This Week in Classical Music

October 18, 2009

Gilbert3.jpg

( Phoenix, AZ )
•NY Phil plays in Hanoi
•Are classical bands the future?
•Frederic the Great's Flute

This Week in Classical Music 10/18/09

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

The New York Philharmonic played in the City of Hanoi this weekend. The streets that once heard and felt bombs dropped from American B-52s now played host to the sweet sounds of Beethoven. The Philharmonic concert was a highlight of the Asian tour that began October 8th; 42-year-old Conductor Alan Gilbert led a master class with 50 or so students from the National music Conservatory as well; the concert was held in Hanoi’s century-old Opera house.
Are Classical Bands the future of classical music? Yes! says Armando Bayolo, who founded the group Great Noise ensemble by recruiting musicians on Craigslist . “"I really feel groups like Alarm Will Sound and eighth blackbird represent the future of classical music." he says. With names like the aforementioned Alarm will Sound, Eighth Blackbird, Time for Three and Absolute ensemble, these “bands” are not only breaking down barriers in the music world but also breaking out of traditional performance styles and venues as well, playing in clubs, bars, and performance spaces like New York City’s Poisson Rouge, or the DC area’s Busboys and Poets”. Nick Kendall, a 31-year-old violinist with the bluegrass-jazz-, classically trained string trio Time for Three, which played there last year during a Kennedy Center residency, and also here with the Phoenix Symphony not too long ago, said The crowd [at Busboys and Poets] is so mixed, all the young people, the vibe in there," said. "If I could sustain a living playing in those kinds of places, I would do it all the time.” Even though they are all different from one another, these new groups see themselves as pioneers, harbingers of a shift, a change, in classical music. Kendall said, " we all come from the same breed, we all trained in the same way but we all are experimenting and coming up with our own individual voice. I think it is so exciting."
A flute belonging to Frederic the Great was played recently for the first time in about 250 years. The occasion was the Usedom Music festival on the Baltic sea island of the same name. The instrument, made in 1750 by Frederick’s teacher Johann Quantz, is made of Ivory, Ebony and silver; the flute is thought to have been a favorite of the King, who was a passionate lover of music and the arts. Ulrich Feldhahn, curator of the collection from which the flute came, said, “the “We have had it examined by an expert in historic flutes, and we have been assured that it’s in perfect condition, and sounds the way it did at the time of Frederick the Great… I find it incredible to think that this links us directly to the private concerts that Frederick the Great played for his friends and family. The flute has a beautiful, warm sound. You could say that it has a soul.”
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; 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 89.5 KBAQ Phoenix, a service of Rio Salado college and Arizona State University.

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