Local associations, national partners and international experts are all involved. In this way, a wide range of interest groups are addressed, from residents of Brunnen to Schoeck lovers scattered around the world. The festival board of trustees would like to make the work of Othmar Schoeck (1886-1957) "more widely known again" and "popularize it", as it writes in the press release of 4 March. The exhibition in the Galerie am Leewasser shows works by landscape painter Alfred Schoeck (1841-1931) and opens the doors to the studio in Villa Ruhheim, the Schoeck family home, which provided Alfred's four sons with a "creative nest" where they could explore their artistic inclinations.

With regard to the composer Schoeck, the festival aims to "document the composer's lifelong connection with Central Switzerland on the one hand, but also present the internationally renowned composer on the other". Brunner Musikvereine and professional musicians from all over Switzerland will perform works by the composer in an opening concert, a chamber music concert and a symphony concert, "while the Bern University of the Arts is organizing an international symposium on Schoeck's last opera, Dürande Castleorganized. Various events, including a performance series and an international Othmar Schoeck competition for song duos, will take place in the rooms of the Villa Schoeck. (...) Also in the series Schwyz booklets Schoeck's correspondence with Hermann Hesse will be published in full for the first time at the festival."

www.schoeckfestival.ch

The 10th International Festival for New Music Forum Valais will take place at Leuk Castle from May 12 to 16, 2016: The two productions by the Décosterd brothers (CodAct) from Neuchatel that have won several international awards: Nyloïd and Pendulum Choir stand out in particular. Pendulum Choir is currently one of the most spectacular and metaphorically rich choral productions: a 9-voice male choir attached to a ghostly hydraulic construction, whose live voices are blended with electronic music to create a fascinating hybrid amidst abstract robotics.

Emphasizes international anniversary edition
The 10th edition of the festival brings together several programs with political connotations: Ensemble Zafraan from Berlin presents music by composers from current and former crisis regions, Nicolas Vérins and video art pioneer Robert Cahens Opera Ushba et Tetnuld reworks the Georgian legend of Mount Ushba, once the most difficult peak in the world, and builds surprising bridges between Georgia and Valais. The festival closes with a performance by the newly founded political pop group Porok Karpo, led by charismatic Tibet activist Loten Namling - Namling received the 2015 Human Rights Prize from the International Society for Human Rights in Switzerland. Manuel Mengis unites several generations of international jazz legends with Flo Stoffner, Barry Guy and Lucas Niggli, Christophe Fellay performs with the South African pianist Jill Richards, and UMS 'n JIP with the Japanese composer Keitaro Takahashi. In total, the festival presents over 50 contemporary works and composers from 25 countries, ranging from classical chamber music formations and orchestral concerts to pure electronic music, for which an international competition has been announced this year for the second time since 2015. The concerts will be flanked by installations, performances and an art exhibition bringing together some of Valais' most popular artists.

Clarinet Didactics" is aimed at students and teachers at all levels and addresses the most important issues in the field of performance and music education. It conveys proven and innovative, yet different teaching and learning concepts from leading music educators, from historical sources to selected contemporary textbooks. Interviews with renowned musicians from professional orchestras and music academies round off the contributions.

"Clarinet Didactics" was launched in 2013 as a project of the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts and is available to the entire community for further development and as a basis for discussion.

The HSLU Music Library has added "Clarinet Didactics" to the database information system DBIS. DBIS is a reference tool for scientific databases run cooperatively by numerous libraries, see: https://blog.hslu.ch/cladid
 

According to the SJMW media release, a total of 1,400 children and young people took part in the entrada competitions as soloists, duos or chamber ensembles. Around 190 jurors were involved in judging the performances.

A total of 306 first prizes were awarded, 75 of which were first prizes with distinction. All first prize winners are qualified for the final. This will take place from May 5 to 7 at the Musikinsel Rheinau. The award ceremony and the prizewinners' concert will take place on Sunday, May 8, in the Stadthaussaal in Winterthur.

