On An Overgrown Path

When asked why his oratorio El Pessebre (The Manger) ignored contemporary musical developments the great Catalan musician Pablo Casals replied with a smile "The figures in a crèche are folk figures; why, they can't sing twelve-tone music!" In 1939 the Catalan writer Joan Alavadera had fled from Franco's forces in Spain with the draft of a poem celebrating his region's tradition of Christmas crèches. In exile Joan Alvadera shared Pablo Casals' house in Prades , and in 1943 his completed Poema del Pessebre won the annual contest in nearby Perpignan for poems written in Catalan. Many years later Casals asked Alvadera to add extra verses and in 1960 his "peace oratorio" El Pessebre was premiered in Mexico. The little-known oratorio is a delightfully derivative concoction; just let's say that if you like Humperdinck's Hänsel und Gretel you will like El Pessebre . Fortunately the work is very well served by the Naïve recording from the Orque...

In a recent post I described the 2012 Aldeburgh Festival presentation of Jordi Savall's Mare Nostrum as a "bold piece of programming". But on reflection perhaps the performance of this transcultural work in the Snape Maltings is not so much bold as appropriate in view of Benjamin Britten's pioneering role in what later became known as world music. Britten's initial interest in Far Eastern music was sparked by his friendship with the Canadian composer and ethnomusicologist Colin McPhee, who he met when living in New York between 1939 and 1942. There is more on this friendship in my post Colin McPhee - East collides with West , and the photo below shows the two composers in New York c. 1940. Britten's first operatic venture Paul Bunyan was composed in New York and Balinese influences can be heard in its Prologue, while in 1941 McPhee and Britten recorded McPhee's transcription for two pianos of Balinese Ceremonial Music . This exposure to a different...

Whether we like it or not brands are now part of classical music. Nowhere has the power of the brand been better exploited than at the BBC where the portfolio includes ' BBC New Generation Artists ', ' BBC Young Musician ', and, of course, ' BBC Proms '. And as every marketeer knows, brands sometimes need repositioning; which makes the headline above particularly interesting. Traditionally the BBC Proms brand represents a trustworthy source of mainstream classical and adventurous contemporary music; to supplement this in 1996 another brand, ' BBC Proms in the Park ', was introduced with the admirable objective of making light classical music accessible to an audience beyond the Albert Hall. Over the years the Proms in the Park have been repositioned from 'light classical to 'light entertainment' - last year Westlife headlined the Hyde Park event , and this year, to the delight of the media, it is Kylie Minogue . So far so good: 'Proms in...

ClariSonus, a website "dedicated to exploring, analyzing and documenting the effect of technology on the recording and reproduction of sound", has a nice link to On An Overgrown Path . Which provides yet more confirmation that there is life beyond the currently fashionable "Breaking - plastic pianist severs arm" approach to promoting classical music. And talking of the effect of technology on the recording and reproduction of sound, the new CD release of Jonathan Harvey's 'Bayreuth meets Buddhism' opera Wagner Dream comes with a sonic as well as musical and spiritual recommendation . No time at present to write in detail about this landmark of contemporary music, but hat tip to recording engineers Franck Rossi and David Poissonnier, and real-time electronic mixing team Jonathan Harvey and Gilbert Nouno, who captured Wagner Dream for Belgium label Cypres at Westergasfabriek, Amsterdam in 2007. Additional hat tip for the inspired CD artwork above, whi...

Just a few days ago I wrote about the sublime CD seen above of Gregorian Chant sung by the monks of L'Abbaye Sainte-Madeleine outside the village of Le Barroux in Provence; while  back in 2010 I discussed  how in small French villages where there are traditionalist Catholic monasteries, block voting by the religious community can be an important factor in elections. Which makes the result for Le Barroux in last Sunday's first round of the French presidential election interesting reading: Marine Le Pen (far right) 135 votes, Nicolas Sarkozy (centre right) 135 votes, François Hollande (centre left) 63 votes. In the small village of Le Barroux 469 people voted, a turnout of 89.33%. Wagner set the benchmark , and I continue to be confounded  by how people of intellect so effortlessly combine the sublime with the hateful . * Thankfully Marine Le Pen is now eliminated from the second and final round of the election on May 6. We will be in France then, coincidenta...

