David Froom wrote:
On 1/29/06 7:52 PM, Carl Dershem wrote:
To me, the price of tickets, plus the perception of snootiness are at
least as much what keep the audiences away as anything else.
Carl,
You are absolutely right. As a way of backing up what I say, we have a
festival here in Maryland, ... Soloists
are generally young up-and-coming touring folks: Lara St. John, Ahn Trio
(premiering a new concerto for trio and orchestra by Kenji Bunch) as two
examples.
...
So, Carl, yes you are exactly right. Get rid of high prices and snootiness,
and classical music of every stripe flourishes.
David Froom
Including crap. We (Louisville Orchestra) played the Kenji Bunch piece
with the Ahn trio last year, on our classical series, not our pops
series. It is pure pop crap, just one bad rock cliche after another.
The Ahn trio itself is a hoax - three attractive young Asian sisters
(including one pair of twins) who play at barely above a good high
school level, but amplify their mediocre playing so loud, and have their
moves down so pat, (not to mention their necklines so low and their
skirts so loose - not that there's anything WRONG with that), that they
have have developed somewhat of a following. (I still can't get that
god-awful cat-screech of an amplified violin sound out of my ear, now
that you've reminded me of them!)
Don't get me wrong - I am in favor of any sincere attempt at what you
describe. I have been a part of performances of some musically
successful collaborations: jazz-symphonic (some works penned by David
Baker, some of them recorded on our First Edition Label, I don't know if
they are currently in print); bluegrass-symphonic with the great McLean
family written by Phillip Rhodes (some recorded, ditto), and others, on
pops concerts that were nice, if not so ambitious. The last two times
that "Blood, Sweat, and Tears" were here were really fun, because their
2nd trpt/musical director had made orchestral arrangements that were
fabulous - including orchestral preludes to some of their hit singles
like "Spinning Wheel". Just playing a bunch of Nelson Riddle's Frank
Sinatra charts with Frank Jr. on the latter's tribute tour, shortly
after Frank Sr. died, was a great collaboration, without getting too
highfalutin' about it, really.
Heck, the Louisville Orchestra was doing this stuff in 1968: _ Three
Views from the Open Window_ was "A psychedelic piece for rock group and
orchestra" written by and performed with Peter Schickele, Stanley
Walden, and Robert Dennis. I was in the audience for the premiere, and
all we young acid rock fans absolutely loved it! (I'll have to dig out
LO LP-691 at a local library and see how it sounds to me now!). (see
http://www.pdqbach.com/shoppe/psrec/garden.htm )
In 1970 the LO commissioned and recorded a work by my composition
teacher Nelson Keyes entitled _Abysses, Bridges, Chasms_ for Jazz/Rock
Combo and Orchestra. (He later revised the last movement and renamed
the work _Bridges_. ) This was written for a combo called "The
Symphonic Bridge" made up mostly of LO members that would play for
receptions after LO concerts. (David, do you remember our giant of a
principal horn and his big sound? You should have heard him sing Ray
Charles and David Clayton Thomas back then!)
But that Bunch piece for the Ahn girl group is pure, unadulterated crap,
now and forever. And it was too loud. But the kids loved it (sigh).
Ray Horton
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