… enough of banning music and Wagner and all that …
(Thanks to Jason Heath for posting this earlier.)
[Updated 11:28 p.m.: Supervisor Mike Antonovich said he does not want to cancel the festival. He wants to substitute works by other composers.]
Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich is demanding that Los Angeles Opera discontinue the Ring Festival L.A. planned for next year, calling Richard Wagner a, “Nazi composer.”
“To specifically honor and glorify the man whose music and racist anti-Semitic writings inspired Hitler and became the de facto soundtrack for the Holocaust in a countywide festival is an affront to those who have suffered or have been impacted by the horrors of Adolf Hitler’s National Socialistic Worker Party,” Antonovich said in a statement released today.
I read it here.
… because these Terry Teachout tweets are too good to skip, but really need to be posted right after I read them. Because.
Paul and I are sitting in separate cars side by side in a Santa Fe parking lot, checking our e-mail…
…and he just e-mailed me a synthesized sound file of the revised orchestration for a new orchestral interlude for “The Letter.”
If that doesn’t sum up opera in the 21st century, I don’t know what does.
In case you aren’t up on opera news, Terry Teachout is the librettist for the opera “The Letter”, with music by Paul Moravec. I’m sorry to say I’m unfamiliar with Mr. Moravec’s music. I see selections at emusic, so I’ll probably be downloading some music while I still have a membership there. (They’ve lowered the number of downloads with my particular plan beginning with my renewal, so I’m guessing I’ll drop the membership. We’ll see.)
Well, I told my oboe teacher I quit. Made an appointment to change my major. I think I’m going to vomit.
Which background music/sound is optimal for cognitive activities such as film interpretation? A quick and dirty study while on call suggests classical music. Bach, to be precise. In my former life, I used to play the oboe (but I wasn’t one of those crazy, fanatical oboe players).