In the current issue of The Hudson Review * Gavin Plumley contributes a penetrating critique of Philip Glass' Ninth Symphony . The title The Pre-Packaged Symphony sets the tone and Gavin concludes that Glass "now surrounds his set musical phrases with nominal symphonic packaging". A recent post here  touched on 'music of the mind' - a fantasy sound created by record companies to make ethnic music palatable to Western audiences. But are there other forms of music of the mind? When classical music tastemakers queue to praise modish composers are they hearing a music of the mind embellished by their own preconceptions? Gavin Plumley describes the digital download release format of Glass' Ninth Symphony as "an ingenious piece of PR" - can the preconceptions that trigger music of the mind be virally created ? Does the conclusion reached by the creator of the 'obedience experiments' Stanley Milgram apply to classical music? - "'A s...

That striking image comes from the current newsletter of the Benedictine community of L'Abbaye Sainte-Madeleine at Le Barroux, France, and the recording by the monks there of Gregorian chant has been a constant on my iPod since it was released several years ago. But it is 20th century sacred music by Herbert Howells rather than plainsong that provides the soundtrack to this post. Howells' Hymnus Paradisi is one of the highlights of the 2012 BBC Proms in a concert that pairs it with Elgar's First Symphony . Behind the inevitable shenanigans  there are many temptations in this year's Proms, including Schoenberg's Gurrelieder , Elgar's Apostles with Mark Elder , Vaughan Williams' Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Symphonies in one evening, Tippett's A Child of our Time , and a John Cage centenary bash . It is also good to see a Proms Beethoven Symphony cycle being given by Daniel Barenboim and his West–Eastern Divan Orchestra. But I am going to voice a ple...

Cultures collide in Brittany, France, as can be seen from my photos which were taken around Pontify , a 'new' town created by Napoléon Bonaparte. Brittany shares France's twenty-first century infrastructure, but is also a region of jagged coastlines, fog and mystery. Local legends tell how invisible creatures populate the region and cause mischief for the humans they live among. These legends connect Brittany with the Celtic culture that inspired composers including  Arnold Bax and Rutland Boughton , and popular musicians such as Vashti Bunyan . But there is a more intriguing collision of cultures in Brittany through links between the local fairy lore and the esoteric Islamic belief in jinn or genies. Both traditions have night-long musical traditions to placate the spirits, in Brittany it is the fest noz (night celebration) and in the Maghreb it is the lila of the Gnawa . These links find musical expression in the CD below which I discovered recently in the Pontify L...

There are loads of preconceptions on classical music running amongst the people, not only the young audience. And these preconceptions are admittedly quite sticky. Before bringing a young audience (people in their twenties, thirties) into a Brahms concert, you first need to bring them to cross the front door, to like the place. This whole campaign is one single step into this direction. That perceptive observation was added by the Philharmonie Luxembourg to the debate about their new promotional video . On reflection I think the Philharmonie is right, and that I, and other readers, were guilty of allowing preconceptions to unduly influence our judgement; plus it was not clear from YouTube that this video was the first of four in a structured campaign. The path that the Philharmonie Luxembourg is trying to lead young people down may not be immediately apparent, but it is certainly rich - 'Tristan goes to India' with Susanna Mälkki conducting the Tristan Prelude and Liebestod...

This promotional video was created for the Philharmonie Luxembourg and Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg by Duchy based creative shop Radar . I am well outside the target group so will be careful about passing judgement. But it does seem a pity that the creatives ignored, or perhaps had never come across, Benjamin Britten's wise words that " This magic comes only with the sounding of the music ". Also on Facebook and Twitter . With thanks to reader Ralf Michaels for the heads up. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

That is the Berber flag carrying the symbol of the Amazigh, meaning 'free people', in the Facebook photo; some of our Berber friends in Morocco are holding it and they appear again in the photo below. In Libya and elsewhere in the Maghreb, Berbers have been a major force in political change to the extent that events in North Africa have been dubbed the 'Berber spring' . The Berbers are the indigenous ethnic group in much of North Africa; despite extensive intermarriage with immigrant Arabs they have retained a strong sense of identity and the marginalisation of Berber culture is a continuing source of friction . In his book Tibet Tibet Patrick French identifies a 'Tibet of the mind' - a fantasy image created in Western minds of Tibet as a vanishing Shangri-La, an image which contrasts sharply with the more complex and less mediagenic reality. Similarly there is a 'Morocco of the mind' - a fantasy world of Marrakech riads, souks, personal shoppers a...

