Did Dvorak Compose “Deep River”?
Though there are some historians of American music who dispute the crucial importance of Dvorak, and many more who simply ignore him,...
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josephirvinghorowi
Aug 9, 20102 min read
Swapping Horowitz for Arrau
SWAPPING HOROWITZ FOR ARRAU As readers of this blog may be aware, my son Bernie is a diehard Vladimir Horowitz enthusiast who has forced...
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josephirvinghorowi
Aug 5, 20103 min read
Reinventing the Orchestra: The Role of Education
The Philadelphia Inquirer reported the other day that, “facing chronic red ink and houses only two-thirds full,” the Philadelphia...
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josephirvinghorowi
Jul 18, 20103 min read
In the Ear of the Beholder
Readers of this blog might (or might not) be wondering what’s become of me. There have been no postings in recent weeks because with the...
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josephirvinghorowi
Jun 27, 20105 min read
Gershwin, Stravinsky, Harrison festivals
During my tenure as Executive Director of the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM, I was handed an opportunity to refashion the orchestra’s...
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josephirvinghorowi
Jun 13, 20102 min read
The Uses of Culture
A recent article on “Funding: The State of the Art” by my friend Andras Szanto makes for informative and depressing reading. “The search...
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josephirvinghorowi
Jun 1, 20103 min read
Ligeti, the New York Phil, and finding stage directors for opera
Alan Gilbert’s first season as the New York Philharmonic’s music director climaxed with a triumphant run of Gyorgy Ligeti’s Le Grand...
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josephirvinghorowi
May 26, 20103 min read
The NEA Music Critics Institute and a Cultural Sea Change
It’s again my good fortune to be Artistic Director of the National Endowment for the Arts’ Music Critics Institute, which — as was...
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josephirvinghorowi
May 10, 20103 min read
Jeremy Denk and the Non-Russian Stravinsky
Two days after the conclusion of Valery Gergiev’s three-week New York Philharmonic “Russian Stravinsky” festival (cf. my Stravinsky...
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josephirvinghorowi
May 9, 20104 min read
Rehearing Stravinsky’s War Symphony
Readers of this blog will appreciate my keen interest in Valery Gergiev’s performances of Stravinsky’s Symphony in Three Movements on the...
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josephirvinghorowi
May 2, 20104 min read
Stravinsky, Self-Denial, and Self-Renewal
The New York Philharmonic’s three-week Stravinsky festival is in full swing. It offers a singular opportunity to hear no fewer than 16...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 25, 20104 min read
One Reason Critics Matter
When people worry about the impact of the recession on the performing arts, they worry about money: waning ticket sales, waning...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 18, 20103 min read
Rescue Attempt for a Major Dance Work
To assess the legacy of a conductor, the first place to look is repertoire. Leonard Bernstein’s too-brief decade as Music Director of the...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 11, 20104 min read
How Performable Is Verdi at the Met? — Continued
In my last blog, I extolled a 1935 Met La Traviata broadcast as an antidote to the Verdi performances of today, and invited readers to...
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josephirvinghorowi
Apr 4, 20103 min read
How Performable is Verdi at the Met?
In the opinion of an eminent European conductor of my acquaintance, it was last possible to adequately cast the big Verdi operas in the...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 28, 20105 min read
Stravinsky, the New York Philharmonic, and Program Music
As Igor Stravinsky’s impregnable twentieth century reputation fades with time, both the man and the composer seem ever more elusive. A...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 25, 20102 min read
The Nose, The Trojans, and Issues of Popularity
Leaving aside the problem that William Kentridge’s spectacular production of The Nose at the Metropolitan Opera overwhelms Shostakovich’s...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 15, 20102 min read
The Stokowski Conundrum
John Adams, on his blog “Hellmouth,” has just posted a stirring piece in praise of Leopold Stokowski. These days Stokowski is by far the...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 14, 20104 min read
Rrecuperating from The Trojans
I’m still attempting to digest Berlioz’s The Trojans, as performed by Valery Gergiev and his Kirov soloists, orchestra, and chorus at...
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josephirvinghorowi
Mar 13, 20101 min read
The Greatest Present-Day Liszt Pianist
As readers of this blog may recall, I have twice (re: Vladimir Horowitz on Feb. 1; re: “Interpreting Liszt” on Feb. 18) written about...
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