September 16, 2007

It’s this week in classical music, an update on what’s happening in the classical music world, I’m Randy Kinkel.

Detroit was once the home of American made cars, and this season it is becoming the home of American music.  The Detroit Symphony will be playing all three symphonies by John Corigliano in honor of his 70^th birthday next year; also on the schedule is a world premiere of the commissioned orchestra work by Stacy Garrop, winner of the symphony’s competition for women composers.  In December Richard Danielpour’s “Book of Hours” for piano quartet gets a hearing with the Kalichstein-Laredo-Robinson trio, and in June the Great Lakes Chamber Music festival honors John Corigliano, Joan Harbison, William Bolcom and Joan Tower.  

Add another young conductor to the trend of freshening up the  podiums of the world’s symphony orchestras; the London Philharmonic has chosen 35-year-old Russian conductor Vladimir Jurowski to take the orchestra into a new era.  Jurowski is the son of conductor Mikhail Jurowski, who moved the family from Russia for artistic and political reasons.  In Dresden, the young Jurowski studied with the likes of Colin Davis.  In a statement, Jurowski said, “Tradition can only be regarded as valuable if it is constantly on the move.  For me, the main attribute of the LPO is the ability to become one with the music.”.

Remember baseball cards?  The ones that had all your favorite players on them with all their stats, that smelled faintly of the bubble gum they came with? The Houston Symphony as unveiled a new line of trading cards featuring members of the orchestra.  Like the baseball cards, the goal of the symphony cards is to introduce the players to the fans and create loyalty.  Like the baseball cards, the symphony cards have “stats” that include age, where they studied, and years with the symphony, along with a personal fact or two.  Marketing Director Bruce Robinson puts it this way: Through the musicians the audience is connecting with the music… that is the essence of what music-making is all about…. When the audience is watching the orchestra play live… they feel a personal connection with the musicians, and that is a big part of their motivation to come to our concerts.”  No word yet on whether Jones Hall will be offering hot dogs or nachos.

For more information on these and other items and events, go to the KBAQ website at KBAQ-dot-org.… be listening every week at this time for another update, and join me at noon every weekday for the Mozart Buffet, an hour of music by Mozart and his contemporaries, … I’m Randy Kinkel, for KBAQ’s  “This week in Classical Music”…  on 89-five KBAQ, K-B-A-Q Phoenix, a service of Rio Salado College and Arizona State University