More on Marin

February 7, 2008 at 7:12 AM

With the amazing responses to my last entry about Marin Alsop and the Baltimore Symphony, I thought it prudent to share another article, this one published in a January issue of The New Yorker in which Alex Ross speaks of her appointment, her trailblazing activities and their success, and the programmatic innovations taking place across the country.

Interesting stuff - anxious for sharing,
Sam

From Tom Holzman
Posted on February 7, 2008 at 5:14 PM

Thanks for the link. It is an interesting article.

From Karen Allendoerfer
Posted on February 7, 2008 at 9:07 PM

Another very interesting article--thanks!

So, I grew up near Buffalo, listening to the Buffalo Philharmonic, and taking violin lessons from one if its members as a teenager. And although I haven't lived there in years, I have to admit that I just found myself naturally thinking that JoAnn Falletta was the "first woman conductor of a US orchestra," to the point that the first few times I read articles calling Marin Alsop "the first," I was confused. Not angry, not combative or anything, just confused. Had I gotten the name wrong? Was I getting early-onset Alzheimer's?

And at this point, I'm finding the debate about which one of them was really first, as well as the definition of a "major" orchestra, the topic with which this article's author opens his piece (as did another author of an article from the NYT I read a few months ago) to be a rather annoying and arcane distraction. I haven't even read that many articles about Alsop, and I'm already sick of that topic of who's first and what counts as major. Whereas I'm not in any way sick of the more meaty discussions of Alsop's music making and conducting, which I find fascinating and would like to read more of.

So I guess what I mean is that the "marketing" issues here puzzle me, and I wonder if they strike others in the same way. Why do the authors think that's such an important thing to lead off with? Do readers?

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