Owner: G.P. URL:http://blog.sashamakila.com/ Join Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 15:26:57 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: Life in music. An aspiring orchestra conductor writes about his travels to concerts, competitions and master classes. Site statistics:Click here
First round is over 2007-09-27 04:23:00 This morning I finally conducted my first round
. I think the waiting is the
worst thing in competitions, and this time I had to wait really long before I
could conduct. And consequently, if I pass on to the second round there will be
very little time to prepare...
In the drawing I got Wagner "Rienzi" overture. Actually altogether six... Read First
round is over Read more:First round
Matacic competition in Zagreb started 2007-09-25 17:03:00 The Lovro von Matacic competition
in Zagreb, Croatia, started today. I got a
big number in the initial drawing so I did not conduct today. Also the
participants are not allowed to see others conduct before they are done, so I
don't have much to tell about the orchestra either.
All the arrangements seem perfect, though. We are in a good hotel, all... Read Matacic competition in Zagreb started
Playing musical chairs in Finland 2007-10-02 08:37:00 In today's news we read that Leif Segerstam will become the
"Chief Conductor Emeritus" of Helsinki Filharmonia and John Storgårds from
Tampere Filharmonia will take up the post of the chief conductor next year. By
following the news coming from the Finnish orchestral field past couple of
months, I think we are now witnessing a chain... Read Playing musical chairs in Finland
Results of the Lovro von Matacic conducting competition 2007-09-30 04:09:00 At the closing ceremony of the competition
. Filip, Jin, me, Ayyub
Afterparty at the hotel lobby. The winner is easy to tell apart by his
super-wide smile!
First Prize - Jimmy Chiang, UK
Second Prize - Eugene McDonough, USA
Third Prize - Hikaru Ebihara, Japan... Read Results of the Lovro von Matacic conducting competition
View from the concert hall... 2007-09-28 18:55:00 Today I unfortunately had to move to the concert hall to follow the
competition, since I was not amongs the six lucky ones chosen to the
semi-finals.
Our jury at work in the Vatroslav Lisinski concert hall. They did not use
cameras so the back view of the participants was the only thing the jurors
could see
I anyway had very interesting time... Read View from the concert hall...
Book Review: Beyond the Baton (What Every Conductor Needs to Know) by Diane Wittry (1/3) 2007-10-07 12:03:00 I promised to review this new and interesting book a long time ago, but only
now I could find time to flip through it again. It is written by my American
colleague Diane
Witty,
and it really made me understand better the way the American orchestras work.
It has also a lot of commonsensical tips that are valid wherever you happen to
be working, and... Read Book Review: Beyond the Baton
(What Every Conductor Needs
to Know) by Diane Wittry (1/3)
News Update 2 - FNO & Franck 2007-10-05 14:29:00 Today the Finnish National Opera opened its doors after a six-month
renovation including enlargening the orchestra pit and installing new stage
machinery. Because of all the speculations in the air, the journalists
naturally had to ask the outgoing (!) chief conductor Mikko Franck whether he
intends to stay now that there is a new General Manager... Read News Update
2 - FNO & Franck Read more:News Update
News Update - The Chamber Orchestra of Lapland 2007-10-04 06:00:00 The orchestra pictured here is NOT the ChamberOrchestra
of
Lapland
Today's orchestral newsflash was, that John Storgårds will stay in lead of
the Chamber
Orchestra of Lapland, in the condition that they will hire one additional
musician per year until 2011 to make this very small but virtuosic ensemble
more versatile. He stated, that the... Read News Update
- The Chamber Orchestra of Lapland Read more:News Update
News Update 3 - Söderblom to leave the Lappeenranta Orchestra 2007-10-15 15:57:00 It seems that the conductors are having a busy autumn here in Finland!
Today's news tells that Jan Söderblom, who has led the
Lappeenranta
Orchestra
since 2000, is resigning as a protest to the lack of interest
from the governors of the city towards their orchestra! The orchestra, which is
only 21 members strong, needs first of all more string... Read News Update
3 - Söderblom to leave the Lappeenranta Orchestra Read more:News Update
Preparing for the next competition... 2007-10-15 11:35:00 Conducting the Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra
Past couple of days I have spent preparing intensively for the next
competition
, which will be the Grzegorz Fitelberg competition in Poland. A
great help again was my professor from the St Petersburg Conservatory, Leonid
Korchmar, who came to Finland to instruct me and some other conducting students
last... Read Preparing for the next competition...
