OUR FAIR CITY

From the desk of James Reel on Friday, July 28th 2006 at 7:00

    A Wikipedia parody called “Uncyclopedia, the content-free encyclopedia that anyone can edit,” includes an entry on Tucson that is most assuredly not endorsed by the City Fathers and Their Girlfriends. In the Culture section one finds this reference to a certain organization with which we are all familiar:
    “The only ...

THE VICAR'S KNICKERS

From the desk of James Reel on Thursday, July 27th 2006 at 7:48

    In the latest Tucson Weekly, my review of an English farce at Live Theatre Workshop, wherein at least one man of the cloth runs around in his underwear:

    The sole measure of a farce's success: Its production is so fast and exuberant that you never have a chance to ...

GEOGRAPHY 101, POLYGLOT EDITION

From the desk of James Reel on Thursday, July 27th 2006 at 5:46

    I was reading an item in the (Manchester) Guardian quoting the German publication Der Tagesspiegel on the overabundance of music festivals, and suddenly felt lost. According to the Guardian’s translation, Der Tagesspiegel posits that “the festivals in Bayreuth and Salzburg are the most prominent examples of an increasingly close ...

CAITLIN BY COINCIDENCE

From the desk of James Reel on Wednesday, July 26th 2006 at 7:49

    This past spring, the day after I interviewed young violinist Caitlin Tully for Strings magazine, I went over to the Tucson Symphony office to find out what they had lined up for the 2006-07 season. Guest soloists included … Caitlin Tully. I was so pleased to be able to sit there ...

BAD CELLIST

From the desk of James Reel on Tuesday, July 25th 2006 at 8:56

    ABC News reports that a model college student and cellist faces sentencing for bank robbery:

    On Dec. 9, 2005, … [Greg Hogan Jr.] walked into an Allentown, Pa., Wachovia bank and handed a teller a note that said he had a gun and demanded money.
    The frightened teller gave Hogan $2 ...

BRITISH BOOSTERIMS, PARTE THE SECONDE

From the desk of James Reel on Tuesday, July 25th 2006 at 7:32

    Kyle Gann presents further evidence of the parochialism of Brit-oriented music critics. Gann is aghast that The Pimlico Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Composers (1999), by Mark Morris, contains full essays on such rather marginal English figures as William Alwyn, Ivor Gurney, Daniel Jenkyn Jones, Elizabeth Maconchy and Grace Williams, but barely ...

MUSIC 101, MULTIMEDIA VERSION

From the desk of James Reel on Monday, July 24th 2006 at 6:45

    Tim Smith of the Baltimore Sun offers high praise for the latest entrant into what Virgil Thomson used to call the “music appreciation racket.” Here's the nutgraf:

    If the thoroughly uninitiated, or just moderately interested, could be coaxed into spending some time with The NPR Listener's Encyclopedia of ...

ABOUT THOSE DONUT HOLES

From the desk of James Reel on Friday, July 21st 2006 at 7:35

    Arts administration consultant Drew McManus maintains a provocative blog called Adaptistration, documenting how orchestra managers are and are not adapting to America’s changing cultural and economic environments. I read it regularly without linking to it because I’ve assumed it might be a bit too specialized for general readers ...

BUT DOESN'T EVERY DONUT HAVE A HOLE?

From the desk of James Reel on Thursday, July 20th 2006 at 7:32

    Speaking of the Tucson Weekly (see below), my contribution this week is a surprisingly uncynical look at the upcoming Tucson Symphony season, placed in the national context.

    At the Tucson Symphony Orchestra, the situation is not so dismal, although it's sufficiently tense that music director George Hanson told me ...

PAYING FOR REVIEWS?

From the desk of James Reel on Thursday, July 20th 2006 at 7:30

    The blogosphere is beginning to rumble over allegations that Fanfare, to which I contribute, gives preferential treatment to the recordings of advertisers. Not that it sells positive reviews, but a disc is more likely to get reviewed if the label buys an ad. It’s not my place to comment ...

