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Liukin for the Perfect Beat

by Stephanie Benson

Can you do a Yurchenko two-and-a-half, an Onodi, a Tkatchev, a Gienger, a Pak salto, a Stalder shoot, a triple full -- wait, let’s make this easier -- can you do a cartwheel? We know you’ve been practicing your best “stick-it” moment since watching the one-two winning punch of gymnasts Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson in Beijing. But how about saving yourself a trip to the hospital and impress your friends with some Olympic trivia that has nothing to do with Michael Phelps, or um, Michael Phelps.

SXSW: Clarinets, Guitars and Tings

by Matty Karas

Gather 17,481 bands (not the official number, just my estimate) in one small place, and you're bound to experience some strange currencies and coincidences. Wednesday night in Austin, Texas, you were able to shuffle, in a matter of minutes, between the serene St. David's Church, where pioneering classical/minimalist/electronic composer Steve Reich cheered on several acts executing pieces he wrote for combinations of live and taped instruments, and the cavernous Buffalo Billiards, where a Manchester, U.K., pop duo The Ting Tings tackled their own songs pretty much the same way -- but different.

Electioneering '08: Violin Diplomacy

by Piotr Orlov

Even in election years, the music-and-politics story isn’t always about the soundtrack of the campaign trail. Sometimes it’s about the soundtrack behind the DMZ.

The New York Philharmonic Orchestra made news this week by traveling to North Korea to play what turned out to be a historic, internationally televised concert in Pyongyang on Tuesday. The visit took on both ambassadorial and artistic trappings. The trip was the first-ever to North Korea by an American cultural organization, and included the biggest delegation of Americans to visit the country since the end of the Korean War in 1953. It also included a Wednesday morning rehearsal during which members of the Philharmonic and the Orchestra’s musical director Lorin Maazel played with the State Symphony Orchestra of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, allowing for historic interaction between groups of people who may as well be ghosts to one another. (It may be the first of many: if reports of continued cultural exchange are to be believed, classic rock/blues legend Eric Clapton may be following the Phil to play for and with the North Koreans.)

Best of 2007: Classical

2007 was a superlative year for music, and -- in its stubborn and eccentric ways -- classical music was a big part of the reason why. Amid larger signs of a music industry in turmoil, the classical institutions -- labels, concert promoters, orchestra administrators, performers, listeners, critics -- seem to have figured out that the Internet is surprisingly friendly to a thousand-year-old musical tradition. Here are the other reasons 2007 was a memorable year for classical music.

R.I.P. Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928-2007)

by Piotr Orlov

It was announced on Friday that Karlheinz Stockhausen, one of the great composers and music theorists of the 20th century, had passed away at his home in Kuerten-Kettenberg, Germany, on December 5. He was 79. No cause of death was announced.

Live: Thomas Adès @ Zankel Hall

Photo courtesy Chris Lee

Not long ago, the idea that classical musicians would be classified as either composers OR performers would have been regarded as curious. Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms all routinely performed or conducted their own music from the keyboard. Chopin, Liszt, and Rachmaninoff were known as brilliantly virtuosic pianists whose concerts were part recital and part heroic spectacle. Gustav Mahler and Leonard Bernstein were both the principal conductors and music directors of the New York Philharmonic. But although there are notable exceptions today (Pierre Boulez, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, to a lesser extent, John Adams) the composer-performer tradition seems on the wane.

Karma Goose

By Tim Quirk

Poor indie rock. It’s not just unfashionable these days, it’s morally suspect. While a lot of me thinks that complaining Arcade Fire aren’t black enough is kinda like wondering why the New York Philharmonic doesn’t use more distortion pedals, I actually liked the New Yorker piece Sam makes fun of in the post below.

But I’m also deeply suspicious of any effort to make people feel bad about the music they like, and doubly so when such efforts cloak themselves in faux-populist clothing (hipsters declaring that the really cool kids don’t like hipster music is a lot like the Ivy League-educated scion of a wealthy family who currently runs our country dismissing his opponent in the 2004 election as elite and out of touch with middle America). And since I’m in New York right now for the CMJ Music Marathon, which is pretty much a non-stop celebration of semi-popular indie rock, this stuff can’t help but percolate in my beer-soaked noggin (relevant aside: at the last indie-rock-tastic festival I attended in Austin, some guy behind me in the bar line at a Ponys show ridiculed me for buying a $4 Tecate instead of a $3 Pabst Blue Ribbon; I try my best to love my fellow human beings, but sometimes they make it very, very difficult).