Blog

JD: Tim, as a conductor, are you conscious of trying to communicate any kind of affect or emotional state, or are you trying to bring an emotional state out of the singers, or are you trying to elicit a response from the people listening? TB: You’re trying to serve the music. One wants to lift the music off the page, as you feel it, and present it to the audience. JR: People often ask me ...
Read More

In the summer of 2017, I had the distinct privilege of visiting John Rutter in his country home. John is widely recognized as the most popular, and the most published, choral composer of our day. We were joined by my longtime friend and colleague, Tim Brown - one of the great choral conductors of the British Isles. Both Tim and John are formerly Directors of Music at Clare College, Cambridge, and as such, truly brought ...
Read More

Mason Bates, Musical America's 2018 Composer-of-the-Year, is a breath of fresh air in a room that is often accused of lacking ventilation! Mason is, at once, edgy yet traditional, intuitive and insightful, curious and experimental, and more willing to test the preconceived boundaries of the concert stage than possibly any composer before him. Small wonder that he is the number two most performed American composer! His performances are a mixture of DJ and symphony orchestra, ...
Read More

Between the time I conducted this interview and it was written and published, Maestro Dutoit’s career has altered due to revelations from the #MeToo Movement. Many, if not all, of his North American engagements have been canceled. So, why, one might ask, would I post Dutoit’s interview under such circumstances? I do so, while not condoning the sick aspects of people who allow positions of power to be used to attempt control of the bodies ...
Read More

Alice Parker, the First Lady of American choral music, invited me to her farm-home in New England, on a crisp Autumn day, to spend time together in an interview. What follows is the beginning of her account of what makes music important in our lives. When I walked into her living room, scores were piled high on tables and piano, at which point I noticed that she did not have a computer in the room, ...
Read More