Mahler vs. Toscanini — and this Saturday’s “Mahler Hour” on Zoom
“How would you compare Mahler and Toscanini in New York?” asked Kenneth Woods, Artistic Director of Boulder’s Colorado MahlerFest, in a...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 24, 20234 min read
“Shostakovich in South Dakota” on NPR — A New Template for Orchestras
My NPR “More than Music” program “Shostakovich in South Dakota” can now be accessed here. I document the impact of a remarkable...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 20, 20232 min read
“Drastically revising our idea of who a music director is” — The South Dakota Symp
The Creekside Singers performing with the South Dakota Symphony “There’s just a tremendous amount of caution, a tremendous amount of...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 18, 20233 min read
Five Festivals for the Charles Ives Sesquicentenary
The National Endowment for the Humanities today announced a $400,000 grant to resume “Music Unwound,” a national consortium of orchestras...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 16, 20233 min read
Rediscovering Harry Burleigh: A Valedictory Setting of Langston Hughes
In recent weeks I’ve had occasion to perform Harry Burleigh’s “Lovely Dark and Lonely One” with three singers: Emery Stephens at St....
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 26, 20232 min read
“Dvorak’s Prophecy” at Princeton April 12 with John McWhorter, Allen Guelzo, and S
“Dvorak’s Prophecy and the Vexed Fate of Black Classical Music” is the topic of an April 12 concert/lecture at Princeton University. I’ll...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 23, 20232 min read
“Mahler in New York” (April 4) — Tickets Now on Sale
One of Gustav Mahler’s most powerful New York experiences was a funeral procession he watched from a hotel window. A fireman had drowned...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 21, 20237 min read
Re-Thinking the Concert Experience in South Dakota and Minnesota
Leningrad under Nazi siege, 1941-42 There was a time – the 1990s, when I was running the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM – when the practice...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 10, 20231 min read
Bruckner and the Cellphone PS
Norman Lebrecht has picked up my blog on Bruckner and the Cellphone and posted it on Slippedisc. You will find a torrent of responses....
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 9, 20233 min read
Bruckner and the Cellphone
Last Sunday’s performance of Bruckner’s Eighth Symphony by Christian Thielemann and the Vienna Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall was very...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 7, 20231 min read
You can now pre-order my new Mahler novel (and get 20 % off)
My forthcoming Mahler novel is now available for pre-order with a 20 per cent discount. Related events: April 4: “Mahler in New York.” A...
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josephirvinghorowi
Feb 22, 20232 min read
Shostakovich in South Dakota
I’m in Sioux Falls, where the South Dakota Symphony – to my knowledge, the most genuinely innovative American orchestra – is performing...
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josephirvinghorowi
Feb 13, 20233 min read
“The Gershwin Moment” on NPR
To close my recent National Public Radio documentary “The Gershwin Moment,” I pose the following hypothetical: What if George Gershwin, a...
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josephirvinghorowi
Jan 29, 20234 min read
Michael Morgan, the Oakland Symphony, and William Dawson
Michael Morgan 1957-2021 The death of Michael Morgan, last August 20, was a heartbreaking loss to American music. As music director of...
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josephirvinghorowi
Jan 17, 20233 min read
“George Shirley: A Life in Music” on NPR
Harry Burleigh, who turned spirituals into concert songs sung by Marian Anderson and Paul Robeson, wrote in 1917 that “the voice is not...
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josephirvinghorowi
Dec 19, 20225 min read
Announcing My First Novel: The Mahlers in New York
My first novel, The Marriage: The Mahlers in New York, will be published in April 2023 by Blackwater Press (a young and enterprising...
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josephirvinghorowi
Dec 11, 20224 min read
Klaus Makela Conducts the Philharmonic — Take Two
I am of course grateful for the torrent of comments I have received in response to my previous blog about Klaus Makela conducting...
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josephirvinghorowi
Dec 9, 20223 min read
Klaus Makela Conducts the Philharmonic
I admit that I am a jaded listener, burdened by a long and presumptuous memory. I heard Mravinsky’s Leningrad Philharmonic during their...
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josephirvinghorowi
Nov 28, 20222 min read
Lou Harrison and Cultural Fusion on NPR
While the present-day conflation of the arts with instruments for social justice is dangerously overdrawn, some musical experiences are...
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josephirvinghorowi
Oct 7, 20221 min read
Toradze Memorial Concert
The recent Alexander Toradze Memorial Concert, featuring more than a dozen pianists, is now accessible online here. In addition to a lot...
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