This Week in Classical Music-April 11, 2010

by: Randy Kinkel

April 11, 2010

Edo De Waart

( Phoenix, AZ )
•De Waart takes on Antwerp
•Slatkin leaves Met Production of La Traviata
•New device breaks in your fiddle

This week in Classical music 4/11/10

It’s KBAQ’s “This week in classical music” --- an update on what’s happening in the classical music world… I’m Randy Kinkel.

Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra MD Edo De Waart has announced he has taken on an additional assignment—as music director of the Royal Flanders Philharmonic in Antwerp, Belgium, starting in 2012. The 68-year old conductor said he will move his family from Middleton to Antwerp, which is only 100 miles from De Waart’s home town of Amsterdam. He said recently that dividing his time between the two orchestras will leave him very little time to guest-conduct elsewhere, although he hopes to "do something at the Metropolitan Opera, hopefully every second year or so." De Waart's contract with both the Belgian and Milwaukee orchestras ends in 2017.

Last week we reported conductor Leonard Slatkin’s troubles with the Met’s production of Verdi’s opera La Traviata: the maestro never had conducted the work in his long and distinguished career, and had problems guiding the orchestra and singers through it. He got some bad reviews. Last week, the conductor withdrew from the production. Met Spokesman Peter Clark said Slatkin was leaving for “Personal” reasons… Slatkin’s Rep at Columbia Artists said this in an e-mail statement: (he) has decided to withdraw from the Metropolitan Opera production of Verdi’s La Traviata, believing that his artistic contribution, which he feels he has thoroughly prepared, does not however coincide with the musical ideas of the ensemble. He wishes the members of the orchestra and musical colleagues well for the remaining performances.”f

Most musicians know that the longer you play an instrument, like a violin, the better it sounds—well, for those who can’t wait years to break in their beloved instrument, there’s a device that can help you do that in record time. It’s the ToneRite, which slips over the strings of an idle instrument and begins emitting subsonic noise meant to mimic the physics of actual music making. The maker claims this results in a greatly accelerated breaking-in period. “You can’t take a cheap plywood guitar and turn it into a vintage Martin,” said Ryan Frankel, chief executive of ToneRite of Gainesville, Fla. “But the fullness and the warmth of a good instrument will really come alive.” John Sherba, a Grammy-winning violinist with the Kronos Quartet, said that the results were subtle but noticeable especially on a newer instrument. “I found the fiddle just rang more,” he said.

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 89-5 KBACH, K-B-A-Q phoenix, a service of Rio Salado College and Arizona State University.