Mahler vs. Toscanini — and this Saturday’s “Mahler Hour” on Zoom
“How would you compare Mahler and Toscanini in New York?” asked Kenneth Woods, Artistic Director of Boulder’s Colorado MahlerFest, in a...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Apr 24
- 4 min
“Shostakovich in South Dakota” on NPR — A New Template for Orchestras
My NPR “More than Music” program “Shostakovich in South Dakota” can now be accessed here. I document the impact of a remarkable...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Apr 20
- 2 min
“Drastically revising our idea of who a music director is” — The South Dakota Symp
The Creekside Singers performing with the South Dakota Symphony “There’s just a tremendous amount of caution, a tremendous amount of...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Apr 18
- 3 min
Five Festivals for the Charles Ives Sesquicentenary
The National Endowment for the Humanities today announced a $400,000 grant to resume “Music Unwound,” a national consortium of orchestras...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Apr 16
- 3 min
Rediscovering Harry Burleigh: A Valedictory Setting of Langston Hughes
In recent weeks I’ve had occasion to perform Harry Burleigh’s “Lovely Dark and Lonely One” with three singers: Emery Stephens at St....
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josephirvinghorowi
- Mar 26
- 2 min
“Dvorak’s Prophecy” at Princeton April 12 with John McWhorter, Allen Guelzo, and S
“Dvorak’s Prophecy and the Vexed Fate of Black Classical Music” is the topic of an April 12 concert/lecture at Princeton University. I’ll...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Mar 23
- 2 min
“Mahler in New York” (April 4) — Tickets Now on Sale
One of Gustav Mahler’s most powerful New York experiences was a funeral procession he watched from a hotel window. A fireman had drowned...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Mar 21
- 7 min
Re-Thinking the Concert Experience in South Dakota and Minnesota
Leningrad under Nazi siege, 1941-42 There was a time – the 1990s, when I was running the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM – when the practice...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Mar 10
- 1 min
Bruckner and the Cellphone PS
Norman Lebrecht has picked up my blog on Bruckner and the Cellphone and posted it on Slippedisc. You will find a torrent of responses....
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josephirvinghorowi
- Mar 9
- 3 min
Bruckner and the Cellphone
Last Sunday’s performance of Bruckner’s Eighth Symphony by Christian Thielemann and the Vienna Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall was very...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Mar 7
- 1 min
You can now pre-order my new Mahler novel (and get 20 % off)
My forthcoming Mahler novel is now available for pre-order with a 20 per cent discount. Related events: April 4: “Mahler in New York.” A...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Feb 22
- 2 min
Shostakovich in South Dakota
I’m in Sioux Falls, where the South Dakota Symphony – to my knowledge, the most genuinely innovative American orchestra – is performing...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Feb 13
- 3 min
“The Gershwin Moment” on NPR
To close my recent National Public Radio documentary “The Gershwin Moment,” I pose the following hypothetical: What if George Gershwin, a...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Jan 29
- 4 min
Michael Morgan, the Oakland Symphony, and William Dawson
Michael Morgan 1957-2021 The death of Michael Morgan, last August 20, was a heartbreaking loss to American music. As music director of...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Jan 17
- 3 min
“George Shirley: A Life in Music” on NPR
Harry Burleigh, who turned spirituals into concert songs sung by Marian Anderson and Paul Robeson, wrote in 1917 that “the voice is not...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Dec 19, 2022
- 5 min
Announcing My First Novel: The Mahlers in New York
My first novel, The Marriage: The Mahlers in New York, will be published in April 2023 by Blackwater Press (a young and enterprising...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Dec 11, 2022
- 4 min
Klaus Makela Conducts the Philharmonic — Take Two
I am of course grateful for the torrent of comments I have received in response to my previous blog about Klaus Makela conducting...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Dec 9, 2022
- 3 min
Klaus Makela Conducts the Philharmonic
I admit that I am a jaded listener, burdened by a long and presumptuous memory. I heard Mravinsky’s Leningrad Philharmonic during their...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Nov 28, 2022
- 2 min
Lou Harrison and Cultural Fusion on NPR
While the present-day conflation of the arts with instruments for social justice is dangerously overdrawn, some musical experiences are...
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josephirvinghorowi
- Oct 7, 2022
- 1 min
Toradze Memorial Concert
The recent Alexander Toradze Memorial Concert, featuring more than a dozen pianists, is now accessible online here. In addition to a lot...
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