Classical Notes: August 17, 2007 Archive

American Idol, classical style

Posted at 10:32 AM on August 17, 2007 by Alison Young

Have you ever watched the Grammy's or checked out the Billboard charts and thought what was the committee thinking when they picked so-and-so? Well now's your chance to BE the committee (and let other people wonder what you were thinking!) Gramophone Magazine has decided to dispense with its normal process of choosing the artist of the year for 2007 and let us, the public, do the choosing.

Some of this year's contenders include Welsh baritone-with-dulcet-tones, Bryn Terfel; conductor/pianist/jet-setter Daniel Barenboim; one of the "Strad Pack" German violinist Julia Fischer; the fearless American mezzo, Joyce DiDonato and the unbelievably-overworked conductor, Valery Gergiev.

Here's the place to cast your entry: The Classic FM Gramophone Awards 2007 – Artist of the year

Mozart's Manuscript

Posted at 3:04 PM on August 17, 2007 by Rex Levang

A priceless manuscript at a Polish library shows how Mozart wrote his Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat Major - in neat, small notes with no corrections.

More about that manuscript and the dispute surrounding it, in this article from the Shanghai Daily.

The Daily is absolutely correct that music manuscripts, visually, vary widely from composer to composer, which you can confirm by browsing the Juilliard Manuscript Archive, with selections from a scrawling Puccini to a methodical Stravinsky.