If I were a rich man....

..dubadubadubadubadubadubadubadum...

Just thinking, as I perused John Eliot Gardiner's Monteverdi Productions website, to see when my next Bach cantatas are coming, they rely a lot on sponsorship. If I were the proverbial rich man, I would put a squillion or two JEG's way, because he has given me so much pleasure with his recordings. So, given the necessary squillions (i.e., you've already bought all the hi-fi and records you could ever possibly need out of petty cash) - what musical organisation/event/festival would you endow, or even start?

 

If I had the money I would actually like to own my own record label.

To be able to put the music I enjoy out in vinyl - gatefolds or nice boxsets like the Mosaic ones, and even package the cd releases in something better and more pleasant than the crappy things they currently come in.

I look at the boxsets put out by Impulse for the John Coltrane or Sony for Miles Davies and they are actually something you want own in their nice wallets with excellent booklets.

Whenever I see Classical boxsets they don't even have some of the nice artwork that the individual releases had and always seem cobbled together.

I'd also like to have the CBSO actually perform all Granville Bantock's music, since he was involved with Birmingham, and then have it recorded to put out on the label.

I'd also sponsor them have a concert series so kids could get in free and enjoy the music and hopefully be inspired to pick up an instrument or write something instead of all this dire pop idol stuff otherwise I feel classical music may start to die out.

 

I would commision James McMillan to write an orchestral piece that had absolutely no liturgical or any other programmatic associations. Brahms said of Bruckner "His piety is his own affair" and the same might be said of McMillan. It about time people started writing symphonies or concerti that speak for themsleves - Brahms felt no need to devise programmes for his.

After that I'd put money into the RSNO, to hopefully raise their standards, attract top players, soloists and conductors and insist that they programme a new piece of music at every concert.

 

I'd buy out Classic FM and sack David Mellor.

 

Or to resurrect Schoenberg and try and explain melody to him, although it may cost more for the explanation than the resurrection.

I still find this guy a struggle.

 

To this end, have a look at the packaging that Gardiner is using for the cantatas - essentially little hard-backed books with the CDs in sleeves at each end and the texts and Gardiner's notes in the middle. Really a big step up from the jewel box.

 

Tones,

what is the website ? I was collecting the cantata cycle put out on BIS with the Japanese forces but haven't bought any in a while and I really enjoy these.

I was listening to Bach's Harpischord concertoes last night and had a large smile on my face.

Maybe while paying to resurrect Schoenberg I could do Bach at the same time and introduce the two of them, see if Bach could get through to him.

 

http://www.monteverdiproductions.co.uk/

Suzuki's are great performances - I have a few of those too.

Personally, I'd leave Arnie exactly where he is and resurrect Seb!

 

And I guess you would find he does not need anything explained

 

I'd put on John Foulds' World Requiem at the Albert Hall, and a concert of his Pasquinades Symphoniques and Cello concerto, together with Havergal Brian's Tenth symphony. The third Pasquinade Symphonique needs completing, but is palindromic, so that should be a straightforward enough job for Anthony Payne. The concerts would be recorded and released on Naxos, so that lots of people would buy the discs.

Foulds is probably the most underrated of English composers, and Brian, while variable and frequently tedious, did produce some wonderful music of which I think the tenth symphony the best of all.

Oh, and I'd want Ian Bostridge and Malcolm Martineau to record Ivor Gurney's masterpiece, the song cycle "Ludlow and Teme", along with some even lesser-known Gurney and the complete songs of W Dennis Browne.

 

I salute you, sir!

 

I would bail out hyperion

 

So would I - may be that's the way to get my record label ???

Seriously though that is a great shame, I've bought loads of Hyperian discs and have never been disappointed. They have great taste in the music they produce and always have interesting and informative liner notes.

They are exactly what a record label shoud be.

 

Did you catch any of James McMillan on In Tune(R3) yesterday afternoon? There to talk about A Scotch Bestiary, but Sean was asking whether he approached sacred and secular pieces differently to which he replied along the lines that all music, by it's nature, is sacred. So, even as a very rich man, you may have a hard time.

What I did enjoy was his setting of the Burns poem The Gallant Weaver. Having just spent a frustrating day at the loom it made me smile on the way home.

 

Maybe I could offer to give the money to his favourite religous institution? It might persuade him. If not, I'll ask Peter Maxwell Davies for another symphony.

 

Perhaps you should listen to MacMillan's third symphony.