Spilling Good INK – Guest Post

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Sticks&Drones’ guest poster Viswa Subbaraman returns in Part The Second of his epic Indian adventure: I left off in my last post about the INKTalks 2014 <inktalks.com> with session 2. I’m going to try to cover some of the big highlights in this post, and in the next one, I’ll focus on my fellow Ink Fellows, which is probably one of the more inspiring parts of the INK Talks for me.Because I had to be in make-up for my INK talk, I missed part of Session 3 of the conference, but I did … Continue Reading

ürtext – The Singular Lens

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What are the tools that can be used to make a great performance? Imagination, technique, consistency… depending on your definition of ‘great’ it can be many different ones. Why Ürtext, then? An article by Stuart Isacoff in the WSJ today wants to make the case against the ürtext editions many of us use and love. What is strange about his argument is that it starts with a rather spot-on critique of the state of piano performance today. I quite agree with him that recordings have made much pianism rather, well, bland. Micro-editing has been a detriment … Continue Reading

For Sale: Bridge in Brooklyn, Cheap!

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Scholarship. Research. Facts. Since we live in the era of “Fox News” we all know that these things are in short supply. Goodness, haven’t you heard about the massive Ebola outbreak in the United States? No? Then how about Anna Magdalena Bach? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, based on nothing more than than a forensic analysis of handwriting a “professor” in North Australia has concluded that not only did Anna Magdalena compose the Cello Suites heretofore attributed to one Sebastian Bach, but also that the aforementioned Sebastian was a wife beater and all-around scumbag. Despite … Continue Reading

Hell’s Coldest Day

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This may come as a shock to many people but…. the classical music world is very strange. Case in point – this weekend, which found me the one place I was pretty sure I would never be again, and though it was a balmy 64 degrees in Minnesota it was certainly the coldest day in the history of hell.

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The Swimsuit Edition!!!

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Every blue moon or so someone (or something) that purports to be part of the classical music business comes up with a sure fire way of grabbing headlines. Yes, in order to save classical music we must thrust classical music into the mainstream! We must make a splash! We must dive right in!!! (are you getting my drift yet?… so to speak?)

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A (Washington) Post Mortem

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Two days ago I tuned into my local MPR station and within 30 seconds had correctly identified the two gentlemen talking – Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. There was something about how they presented themselves which made me immediately think about Watergate and Nixon. I didn’t even get the gist of their topic before I knew who they were. One of them (can’t remember which), when talking about that era, mentioned that he thought they were working for the greatest editor (Benjamin Bradlee) and the greatest owner (Katharine Graham) in the business. Lo how the mighty have fallen.

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