'Glencore, the multi-billion pound commodity giant, stands accused of profiting from child labour in a mine in the Congo, and paying the associates of paramilitary killers in Colombia, following a Panorama investigation. Undercover filming showed children as young as ten working in the Glencore-owned Tilwezembe mining concession. And sales documents show a Glencore subsidiary made payments to the suspected associates of paramilitaries in Colombia' - BBC News April 16 Last night's Panorama on BBC TV was an investigation into multi-national commodities trader Glencore. Using the title 'Billionaires behaving badly?' the company was, to quote the BBC, "accused of reckless greed" - programme image above, watch the documentary here . As was highlighted On An Overgrown Path last week , Glencore sponsors the Lucerne Easter Festival; among the artists appearing this year were Claudio Abbado, Bernard Haitink, Mariss Jansons and András Schiff, and next year's fe...

'A brilliant student, encouraged by Stravinsky, Boulanger, Milhaud and Messiaen, Alain Kremski abandoned the more obvious musical route to pursue the mystical universe of temple bells, gongs and bowls. He won the Prix de Rome for composition and was in residence for three years at the Villa Médicis where he established a firm friendship with Balthus, built on a shared passion for painting, sculpture, literature and travel... His compositions do not seek to evoke the sacred music of the Far East and its ritualistic codes, but find their place in the context of contemporary music where East and West coincide. Kremski would, modestly, consider them as an homage to Tibetan civilization and the its precious spirituality which Western culture must preserve at all costs ' - source Cezame music agency . Alain Kremski's unique music has featured here before and in Exils (Exiles), which is dedicated to the Dalai Lama, Tibetan singing bowls are scored as equal partners with a piano...

'In 2005 [Clemency] Burton-Hill co-founded Aurora Orchestra' - Wikipedia 15/04/2012 'Aurora was founded in 2005 by conductors Nicholas Collon and Robin Ticciati, who gathered around them an ensemble of the UK’s leading emerging soloists' - Aurora Orchestra website My post on the Independent's recent Gustavo Dudamel feature has been picked up by the Radio 3 Forum , and a contributor to the forum has highlighted the two contradictory statements above. The explanation presumably is that Clemency Burton-Hill, who is a talented violinist as well as a media celebrity , was one of the original invited members of the Aurora Orchestra, but did not co-found it. Which as the forum contributor points out "isn't quite the same thing". A question of nuance maybe, but isn't classical music and journalism all about nuance? And yes, anyone can edit Wikipedia. But the article edit history and Ms Burton-Hill's personal website are also worth reading. Does cl...

Yesterday's Independent carried the gushing feature seen above written by Clemency Burton-Hill on location in Caracas with Gustavo Dudamel and laced with generous quotes from the president of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Ms Burton-Hill is better known as a presenter on BBC Radio 3 and the Proms , and also of the current BBC Four Young Musician 2012 programmes . What the feature byline does not explain is that one of her other roles is writing promotional material for artist agent Askonas Holt. And it also does not tell readers of Askonas Holt's role in Gustavo Dudamel's forthcoming UK tour with the the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela and in his past Los Angeles Philharmonic tours , all of which feature prominently in the Independent article. A search reveals no less than twenty-five contributions by Clemency Burton-Hill to the Askonas Holt website, while on the Dudamel/LA Phil tour page there is a glowing write-up by.... Clemency Burton-Hill. As t...

There cannot be a single person on this planet who does not know that the Titanic sunk on April 15, 1912. But how many have heard of the less mediagenic deaths of sixty-three Libyan migrants in a small inflatable boat off the coast of Italy last year? 1517 passengers perished in the Titanic tragedy - by contrast more than 17,000 people have died since 1998 trying to cross the Mediterranean illegally to flee the poverty and oppression in North Africa, circumstances that are the legacy of the failed colonial ambitions which also created the "unsinkable" Titanic . This deathtoll makes the Mediterranean one of the biggest mass burial site in history; yet, with the honorable exception of the Guardian newspaper and of intercultural visionaries Montserrat Figueras and Jordi Savall, few outside the human rights movement have taken up the cause of the migrants who are literally being left to die off the shore of western Europe. Mare Nostrum - Our Sea - is the recently released m...