May 27, 2006
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The blogger?Hmm ... Lang Lang now allegedly has a blog, called Found in Translation.  A sample entry: "After the performance, waiting for my autographs was a huge line that extended all the way outside the door. A little girl asked me for the towel I used. I said to her, “It’s on the piano. You can take it.” Actually, my towel is always snatched by some quick-acting fans after every performance, leaving me no chance to get it by myself."  Talk about sweating the details. This is too good to be real ... isn't it?

Shirley Apthorp in the Financial Times has a short but interesting piece on Masaaki Suzuki and the rise of early music performance in Japan.  “There’s nothing strange about playing Bach in Japan," says Suzuki. "For Japanese musicians, Bach’s music is absolutely fundamental. Bach is Bach." Suzuki's performance here in March with the Bach Collegium Japan at the Library of Congress was nothing less than spectacular.

In The Washington Post today, Tim Page's poignant interview with the very Russian Yuri Temirkanov, back with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra for the first time since October:  on Shostakovich, his beloved St. Petersburg, and the messy appointment of Marin Alsop as music director of the BSO.

The Guardian's Stephen Moss interviews rival opera directors -- and siblings -- David and Christopher Alden.  The latter has few kind words for the American music scene; "In America art is only important as entertainment, and the kind of stuff that I do often tries to push beyond that," he modestly sniffs -- admitting that his career in the US is "pretty well over." No kidding.

And in tearjerker opera news from Wales,  Barney the homeless mongrel has landed a role in a touring Ukranian National Opera production of La Boheme.