The detailed ranking lists with the results of the participants can be found under the following link: 
www.sjmw.ch/de/content/entrada-2016-resultate
 

With the piece I was glada frequent opening hymn of the Anglican Church and one of the traditional hymns at coronations of British monarchs, will open this year's Tonhalle concert by Stadtmusik Zürich together with over 100 singers from the Zurich Academic Choir. Under the direction of Niki Wüthrich, the Stadtmusik will then perform the four-movement piece based on various English folk songs Second Suite in F by Gustav Holst, his second and last suite for wind orchestra. The Gloria by the English composer John Rutter is a three-movement work that sets the Latin text of the Gloria from the liturgy to music. It is performed by the Stadtmusik and the Academic Choir with a sonority typical of John Rutter.

Again from the town music alone is in the second part The Cries of London by Martin Ellerby, a homage to the city of Thames. The title is reminiscent of the market criers and street barkers who for centuries shaped the acoustic appearance of the metropolis with their penetrating advertising. With the following Toward the Unknown Region by Ralph Vaughan Willliams will conclude the concert together with the Academic Choir in an impressive manner.

The three works I was glad, Gloria and Toward the Unknown Region were specially arranged for wind orchestra by Paul Noble for this concert and can therefore be heard for the first time.

Further information under www.stadtmusik.ch

Link to the program booklet

Windbläss is concerned with maintaining and expanding the culture of house organs, which is deeply rooted in Toggenburg and dates back to the 18th century. The organs built by local craftsmen stood in the ridge chambers of wealthy farmhouses and were an expression of self-confident religious rebelliousness. They served as a musical accompaniment to private church services, which took place in the farmhouses independently of the regional church.

The Windbläss association is a contact point for house organ owners and promotes knowledge about this tradition. Above all, however, it organizes concerts that bring together tradition and the avant-garde. Windbläss blows mainly from the Nesslauer Bühl, where a restored Webstuben organ invites you to the events, in combination with a wide variety of instruments and singing.

The Arbon-Horn Youth Music School (JMSAH) is organizing a music camp in Signau in Emmental from 8 to 13 May 2016. The activities will be documented on a blog: www.jms.blog-net.ch

In addition to making music together and playing in a large orchestra, fun also plays a major role, the organizers write in their press release. The Arbon-Horn Youth Music School is committed to the unique promotion of young talent by offering training in up to 15 different ensembles in numerous clubs. Playing in a large orchestra, camps, trips, competitions and professional teachers create enthusiasm and increase the social, professional and personal skills of children and young people. Targeted support is provided from an early age when playing in an ensemble; the Arbon Youth Music, for example, has up to 20 performances in 2016.

The JMSAH Orchestra is made up of young musicians from the following clubs: Musikverein Uttwil, Musikverein Harmonie Münchwilen, Stadtharmonie Amriswil, Musikverein Sommeri, Musikverein Eintracht Güttingen, Musikverein Tägerwilen and Stadtmusik Arbon.
If you would like to take advantage of this offer, please register by mid-June. More information can be found on the website: www.jmsarbon-horn.ch
 

Taking into account the local infrastructure, historical, linguistic or cultural peculiarities of the community or on the occasion of a current issue, forms and vessels for artistic implementation are to be developed together: Whether cinematic searches for traces, concerts, art installations, cultural education programs in schools, literary work, restoration work in public spaces or exhibitions - in castles, stables, allotment gardens - there are many possibilities and ideas for fruitful collaboration, writes the HKB.

The local population, local businesses and local authorities should actively participate in the project - as direct contributors, hosts or audience members. At the same time, HKB students and lecturers are given the opportunity to break out of their familiar surroundings, get to know a different part of Bern and demonstrate their skills there.

The aims of the experiment are direct encounters, cultural exchange between urban and rural areas, mutual insights, discovery and joint cooperation. The results of the projects will be presented both in the municipalities and in the city of Bern, and their development will be documented and accompanied by media.

More info: hkbgehtanland.ch
 

With Ursula Gut as President and Alexander Keil as Managing Director, there will also be a new management team. They replace Peter F. Weibel and Elmar Weingarten. Ursula Gut was Mayor of Küsnacht from 1998 to 2006 and a member of the Zurich Cantonal Council from 2006 to 2015. Alexander Keil has worked for the Staatsschauspiel Dresden, the Bayreuth Festival and most recently for the Schauspielhaus Zurich, where he was responsible for special events and guest performances.

