Synaphaï: Gene Gaudette's Blog

Half a century ago, classical musicians – including then-fireband of the avant garde Pierre Boulez – would have immediately associated that nickname with one of the greatest maestros of all time, Pierre Monteux.  The Sunday New York Times profiles Boulez, now one of classical music's most respected mentors and esenior statesmen.

Gramophone and The New York Times report that Russian-born American pianist Kirill Gerstein has won the quadrenially-granted $300,000 Gilmore Artist Award. I've been mightily impressed by his debut CD recording for OehmsClassics, and hopefully this award will bring the name of this mightily worthy pianist to a broader audience.

The Boston Globe and AP are reporting that conductor Seizi Ozawa has been diagnosed with esophageal cancer — the same disease that claimed ny dad's life — and has cancelled all of his scheduled appearances for the next six months to undergo treatment. Esophageal cancer is tough and persistent, but judging from the news reports it was caught early, a factor that is likely to greatly improve Maestro Ozawa's prognosis.

If you have not yet stumbled upon Grumpy's Classics Cave, you are depriving yourself of some extremely rare aural treats. Yes, a bit of time is required to download Grumpy's lossless .flac files, but your patience will be well rewarded. His latest offering from the cave is an exceptional vintage recording of lute music by John Dowland played with pre-historically-informed, almost neo-Romantic passion by Mildred Clary.

The New York Times's Steve Smith profiles the groundbreaking German record label and its iconoclastic founder Manfred Eicher.

How can I not steer you to a blog post at Classical Iconoclast that touches on Christmas greetings from the late Karlheinz Stockhausen and takes a controversial swipe at Alex Ross's much-praised The Rest Is Noise?

Yes, I know it's from an Easter oratorio. Yes, you'd expect me to post an historically informed version. But no! Here's a 1938 aircheck of the "Hallelujah" Chorus from Handel's Messiah (in what sounds to me to be Mozart's arrangement) performed by the Concertgebouw Orchestra and Tonkunstkoor conducted by Willem Mengelberg, with a little bit of audio restoration from a so-so source by yours truly.

Hear last year's early electrical holiday cheer here.