FEATURE
Sony Corp Opens up 360 Virtual Mixing Audio Tech to Music Creators and More
Music Business Worldwide: Mandy Dalugdug
The technology uses specialized headphones to recreate the acoustic environment of professional studios, allowing anyone to produce studio-quality mixes in any location.
RESEARCH AND OPINION
Ingredients for brilliance
Aeon: Julia F Christensen
An immersive ‘flow state’ isn’t only accessible to great artists and athletes. You can find your flow too. Here’s how.
The Most Open-Eared Festival in America Is Ojai
NY Times: Zachary Woolfe
Birds joined in for the blissed-out sounds of concerts organized by the adventurous flutist Claire Chase at the Ojai Music Festival in California.
Apple Music Head Calls It “Crazy” Other Streaming Platforms Offer Music for Free
Pandora: Ethan Millman
“As a company, we look at music as art, and we would never want to give away art for free. It makes no sense to me,” Apple Music head Oliver Schusser said during a keynote at the NMPA’s annual meeting Wednesday.
William Kentridge Reflects on What It Means to Be a South African Artist
NY Times: Kate Guadagnino
For nearly five decades, whether in drawing, painting, sculpture, video, theater or opera, William Kentridge, 70, has explored the history of violence and its effects on humanity. “I think my experience of South Africa has been that one has to keep an optimism and a pessimism together, and neither by itself is accurate.”
The Musical Mysteries Brian Wilson Left Behind
NY Times: Bob Mehr
The Beach Boys mastermind has been the subject of pop scholarship and major boxed sets, but some corners of his oeuvre remain unreleased.
How the iPad cured a top pianist’s stage fright
NPR: Leila Fadel and Olivia Hampton
Simone Dinnerstein is breaking her silence on her predicament, and how she ultimately overcame it, in the hope that it might help others and soften what she calls “rigid” classical music conventions.
NATIONAL
CSO puts MusicNOW on “pause,” leaving future of new-music series in doubt
Chicago Classical Review: Lawrence A. Johnson
The death of MusicNOW, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s long-running new-music series, may no longer be exaggerated. The orchestra has informed subscribers that the contemporary music series will be “paused” for the 2025-26 season. There was no public announcement or acknowledgement.
Grant Park Music Festival’s new principal conductor bringing a contextualized ‘bucket list’ to the repertoire
Chicago Sun Times: Kyle MacMillan
“Chicago was really the place that really pushed me not only as a conductor but as a musician overall and showed me what the possibilities could be,” Giancarlo Guerrero says.
The Pint-Size Singers Hoping to Be Opera Stars
NY Times: Javier C. Hernández
The Metropolitan Opera Children’s Chorus has long been an elite training ground for young singers. Getting in requires grit, personality and a soaring voice.
Texas Ballet Theater becomes first DFW dance company to reach a union contract in 40 years
Kera News: Elizabeth Myong
Griff Braun, national organizing director of AGMA, said “this is an important step for dance and for union artists in the North Texas area.”
Trump brings red-carpet vibe, and boos, to Kennedy Center’s ‘Les Mis
The Washington Post: Matt Viser and Travis M. Andrews
The man whose order has led to the tearing down of barricades in Los Angeles watched on as the heroes of the musical sang, “Now we pledge ourselves to hold this barricade.”
Protests and curfew cancel L.A. Phil and ‘Hamlet’ as arts groups’ losses mount
LA Times: Jessica Gelt
Organizations including Los Angeles Opera, Museum of Contemporary Art, the Broad museum and the Japanese American National Museum are grappling with the snowballing effects of the civic unrest compounded by an uncertain future as thousands of National Guard troops and Marines roll into town under President Trump’s orders.
INTERNATIONAL
In Ukraine’s Kharkiv, ballet offers ‘rebirth’ after bombs and bullets
Reuters: Marko Djurica
In the dark, brick-walled basement of the Kharkiv National Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre, a dance company has created a space protected from drones and bombs where audiences can lose themselves in performances of classic ballets.
ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND MUSIC BUSINESS
US music publishing revenue jumped 13.4% to $7bn in 2024, outpacing the growth rate of recorded music
Music Business Worldwide: Daniel Tencer
Given the lacklustre growth in US recorded music revenues last year, it wouldn’t have been a surprise if music publishing revenues also showed signs of weakening.
Taylor Swift’s Master Plan
The New Yorker: Tyler Foggott
In a bid to gain control over her own music, the singer-songwriter rerecorded most of her old studio albums. Then she bought the old ones back. What do we do with the Taylor’s Versions now?
In The Era Of Algorithms, Roots Music Is Getting A Boost
NYT Magazine: Carlo Rotella
Streaming services are helping revive America’s most old-fashioned, undigital genre.
OFF THE BEATEN PATH
The Met Opera’s ‘Diva Whisperer’ Takes Her Last Bow
NY Times: Javier C. Hernández
Suzi Gomez-Pizzo, who is retiring as a wardrobe supervisor at the opera house after 18 years, has been a confidante and cheerleader to the stars.
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