It's this week in classical music, an update of what's hapenning in the calssical music world, I'm Randy Kinkel.

Ricardo Muti is the new maestro of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He was named on Monday to the prestigious post, the tenth Music director in the history of the CSO; the position has been vacant since the departure of Daniel Barenboim in 2006. the 66-year-old Muti signed a five-year contract, to begin in the 2010 season. Said Muti, "I had the experience of conducting this fine orchestra last year. Making music with these fine musicians was fantastic, Muti said he had decided several years ago not to make any long-term conducting commitments, but began re-examining that decision after the CSO European tour.
"The atmosphere was so wonderful that I changed my mind," he said.

A long-lost opera by Antonio Vivaldi had it's first performance in 278 years last week. The opera, "Argippo" a tale of love, passion, and trickery in an indian ruler's court, was discovered by a Czech musician as he rummaged through an archive of anonymous scores in Regensburg, Germany. One of the arias he found matched the libretto of one he knew of in Prague, and he knew he had found the long-lost opera by Vavldi. or most of it, anyway.. Ondrej Macek, who found the score, led the orchestra for the performance, which tiook place in a castle in Prague, the city where it had it's debut in 1730. about 2/3 of the score survived over the years; Macek filled out the rest with other arias by Vivaldi written around the same time.

Nigel Kennedy says he has been "Prevented from Performing" at the Classical Brit Awards show. Kennedy had planned to play Vittorio Monti's "Czardas" with the glamorous Girl band string quartet Bond, but the Show's organizers nixed it, saying Bond had not been through their selection process. Kennedy was furious, saying, " I was looking forward to this because the quartet Bond had agreed to perform the gypsy song Czardas with me, and having just finished rehearsing, it had become clear that this was going to be one of my best performances of that music, not just musically but as a visual TV spectacle as well."However, the Classical Brits committee have had other ideas. The Brits committee have correctly identified Bond as a 'star' band who they didn't elect to play and, because they didn't choose Bond as a committee, we are not allowed to present our version of Czardas on the show. I am not going to let some old farts dictate my musical decisions."
For more on these and other items and events, go to the website, KBAQ.org. be listenijng evey week at this time, and join me each weekday at noon for the Mozart Buffet, an hour of music by Mozart and his contemporaries,. I'm Randy Kinkel, for KBAQ's "This Week in Classical Music", on listener-supported 89-five KBAQ Phoenix, a service of rio salado college and arizona state university.

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May 11, 2008 by Randy Kinkel courtesy of KBAQ.

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Title: May 11, 2008
Author: Randy Kinkel
Publisher: KBAQ 89.5 FM
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