It’s not uncommon to see articles both decrying the sad state of affairs in classical music as a whole as well as celebrating the new opportunities that are available for both composers and performers with the right amount of musical and entrepreneurial skill, luck and perseverance. A prime example of one that covers both issues was recently published as a transcript of a speech given by the Guardian’s Tom Service with the intentionally controversial title “So long, and thanks for all the noise: 2010 and the end of musical history”. Well-spoken and thoughtful (and without the acidity of many critics

Hopefully you’ve been following Armando Bayolo’s postings on our Forum about his adventures with Louis Andriessen’s De Materie – I’ve known about it for over a year now and it’s intensely satisfying seeing a good friend’s massive endeavors come to fruition. If you’re even remotely close to Washington DC tonight, there’s nothing culturally more important on the Eastern Seaboard than Great Noise Ensemble’s performance of this massive work by one of the 20th century’s most important composers. From the GNE website: De Materie incorporates eclectic musical influences, ranging from Johann Sebastian Bach and Igor Stravinsky to the old Netherlands chanson

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrhUO-m2w6s[/youtube] The first episode just went up today…Joel Puckett & DJ Sparr have some brief  interviews with Christopher Rouse, Robert Beaser, Augusta Read Thomas and Oscar Bettison. Keep up with ’em online here.

2010 celebrates 35 years of the new music festival June in Buffalo and the 25th year that it has been under the direction of composer David Felder. Based at the University of Buffalo, the festival has brought many leading composers and performers together since Morton Feldman started it in 1975 (a wonderful online exhibit on June in Buffalo has been put together by the UB Library and can be found here). This year’s festival kicked off last night with performances of Steve Reich’s Sextet and Double Sextet by the chamber ensemble Signal, who have quickly become a major force in

While a fair amount of attention has been given to the American Composers Orchestra Underwood New Music Readings (namely here, here, here, here annnnd…here) which took place this past Saturday, Miller Theatre wasn’t the only place where new orchestral works were getting read & performed. Saturday was also the culmination of both the Albany Symphony‘s first annual Composer to Center Stage Festival Reading Session and their American Music Festival at the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. As the spring semester at SUNY Fredonia was so kind to have come to an end, I decided

University of Washington Professor Huck Hodge and University of Missouri at Kansas City Professor Paul Rudy have been awarded the 2010 Rome Prize in Music. Hodge, a graduate of Columbia University, was awarded the Luciano Berio Rome Prize to compose two works: Augurios for ensemble and Scenes from Faust for symphonic wind ensemble. Rudy, a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Colorado at Boulder, was awarded the Elliott Carter Rome Prize for his 2012 Stories Nos. 5-7 and a Saxophone Concerto for the jazz saxophonist Bobby Watson. Hot off the wires: The American Academy

From the Pulitzer site: For distinguished musical composition by an American that has had its first performance or recording in the United States during the year, Ten thousand dollars ($10,000). Awarded to “Violin Concerto” by Jennifer Higdon (Lawdon Press), premiered on February 6, 2009, in Indianapolis, IN, a deeply engaging piece that combines flowing lyricism with dazzling virtuosity . Finalists Also nominated as finalists in this category were: “String Quartet No. 3,” by Fred Lerdahl, premiered on December 8, 2009, in Cleveland, Ohio, a remarkable work that displays impeccable technical facility and palpable emotion; and “Steel Hammer,” by Julia Wolfe (G. Schirmer, Inc.),

To say that there was a bit of discussion on the announcement that eighth blackbird was going to be hosting their first composition competition would be a gross understatement…let’s say that it did not go unnoticed or unheard. To that point, it seems that such discussions can carry some weight, because eighth blackbird has just announced that the competition has been postponed and will be undergoing a re-work: eighth blackbird announced its new composition competition in early February. The initial response was positive and enthusiastic, but over time aspects of the competition began to attract scrutiny. While some of the