Monday, October 15, 2007

National Symphony And Radio, In Crisis, Fail To Prepare Experienced And Younger Audiences For The Classical Beauty Of Bartok, Stravinsky, And Barber

... "I had come to presume it was impossible for an NSO soloist not to get a standing ovation, but Midori, the evening's violin soloist, somehow managed. Whether Bartok's discursive and episodic Violin Concerto No. 2 left the audience cold, or whether Midori's overly tense sound failed to reach many of them, two perfunctory curtain calls were all this masterpiece could draw." ...

Robert Battey "Schubert's 'The Great' Shows NSO At Its Best" Washington Post October 12, 2007

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It will be increasingly difficult in a city which allows its major orchestral conductor to open the season with two Viennese waltzes and to devote subscription weeks to "Serious Fun" programming -- and where the public WETA/WGMS-FM radio station refuses to program modern classic music by Stravinsky and Bartok -- for audience members -- older and younger -- at National Symphony subscription concerts to appreciate the beauty of classical masterpieces such as Bela Bartok's Violin Concerto #2. [Even Samuel Barber's Violin Concerto is banned from the airwaves controlled by the WETA/WGMS merger.]





















Bartok, Stravinsky, and Barber -- Unwanted on the Nation's Capital's public radio.

Now let us praise the famous classical composers banned by WETA/WGMS, in the Nation's Capital.

Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons. Carl Van Vechten photo of Samuel Barber from the collection of the Library of Congress. Van Vechten estate requests that integrity of the photo be respected. With thanks.

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