Made in Thailand: Composed in America

Last week on Monday I was over at mae's1 house helping her clean out her kitchen while we were listening to the late Suthep Wongkamhaeng2 (สุเทพ วงศ์กำแหง), one of mae's favorites. As I was drying dishes, a song came up in the playlist and mae said she used to sing it to me as a …

Diversity, Inclusive Programming, and Music Education (part 2): Postcolonialism

This is the second of a multi-part series about Diversity, Inclusive Programming, and Music Education (for part one, click here). As this piece follows up on ideas brought up in the previous post it's suggested you read it first. Also, as I mentioned at the conclusion of that piece, it might be useful for you …

Diversity, Inclusive Programming, and Music Education (part 1)

In 2011 Tyler Thompson, a fifteen year old African American sophomore at the Oakland School for the Arts, made some waves in national and international news as a singer of songs in Mandarin. In 2004 he had already made national news for singing in a children's Chinese Opera. Here's an AP Video Piece from '11 …

How Easy is it to Avoid the Art of Monstrous Men?

Actually, it's ridiculously easy. I'll just stick to music, since that's what I usually focus on in this blog. And let me qualify the "ridiculously easy" by stating that I'm referring to the work of folks that may only be scratching the surface of those that remain unaccused--there may very well (and very likely) be …

What’s it like playing Pop Music when you’re not a Pop Superstar?

Some time ago one of my friends and one of the owners of a local record shop/venue, Modern Cult Records, posed a question (friends only post, unfortunately) on Facebook: Why do so many bands tour directly around Louisville? How can we change this frustrating f**king trend? Do I need to open my own damn venue? …

R.I.P. Rachel Blanton (1974-2014)

I knew Rachel since we were both in the Floyd County Youth Symphony, so basically since High School.  While she and my brother Joe knew each other better (I believe they were in the same class) one of the unique aspects of classical music organizations in educational institutions is that folks are always interacting at …

Discovering your Band or Orchestra’s Roots

One of the local research projects I've been working on is charting the evolution of Classical Music in Kentuckiana (i.e. the Louisville-Jefferson County, KY-IN MSA). Being one of the MSA's which lies over two states, this makes some of the data gathering a little trickier, but lately I've decided to focus very specifically on New …

5 Things Classical Musicians should know about being in a Band

So, why aren't you in a band anyway? One of the things I think all Classical Music students (especially performers) should be required to do is play in a band.  No, this doesn't mean they should take up a guitar, bass, drums, or sing.  What this does mean is that it should become an integral …

Covers vs. Originals: Why classical musicians might not want to think like rock bands

In the previous post in this series I mentioned that I would be exploring narrow ideas of “Success” in discussions from some Classical Music Crisis folks. I brought up the phenomenon known as Survivorship Bias and how our models for success can be skewed by survivors while missing possibly more relevant data that can be …

Survivorship Bias: Why classical musicians might not want to think like rock bands

This is going to be the first in a series of posts exploring narrow ideas of "Success" in discussions from some Classical Music Crisis folks. Survivorship bias also flash-freezes your brain into a state of ignorance from which you believe success is more common than it truly is and therefore you leap to the conclusion …

New Opera in Louisville

In my post about new new music groups in Louisville I neglected to mention the Thompson Street Opera Company, about which I knew little. Fortunately, one of my colleagues in Eight.dB, Claire DiVizio, is actually the founder and executive producer of the company. Thompson Street Opera Company (founded 2011) As you can see from their …

New New Music Groups in Louisville

As I mentioned in my previous post, at least five groups have been formed in the past couple of years which focus significantly or exclusively on new music in the Louisville area.  This is not to say that this exhausts the list of new and experimental groups in the area. For a mosre complete (but …

Musical Chairs in Louisville Arts Music Culture 2011-2014

As we approach the three year anniversary of the work stoppage of the Louisville Orchestra and as I've been doing a significant amount of research into the local Greater Louisville Music and Arts scene I've realized how interesting the past three years have been. I've constructed a short (and by no means complete) timeline of …

Why New Music Louisville: The Evolution of NuMuLu (part 1.5) – New Solo Cello Repertoire and Extended Techniques

As I was looking for scores for my students who performed at the ISSMA Solo and Ensemble Contest this past Saturday, I came across a number of my collection of sheet music for new solo cello works. I've not looked through them until lately as I've started up my two lastest new music projects (The …

The Classical Music “Crisis” and Millennials

I was reading a few posts about Millennials in Classical Music at Catherine Starek's blog, Mezzaphonically Speaking, and it occurred to me that I haven't spent as much time taking a look at how the changing ethnic demographic of the US is affecting attendance at music events. Sure, I've brought up the emerging Demographic Racial …

NuMuLu – New Music Louisville

I've started a website and facebook page that features new and experimental music in the Greater Louisville and Kentuckiana region.  Sometimes it's difficult knowing what is actually happening around you unless you have some place that aggregates all the relevant activity, events, and people involved in it. I had once tried this in Indianapolis while …

Kaiser on the Royal Opera House Cinema Season

Michael Kaiser's latest blog post discusses the slowly growing trend for streaming to movie theaters as the Royal Opera House moves into that form of broadcast. The Royal Opera House recently announced it would soon begin beaming performances to American movie theaters, mimicking the broadcasts of the Metropolitan Opera. We have also seen several high …

Indie-Classical, Alt-Classical, and the shift to Local Culture

I've been reading a number of pieces debating the relevance of using the term "indie-classical" to describe a new ethos in classical music (or simply to describe a school centered around Nico Muhly) and it's reminding me of the modern/post-modern debates and the futility of attempting to own names that piggyback on marketing terms.  In …