The position of curator is also to be created. The Artistic Commission and the Board of Trustees want to "appoint a suitable person in the near future".

www.festspiele-zuerich.ch

So now he too has his anniversary: Max Reger, who died 100 years ago and whose fame is in strange proportion to his undiscovered oeuvre. Word got around that Reger wrote many organ chorales. But who knows the Violin Concerto in A major from 1908, the string quartets, the Sinfonietta from 1905 or the colossal Symphonic Fantasy and Fugue for organ op. 57 from 1901, which does not at all fit the image of the staid admirer of Johann Sebastian Bach?

Susanne Popp clears up preconceptions: The constant point of reference was indeed the extraordinarily admired Bach, but Reger understood him as the beginning and end of all music at the same time. When he wrote fugues, preludes and chorales again, it was never in the sense of a restoration, but in the service of continuing a tremendous legacy under progressive auspices. Popp vividly describes not only his life, but also many of his works: "massive masses of sound" in the Inferno fantasy for example, "which have no tonal center and encompass the entire twelve-tone space". Or the late works Requiem aeternam (1915), which Popp even interprets as anticipating the aesthetics of György Ligeti due to its "sound surfaces and expressive fields".

Susanne Popp has been the director of the Max Reger Institute in Karlsruhe since 1981. She is therefore extremely familiar with the sources. She proves that Richard Wagner was the decisive factor in his becoming a composer. The erudite musicologist Hugo Riemann then introduced Reger to the German B-line, i.e. Bach-Beethoven-Brahms. The composer was not on good terms with Italians or the French throughout his life. Here he was dogmatic: that Scarlatti had fire, but not warmth like Bach - he would have signed this immediately, like many of his German colleagues.

This biography has 542 pages. The notes and source references alone comprise 60 pages - proof of how much Susanne Popp read for this outstanding book. Many quoted passages from letters written by the writing and composing maniac paint a very direct picture, which makes you smile in some places and makes you think in others. Reger was quite addicted to alcohol, including the constant smoking of strong cigars. His death on May 11, 1916 was probably due to smoking. Susanne Popp also has another, very plausible explanation for the fatal heartbeat at the end: "Foreseen by everyone and yet suddenly, his heart was no longer able to cope with the permanent overpressure of composing against death and fighting against oblivion in concert."

Susanne Popp, Max Reger - Werk statt Leben, 542 p., 39.90 €, Breitkopf und Härtel, Wiesbaden 2015, ISBN 978-3-7651-0450-3
Reviews of the organ works in the new Max Reger edition:
Volume I/4, Choral preludes 
Volumes I/5-7, Organ Pieces I-III

The top five music schools are New York's Juilliard School, Vienna's Musikuni, London's Royal College of Music, the University of Oxford and the Royal Academy of Music. The first German institution in 16th place is the University of Music in Munich. Half of the top ten is made up of British educational institutions.

The Conservatoire de Musique de Genève ranks 19th, while the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK) is in 35th place, just ahead of the Mozarteum Salzburg, the Leipzig University of Music and the City University of New York. In both cases, the institutional reputation outweighs the appeal of the teaching staff.
 

The whole list:
www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/university-subject-rankings/2016/performing-arts

Whether Rossini was a brilliant chef or not is debatable. What is certain is that when he retired from active operatic life at the age of 37 and spent his retirement with his hobby of "composing", he was also a passionate gourmet devoted to good food and loved managing his fortune. It is also undisputed that Gioachino Rossini, who came from a musical family, was one of the most important opera composers of the bel canto era. Born in 1792, he made his first appearance as a composer at the age of 20. In two decades, he wrote no fewer than 39 operas, later also sacred, vocal, piano and chamber music, including numerous songs.