A new blog about conducting 2007-10-23 14:51:00 My American colleague Amy
Wilson has started a new blog called Conducting Orchestras. It
is mainly aimed at students of conducting, so let's hope by time it will become
a good resource. I will add it to my blogroll on the right. Don't forget to
check Kenneth Woods'
blog too - it is regularly updated and has a lot of interesting
articles!... Read A new blog about conducting
Musician humor 2007-10-21 02:33:00 More funny band cartoons at: http://www.talesfrombandcamp.com/... Read Musician
humor
Book Review: Beyond the Baton (What Every Conductor Needs to Know) by Diane Wittry (2/3) 2007-10-27 11:25:00 Here is the second part of my review of Diane
Wittry's book Beyond the Baton
(the first part can be found here). I will now lead you
through the following three chapters, which in my opinion contain the most
valuable part of the book:
4 - Artistic Leadership
5 - Artistic Programming
6 - The People Factor
Maestro Thielemann, the last of the... Read Book Review: Beyond the Baton (What Every Conductor Needs
to Know) by Diane Wittry (2/3)
10 Reasons Why You Should Participate in Conducting Competitions 2007-10-28 13:13:00 We all know that music is not a sport, so why bother going to music
competitions? They are unfair, there is always politics involved, the winners
will be forgotten in a year, and so on and so on. There are countless excuses
not to go, but after taking part to more than ten (!) competitions I figured
out at least ten reasons why you should kick... Read 10 Reasons
Why You Should Participate
in Conducting Competitions
New active musical blog by TWO conductors 2007-11-09 14:27:00 Earlier this week a new musical blog, Sticks and
Drones, saw the daylight for the first time, and it is maintained by not
only one, but TWO US-based orchestra conductors, Ron Spigelman and Bill Eddins. By the fifth day into its existence the blog has
already six entries, all of them interesting! It seems that this one got a
great start and I hope... Read New active musical blog by TWO conductors
Off to another conducting competition 2007-11-14 04:51:00 Next time I will be writing from Katowice, Poland, where I will be taking
part to the 8th
Grzegorz Fitelberg International Conducting Competition. The repertoire for
that one is really big but consists of good mainstream repertoire plus some
interesting Polish works. One could tour the world for a year just by combining
those pieces into different... Read Off to another conducting competition
Going to the Semi Finals 2007-11-20 14:10:00 An hour ago we heard the results of the first round of the Fitelberg
conducting competition. I was among the 12 "lucky ones" (many times it really
is about luck) who will continue in the competition. My turn will be tomorrow
at 6 PM, so I will have a little more time to prepare... At the moment I cannot
spend much time writing about the... Read Going
to the Semi Finals
The Fitelberg Competition has Started 2007-11-17 09:28:00 Last night we had the opening ceremony and opening concert of the Fitelberg
conducting competition here in Katowice. Due to some cancellations we are not
40 but 35 competitors. Now I can honestly say that I know more than half of the
competitors! Unfortunately a couple of my friends also did not arrive... So, we
listened to some welcoming words and... Read The Fitelberg Competition has Started
Competition results & other things 2007-11-25 10:20:00 It is my last day in Katowice, and it has been so intensive here that I
absolutely had no time to update the events here. First of all, I unfortunately
did not make it to the finals on Friday, but I of course went follow them with
great interest. Afterwards we heard the results
and at least for me there was a
couple of surprises in the order of the... Read Competition results & other things
Some reflections after the Fitelberg competition 2007-12-08 13:08:00 Now it is exactly two weeks after the Fitelberg conducting competition
finished in Poland. I have been thinking a lot about all the things I saw and
heard and learned there, and concluded that again it really was an experience
worth living. I feel that after doing these two competitions (Matacic and
Fitelberg) this autumn I am much better conductor... Read Some reflections after the Fitelberg competition
Leaving for Petrozavodsk 2007-12-09 21:36:00 I am right now leaving for Petrozavodsk, Russia, to conduct a concert with
the Carelian
State Symphony Orchestra. I will have a great program there: Debussy
Rhapsody for Clarinet and Orchestra, Grieg Piano Concerto and Sibelius Fifth
Symphony!
Since there are no flights at the moment from Finland to Petrozavodsk, and
the train via St Petersburg... Read Leaving
for Petrozavodsk
Guest Conducting the Karelian State Philharmonic Orchestra 2007-12-23 14:23:00 The Philharmonic
in Petrozavodsk. Not much unlike the cultural palace in
Tambov where I conducted last year...
Orchestra
's solo cellist discussing with administrator Olga Palchikova at
the philharmonic office
The concert hall from the inside
Musicians arriving to the rehearsal
My soloist for the Grieg piano concerto, Aleksandr Onkin... Read Guest
Conducting the Karelian State
Philharmonic Orchestra
Italian Opera Gala by the Students of Sibelius Academy 2008-03-09 01:03:00 Resting
before the opera concert...
The concert should be online in a couple of days here:
While you are waiting, check out the last year's opera gala here: Read Italian
Opera Gala by the Students of Sibelius Academy
Pedrotti preselections in Brussels 2008-02-22 08:13:00 There are two international conducting competitions organizing preselections
before the actual competition - Pedrotti competition in Italy and Besancon competition in
France (more about that later). So two days ago I travelled to Brussels
to
attend the last Pedrotti preselection. They had held them already in Trento,
Montreal, Prague and Tokyo.
In... Read Pedrotti preselections in Brussels
Settling in Paris 2008-02-10 06:19:00 The past week I have spent settling in Paris
, looking at the sights and
trying to learn how to navigate in the city. Paris was not as warm in winter as
I expected so I also caught a flu in the process... Anyway, it is a great city
and I am so happy that after a lot of postponing I finally made it here!
Musicians of ONF in the Olivier Messiaen... Read Settling in Paris
The RNCM Junior Fellowship in Conducting Auditions 2008-01-25 12:11:00 A view from the bus window in Dublin where I stayed one night on my way to
Manchester
My trip to Manchester was a perfect example of a trip made on a really tight
budget. Instead of paying 300 for a Finnair direct flight to Manchester I flew
on Ryanair and together with airport transport etc. expenses I ended up paying
less than half of that. But... Read The RNCM JuniorFellowship
in Conducting Auditions
Paris - Moscow - Mikkeli 2008-04-09 03:58:00 During past days I have been traveling so much that there was no way to
update my blog, sorry! What happened is worth telling anyway: After I returned
to Paris
from Jyväskylä I was just spending my time with some friends at the
Cité des Arts and elsewhere, and attending the rehearsals at the ONF. I was
planning to go to Moscow
for the following... Read Paris - Moscow - Mikkeli
ONF US Tour News Watch 2008-05-02 13:21:00 The Orchestre National de France is now touring US. Here some reviews I
found in the net. Wish I was there with you guys!
-dyn/content/article/2008/04/29/AR2008042902881.html... Read ONF US Tour News Watch
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