programme in Venezuela. In a major article that made the front page of the influential Film & Music supplement (above) Guardian journalist Charlotte Higgins visits both Venzuela and Rome, and sings the praises of what she calls ‘The System’, or to give the Venzuelan education programme its full title Fundacion del Estado para el Sistema Nacional de las Orquestas Juveniles e Infantiles de Venezuela.

Also championing Venezuelan music education is Simon Rattle, who gushes euphorically in the article about wunderkind conductor Gustavo Dudamel, and declares "If anyone asks me where is something really important going on for the future of classical music, I say here." Rattle and Dudamel are just two of the big names that appear in the article, the others are Claudio Abbado, and the Berlin Philharmonic, Gothenburg Symphony, and Simón Bolivar Youth Orchestras.

Now I am a huge advocate of music education, and have written about it on these pages, and I am also a great admirer of what is happening in Venezuela. But there are some hard facts that didn't make it into Charlotte Higgins' article. Music education in Europe and North America has been the victim of another system, known as the free market. This balances supply and demand, and, whether we like it or not, this has put a greater value on training computer programmers than orchestral musicians. But some in classical music have benefitted from this system, particularly the artists agents who have found a lucrative niche matching musical supply to demand.

The Guardian article prominently namechecked Simon Rattle, Claudio Abbado, Gustavo Dudamel, and the Berlin Philharmonic, Gothenburg Symphony and Simón Bolivar Youth Orchestras. Now follow this link to the website of leading artists agent Askonas Holt, and you will see that the artists represented by them include Simon Rattle, Claudio Abbado, Gustavo Dudamel, and the Berlin Philharmonic, Gothenburg Symphony and Simón Bolivar Youth Orchestras. Uncanny isn't it? - particularly as the footnote to the article is also rich in namechecks - "The Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela's recording of Beethoven's Fifth and Seventh Symphonies, conducted by Gustavo Dudamel, is out now on Deutsche Grammophon".

The practice of music critics being supplied with free concert tickets and CDs is long established. But in the brave new global world of classical music the stakes are much higher. Follow this link and you will find that there are major international tours in 2007 by the Gothenburg Symphony and Simón Bolivar Youth Orchestra organised by Askonas Holt and conducted by Gustavo Dudamel, and some global exposure in the Guardian isn't going to harm ticket and CD sales for that is it?

This is not just an isolated example of global promotion. Several music critics, including Norman Lebrecht, have recently written reviews of the Vienna premiere of John Adams new opera The Flowering Tree. The orchestra for that premiere was another band from South America, the Orchestra Joven Camerata de Venezuela, and in December the opera is in the repertoire of Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic, who are of course in the Askonas Holt stable, before being performed by the San Francisco Symphony, who are co-commissioners and also Askonas Holt artists. The opera is also coming to London, so some exposure there in the Evening Standard doesn't go amiss either. And back with Venezuelan musicians the Guardian article won't hurt the 2007 Edinburgh Festival appearance of Gustavo Dudamel and the Simón Bolivar Youth Orchestra, which is promoted by Askonas Holt, as is the major US tour that follows.

I am the first to agree that classical music needs all the exposure it can get, and also that our children need all the music education they can get. But, equally, don't readers of the paid-for newspapers need all the hard facts they can get on The System behind these glowing articles?

For more on The System follow An Overgrown Path to No such thing as an unknown Venezuelan conductor.

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