Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise

A Liszt moment

Andrew McIntosh's Fixations

In praise of John Williams

I greatly enjoyed speaking with David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker and host of the New Yorker Radio Hour, about the monumental film-scoring achievements of John Williams. I interviewed the composer in 2020, and visited him again a few months back. As I recount in my chat with David, Williams showed me the original score of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, possibly his finest Hollywood achievement and certainly one of the most potent film scores ever written.

Headline to remember

In my book Wagnerism, I mentioned the existence of a Russian mercenary group called Wagner, little imagining that it would grow in magnitude to the point of threatening a coup. Exactly what role the composer Wagner played in the formation of the group Wagner is uncertain. Luke Harding, the Guardian reporter who has written extensively about the organization, asserts that Dmitry Utkin, its shadowy founder, took inspiration from the "Ride of the Valkyries" scene in Apocalypse Now. Utkin also seems to have a fetish for Nazi iconography, and he may view Wagner in the same light. The precise facts of the matter will probably never be known, but a new chapter in the story of Wagner's endless political-cultural aftershocks will eventually have to be written — not, to be sure, by me.

I'm not sure how often Wagner has appeared on the front page of the New York Times. One other instance is below.

Schindler's Program

For the journal Nonsite I've written an article about the origins of R. M. Schindler's "Modern Architecture: A Program," his visionary manifesto of 1912-13. While examining the Schindler Papers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, I made an apparent discovery about how the Program came to be written. Much thanks to Todd Cronan for inviting me to contribute.

Log-cabin minimalism

The MELA Foundation, which administers the work of La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela, is seeking donations to preserve the log cabin in which Young was born, in 1935, in Bern, Idaho. I'm amazed to hear that it still stands, though it is apparently now in very poor condition. Above is a photo that Zazeela took in 1979.

Sciarrino, Saariaho

Sonic Signatures. The New Yorker, June 19, 2023.

A Marie Jaëll moment

Nightafternight playlist

New and recent releases of interest.

Byrd, Mass for Five Voices and other works; Owain Park leading The Gesualdo Six (Hyperion)

Spontini, La Vestale; Marina Rebeka, Stanislas de Barbeyrac, Tassis Christoyannis, Aude Extrémo, Nicolas Courjal, David Witczak, Christophe Rousset conducting Les Talens Lyriques and Flemish Radio Choir (Bru Zane)

Density 2036, Parts VI, VII, VIII: works of Olga Neuwirth, Pamela Z, Phyllis Chen, Sarah Hennies, Liza Lim, Matana Roberts, Wang Lu, Ann Cleare; Claire Chase and various collaborators (New Focus)

Machaut, The Fount of Grace; Orlando Consort (Hyperion)

Ligeti, Études, Capriccios; Han Chen (Naxos)

Schubert, Piano Trio Nos. 1 and 2, Notturno, Rondo, Arpeggione Sonata; Christian and Tanja Tetzlaff, Lars Vogt (Ondine)

Anna Thorvaldsdottir, ARCHORA, AIŌN; Eva Ollikainen, Iceland Symphony Orchestra (Sono)

Newton Armstrong, The Book of the Sediments; Juliet Fraser (all that dust)

Uncollegiality at the Met

Zachary Woolfe writes about a strange recent incident at the Met: "Before 'Flute' opened, Stutzmann was quoted in The New York Times remarking that McBurney’s production, which raises the pit almost to stage level, lets the musicians see what’s going on rather than keeping them, as usual, in the 'back of a cave' where there’s 'nothing more boring.' Jokey and innocuous. But for some reason, the musicians flew to social media and condemned her for accusing them of playing bored. Even worse, the Met’s music director, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, rather than standing up for his colleague or trying to resolve the conflict behind the scenes, publicly cheered this unseemly pile-on, adding seven clapping emojis to an Instagram post by the orchestra. He and the musicians should be ashamed of themselves; Stutzmann should be celebrated."

This is undignified behavior by the Met's music director, and he should apologize to his colleague. The Met needs gifted music directors, particularly given Nézet-Séguin's tendency toward abrupt cancellations.

Dudamel at the NY Phil, Mozart at the Met

The Pit and the Podium. The New Yorker, June 5, 2023.

Der Schreibtisch des Zauberers

At the Thomas-Mann-Archiv, Zurich. Alongside the permanent exhibition evoking Mann's study, the archive has mounted a temporary exhibition titled "Achtung Europa!," about the author's political activity in Europe over the course of his life.

Marbach am Neckar

Inside the secret command center of German literature — the magnificent Deutsches Literaturarchiv Marbach.

For Kaija Saariaho

An incalculable loss for the musical world.

Mahler's baptismal record

A haunting item, to be seen in the Komponistenquartier Museum in Hamburg. Mahler converted to Catholicism at the St. Ansgarkirche in Hamburg in February 1897, in advance of his move to Vienna.

Ligeti at 100

American classical organizations have mostly ignored György Ligeti's hundred birthday, but events have been plentiful in Europe. The Vienna Philharmonic, Dresden Philharmonic, Gürzenich Orchestra, and Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic are all playing his music today. The Dallas Symphony is one of very few American groups marking the anniversary. I devoted a column to Ligeti in 2001 and wrote this notice when he died, in 2006. I treasure the memory of meeting the great man, in 1993, even if I asked a stupid question.

A Sarah Nemtsov moment

A Kristine Tjøgersen moment

At the grave of Edvard Grieg

Taken during a visit to the lovely Grieg Museum in Troldhaugen, outside Bergen. Below, pictures of Grieg's composing hut. Earlier, in Lofthus, he had a similar cabin built. These were perhaps the inspiration for Mahler's various composing huts.

Previously: Feuchtwanger, Toch, Lubitsch, Korngold, Salieri, Bruckner, Liszt, Georg Trakl, Willa Cather and Edith Lewis, Thomas Mann, Bach, Nietzsche, Monteverdi, Koussevitzky, Michael Furey, Luranah Aldridge, Ligeti, Frescobaldi, Villiers de l'Isle-Adam, Baudelaire and Beckett, Nadia and Lili Boulanger, Stravinsky and Nono, Zemlinsky, Schnittke, Fibich, X. Scharwenka, Elliott Carter, Enescu, Rachmaninov, Mahler and many others, Russ.

Momento Sciarrino