Latest news – Page 216
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ArticleGerman music schools report 14 per cent rise in student numbers
The number of young people learning musical instruments in Germany has risen by 14 per cent in the past decade, according to new figures released by the Association of German Music Schools (AGMS). A total of 920,000 students are currently involved in music education programmes, compared with ...
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ArticleThe Strad January 2014 issue is on sale now
The January issue of The Strad is now on sale. In our 'Fresh Thinking' edition Californian cello innovator and sound sculptor Zoë Keating reveals how technology and the internet have helped her home-grown music to flourish outside the mainstream. Our article on pop-up exhibitions investigates why a ...
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ArticleCellist wins £8,000 first prize at 2013 Penderecki Competition
French–Armenian cellist Astrig Siranossian has won the first prize at the second International Krzysztof Penderecki Cello Competition. The 25-year-old (pictured) received PLN40,000 (£8,000) and performance opportunities with a number of Polish orchestras. She was also awarded two special prizes, including one for the best performance of Penderecki’s ...
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ArticleHungarian violinist János Négyesy dies aged 75
Violinist and pedagogue János Négyesy died on 20 December at the age of 75. For more than three decades he was a member of the music faculty at the University of California at San Diego (UCSD), also giving masterclasses worldwide. A leading advocate for contemporary music, Négyesy ...
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ArticleAmerican violinist Maud Powell to receive posthumous lifetime achievement Grammy
The great American violinist Maud Powell (1867–1920) will be awarded a posthumous lifetime achievement award by the Recording Academy at a ceremony the night before the 56th Grammys in January. Powell is credited with being a groundbreaking pioneer, whose consummate skill and communicative abilities impressed aficionados and the ...
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ArticleSistema Scotland to launch Big Noise project in Aberdeen
Sistema Scotland, the five-year-old youth music programme based on Venezuela’s El Sistema, has announced plans for its third children’s orchestra project in Scotland. Big Noise Torry will be based in the Torry area of Aberdeen and involve children from several local schools. The aim is to have ...
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ArticleStolen ‘ex-Kym' Stradivarius violin fetches £1.385m at auction
The Stradivarius violin belonging to London-based violinist Min-Jin Kym that was stolen at a Pret a Manger sandwich bar in London’s Euston Station in November 2010 and later recovered by police, has sold for £1.385m ($2.27m) at auction. The sale price exceeds the £1.2m valuation attached to ...
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ArticleGermany's Notos Piano Quartet triumphs in Italy
The Notos Quartet from Germany has clinched the €12,000 first prize at Italy’s Premio Vittorio Gui International Chamber Music Competition after performing Brahms’s Piano Quartet in C minor op.60 in the final round. The win is a particular coup for the ensemble since the last two editions ...
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ArticleExtinct stringed instrument to make its London debut
A small-scale cello that sits against the shoulder and is played like a violin will make its London debut as part of a programme from the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment (OAE) on 25 March at Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre. The 18th century violoncello da ...
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ArticleBrussels Philharmonic string players to benefit from new instrument investment scheme
The Brussels Philharmonic has set up a new instrument foundation to help investors and philanthropists purchase musical instruments to be played by the orchestra’s musicians. The Brussels Philharmonic Foundation has been created with stringed instruments in particular in mind, being on average the most costly of orchestral ...
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ArticleEastern Europeans dominate at third Toru? International Violin Competition
Four Eastern Europeans and two South Koreans made it to the final round of this year’s International Violin Competition in Toru?, Poland, which ran from 23 November–2 December. The top prize of €12,000 went to Polish violinist Anna Malesza (pictured), a student of Marcin Baranowski at the Academy ...
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ArticleGothenburg Symphony launches airport ‘music chairs' with flashmob performance
Travellers passing through Göteborg Landvetter Airport in Sweden got more than surround sound when they tried out four new ‘music chairs’ installed in the airport’s terminal building. The chairs, which have been commissioned by the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra (GSO), contain a sound system and screen, allowing passengers ...
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ArticleBerlin declares viola 'Instrument of the Year 2014'
An annual citywide festival in Berlin that spotlights underrepresented musical instruments will turn its attention on the viola next year with a series of concerts, workshops and events at locations across the German capital. The year-long event, simply called ‘Instrument of the Year’, launched in 2011 with ...
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ArticleMusicians forced to take instruments without cases on board flight
Three members of the French string quartet Quatuor Voce were requested to remove their stringed instruments from their cases before taking them on board a flight, the ensemble reported on Twitter. The musicians were at Paris's Orly Airport booked on a flight with the Spanish airline Vueling ...
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ArticleBassist designs scordatura pedals for real-time retuning
A young US double bassist and composer is developing a pedal system to allow bass players to change the pitch of strings while playing. Carter Callison, a doctoral student and Manson Composition Fellow at London's Royal Academy of Music, has raised $8,000 through crowdfunding website Kickstarter ...
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ArticleCremonese luthiers shape their craft
This photograph by Italian artist Ettore Favini is one of a series called Ipotesi di Finito #4 – Dare forma alla cultura – a collaborative project involving people who work in libraries, museums, theatres, palaces and other cultural locations in Cremona. For each photo site, the artist asks ...
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ArticleGaspar Cassado Competition winner Sihao He plays Bach
Sihao He, who recently won the Gaspar Cassado International Violoncello Competition, plays Bach's Cello Suite no.3 in C major BWV1009 at Brevard Music Center in North Carolina, US. Our Gaspar Cassado Competition news story contains a video of Sihao performing at the competition. Subscribe to The Strad or download our ...
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ArticleViola player and pedagogue John White dies
Tully Potter pays tribute to a violist who influenced a generation of British players
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ArticleBowdoin Music Festival names string-playing brothers as new directors
Violist Phillip Ying and his brother, cellist David Ying, are to take over as co-artistic directors of the Bowdoin International Music Festival in Brunswick, Maine, US, from the close of the festival's 50th anniversary season in 2014. The Yings succeed founder artistic director Lewis Kaplan, who launched ...
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ArticleChina's Sihao He wins Gaspar Cassado Competition
Sihao He, from Shanghai, has won first prize and around $15,000 at the Gaspar Cassado International Violoncello Competition in Hachioji, Japan. The 20-year-old performed Schumann's Cello Concerto in A minor op.129 in the final round at the Hachioji City Art & Cultural Hall, accompanied by the Tokyo ...