La Cenerentola was already five years ago, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, an opera completed in just 26 days, six years (only later performances would bring these two works the fame they deserved), when Rossini performed a season of several of his operas at the Kärntnertortheater in Vienna in the spring of 1822. As a farewell to Vienna, he composed the Cavatina, which has now been republished by Edition Dohr Addio di Rossini, originally published under the title Addio ai Viennesi appeared. This farewell gift is a showpiece of Rossinian compositional art. It was reprinted several times in the first half of the 19th century; the present edition is based on the London version from 1824 and, although already recorded by Marilyn Horne and other Rossini mezzos, has not yet appeared in any modern edition.

You would do well to polish up your coloratura if you want to sing this Cavatina, a bravura piece with all the ingredients of true Rossini singing: great melodic beauty, rich coloratura, operatic sighs, the famous Rossini crescendo. An encore par excellence, to be mastered by soprano/tenor or high mezzo-soprano/baritone - but only with considerable virtuosity.

It is also interesting to compare it with the adaptation of this cavatina as a solfeggio by Rossini himself, published in the same issue. It appeared in 1827 in the Gorgheggi e Solfeggi We can confidently take the subtitle of this vocal collection, "per render la voce flessibile", literally, even though the solfeggio version is inferior to the original Cavatina in terms of virtuosity. The piano accompaniment is simplified, phrasing differs, this piece is intended as a practice piece and can even be used in singing lessons. The solfeggio is for vocalizing voice, although the vocalise in the present edition is underlaid with text.

Gioachino Rossini, Addio di Rossini, Cavatina for voice (mezzo-soprano or baritone) and pianoforte in two versions, score, E.D. 14209, € 12.80, Dohr, Cologne

The "Camphuysen" manuscript, an album by an anonymous Dutch dilettante from around 1650, was already edited in 1961 by the recently deceased Alan Curtis, but at that time without the nine intavolations of Genevan psalms, which are now included here. Not all of the pieces are really productive: seven of the twelve movements are simple harmonizations whose upper parts, however, are richly provided with trills and mordents, which is interesting in terms of performance practice. In this respect, they are welcome additions to the literature surrounding the Genevan Psalter. Musically, however, the most valuable is the secular addition, an anonymous three-verse arrangement of the English melody Daphne.

The four partitas by Georg Muffat, a first edition based on a manuscript (SA 4581) which is now back in Berlin, are a real gain for the repertoire. Recently, the keyboard works of this composer, who is so important for the performance practice of baroque ensemble music, have increasingly come to the fore. Compared to the partitas edited in 2003/04 from a Viennese manuscript (Bärenreiter BA 8419 and 8460), the music here is more pleasant and easier to read. The Partita in F major appears in both editions; however - as the editor inaccurately refers to - only five dances are shared, and both versions also contain three additional movements each as unique pieces.

How are publishers supposed to earn money after completing the complete editions of popular composers? Bärenreiter-Verlag is reissuing individual works from the New Bach Edition, albeit supplemented by fingerings by renowned performers. The German pianist Ragna Schirmer has chosen the Goldberg Variations to this task. Her entries largely guarantee a pianistically secure legato. It is strange that fingerings are sometimes missing where they are urgently needed. The assignments of the middle voices to one of the two systems by means of square brackets are mostly helpful. However, the publisher could have improved readability in these places if the notes had also been transferred to the appropriate system instead of just adopting the old edition. More valuable are Schirmer's "sopra" notes to indicate the mutual position of the intersecting and interlocking playing hands on the one-manual piano. Ultimately, however, I am surprised that even today a Bach work, harpsichordistic like no other, is published without commentary as a work for modern piano.

Neuf psaumes pour instruments à clavier suivis d'une page profane Daphne (après 1652), Extraits du Recueil de Camphuysen, CD 3099, Fr. 18.00, Editions Cantate Domino, Fleurier

Georg Muffat, Four Partitas for Harpsichord (D-Bsa SA 4581), first edition of the four unpublished partitas from the archive of the Sing-Akademie zu Berlin by Markus Eberhardt, EW 796, € 17.50, Edition Walhall, Magdeburg

Johann Sebastian Bach, Goldberg Variations, Fourth Part of the Clavier-Übung BWV 988, Urtext edited by Christoph Wolff, BA 10848, € 10.95, Bärenreiter, Kassel