MAHLERIA

From the desk of James Reel on Wednesday, July 19th 2006 at 6:52

    Kyle Gann has figured out why Mahler appeals to some of us much more than Shostakovich does:

I spent all day writing program notes for the Shostakovich Eleventh Symphony, and I finally pinpointed why I can't love his music as much as I do Mahler's. It often demonstrates ...

HOW TO BE INTERVIEWED

From the desk of James Reel on Monday, July 17th 2006 at 6:58

    Timothy Mangan of the Orange County Register offers some tips to interviewees that I wish would be heeded by the people I interview.

LIBERAL COMEDIAN SUES BLOGGER

From the desk of James Reel on Friday, July 14th 2006 at 7:39

    This is old news, but only now have I caught up with it via another blogger. The sainted Garrison Keillor isn’t above using bully tactics to protect his lucrative Prairie Home empire from harmless parody. Read all about it here.

INTERVENTION

From the desk of James Reel on Thursday, July 13th 2006 at 7:08

    Pianist Jeremy Denk has had enough of people remarking that performers presenting a score should just “leave it alone”:

To "leave a piece alone" by contemporary standards means perhaps: to do what modern conservatory education tells us to do: play in time, observe markings, play expressively but do not add ...

PAIN IN THE NECK

From the desk of James Reel on Thursday, July 13th 2006 at 7:07

    In the latest Tucson Weekly, I offer a preview of a comedy-magic benefit for a foundation supporting those who suffer chronic pain. It all started with a local high school girl:

    In 1998, 16-year-old Amy Potter was a dedicated jock. She played varsity basketball and golf at Sabino High School ...

CONCERT BROADCASTS

From the desk of James Reel on Wednesday, July 12th 2006 at 6:28

    I often wonder if anybody listens to the concert programs we broadcast at 8 p.m.; it seems that most people are spending their evenings out, or watching TV, or reading, or anything but listening to the radio. But here's a comment I got today from a former Tucsonan ...

FELLED BY A BLOG

From the desk of James Reel on Tuesday, July 11th 2006 at 6:59

    The Arizona Daily Star reports the latest personnel mini-scandal at the UA: “An adjunct psychology lecturer at the University of Arizona resigned Saturday after writing to a conservative blogger that she wouldn't care if his 2-year-old son was killed the way JonBenet Ramsey was.” Although I am inclined to ...

MRS. MOZART, PRE-PAPARAZZI?

From the desk of James Reel on Tuesday, July 11th 2006 at 6:31

    Monday morning, before I discovered that my blogsite was down, I was all set to upload the following post …

    Here’s a link to a recently discovered photo taken in 1840 of a group that includes Constanze Weber Mozart, Wolfgang’s widow. She was 78 at the time; Mozart had ...

LHL IN THE ARCHIVES

From the desk of James Reel on Thursday, July 6th 2006 at 7:34

    From the archives of Fanfare magazine, here’s an interview I conducted a bit more than two years ago with Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, who died this past Monday.

LORRAINE HUNT LIEBERSON

From the desk of James Reel on Wednesday, July 5th 2006 at 7:05

    It’s remarkable and touching how people are reacting to the death Monday of mezzo Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. How many other classical singers today would inspire such a mixture of admiration, respect, and deep affection? She was a superb artist, excelling equally in vocal technique, communicative expression, taste, and musical ...

DECLARATIONS

From the desk of James Reel on Tuesday, July 4th 2006 at 7:34

    A few stray thoughts on Independence Day:
    » American composers have rarely been able to transform patriotic texts into lyrics that flow as beautifully when sung as they do when spoken. Randall Thompson’s Testament of Freedom (text by Thomas Jefferson) is something of an anomaly in that it handles the ...

INCIVILITY

From the desk of James Reel on Monday, July 3rd 2006 at 7:40

    Perhaps it’s merely coincidental, but shortly after my intemperate post on radio consultants appeared, another blogger declared at her site, “Writing about an organization you work for in a negative way (I’m not talking anonymous blogs; those are another story all together and I'm not going into ...