This Week in Classical Music-May 9, 2010

by: Randy Kinkel

May 09, 2010

Gustavo Dudamel

( Phoenix, AZ )
•Dudamel on the DL
•Musical Instrument Museum opens in PHX

This week in Classical Music 5/09/10

It’s This week in Classical Music”, an update on what’s happening in the Classical music world; I’m Randy Kinkel.

Classical music conducting is not looked upon by many as an especially athletic activity—until now, that is—The LA Philharmonic Maestro Gustavo Dudamel, usually energetic on the podium anyway, did a particularly energetic lunge during the last movement of the Dvorak Cello Concerto… and injured himself! Philharmonic president Deborah Borda said that the 28-year-old Venezuelan music director heard a loud pop and lost sensation on one side. He managed to pump out enough endorphins to keep up a fiery performance, but he did not look quite right at the curtain call. Backstage, Dudamel was in great pain but still insisting on conducting Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony after intermission. Borda said she practically had to hold him down and rushed him to the hospital. Tests revealed a bad muscle pull in his neck, and he was sent home. The orchestra’s associate conductor, Lionel Bringuier conducted the Tchaikovsky that night. Hopefully, Dudamel won’t still be on the disabled list for his concert with the LA Phil Wednesday night at Symphony hall here in Phoenix!

The Musical Instrument Museum (MIM), the first global museum of its kind, had its grand opening in Phoenix a couple of weeks ago. The museum has completed construction of its new building and galleries and public spaces, including exhibition installation of the Geo-Galleries, five expansive galleries that focus on different regions of the world, and the Artist Gallery, where unique stories of musical icons will be told through their instruments. MIM exhibits instruments from every country in the world, over 12,000 instruments and objects, representing musical traditions from folk and popular to ritual and courtly. The $250 million dollar project is on two floors of galleries, the new building also has a classroom, garden courtyard, performance hall, recording studio, restaurant, café, and store. The concert space has already played host to a number of world musicians… This afternoon’s 2:30 Concert features the Sierra Leone All stars.

Parts of Nashville, Tennessee are still underwater, and the Country music capital’s icon the Grand Ol’ Pry isn’t the only musical casualty of the flood waters-- One of the city's recently acquired glories — the $2.5 million Schoenstein pipe organ installed in the Schermerhorn Symphony Center in 2007 — has been damaged—sources say the pipe organ's operating mechanism and console, Both of which were housed in the Schermerhorn's basement level, is currently under anywhere from 12 to 14 feet of flood water. Schermerhorn Senior director of communications Alan Bostick said "Everything that drives the pipes and manipulates the sound was submerged…The full extent of damage to the organ, won't be known until the waters recede. Bostick says no one will be able to tell whether the damaged components can be repaired or replaced until they can be inspected. But every piece of the organ was meticulously tailored to the Schermerhorn's dimensions — making the damage of any one piece a potential disaster. Bostick said the building will be unusable for at least a month.

for more on these and other items and events, go to the website, kbaq.org; be listening each week at this time for another update, Find us on facebook and follow us on twitter; and join me every weekday at noon for “The Mozart Buffet”, an hour of music by Mozart and his contemporaries; I’m Randy Kinkel for 89-five KBAQ Phoenix, a service of Rio Salado College and Arizona State University.