George’s Blog

Inside Music

December 20, 2018 George's Blog

Are you a radio listener?  And, if you are, where are you when you are doing this?  For many people the answer is: “Yes” to the first question and “in my car” to the second.  Driving and radio listening have been married ever since their ‘wedding year’ of 1930, the year of the first commercial […]

Read the full article →

Being Thankful – Encore 2018

November 17, 2018 George's Blog

I know: ”You’re making a habit of this!”  No, I will not.  But in reading this ‘Thanksgiving Blog’ from 2012 I found some thoughts that I believe still have merit six years down the road.  So, I once again beg your indulgence.  A few updates have been made. Mental health professionals and spiritual mentors agree […]

Read the full article →

Intentional Acts of Kindness – Encore

October 24, 2018 George's Blog

Old blog posts, once written, become a ‘thought mining resource’ for me.  I might be looking for some reference I made to a particular subject or person…perhaps an author whose voice struck me as important to echo or amplify. Today, I was rereading old posts and came across this one. It has been one year […]

Read the full article →

Not Their Thing

September 18, 2018 George's Blog

A recent search online connected me with an interesting 1984 article from the archives of The New York Times entitled, Education: Classical Music Not Their Thing.  Gene I. Maeroff discusses a study conducted by the Association for Classical Music of New York, of the attitudes of 900 sixth grade and tenth grade students toward classical […]

Read the full article →

Something To Cheer About!

August 21, 2018 George's Blog

We’ve written about our educational television shows before, and we’re proud of the number of viewers who according to Nielsen Ratings have seen each of them here in the United States – somewhere north of one million viewers nationwide per show.  But did you know that our productions have ‘afterlives’ beyond their three-year runs on […]

Read the full article →

The Universal Language?

July 24, 2018 George's Blog

Marissa Fessenden penned an article for Smithsonian.com in February 2018 entitled Why Music Is Not A Universal Language in which she cites a video made by Ethen of the Sideways YouTube Channel – a video that is sadly no longer available – hence, I’ve posted no link.  I did watch this video and found it […]

Read the full article →

If You Build It…They May Not Come

June 19, 2018 George's Blog

Picture a brand new performing arts center; the orchestra is tuned and ready to play a magnificent symphony; the lights dim.  But what if there was no audience?  It could happen. Virginia Johnston, The Discovery Orchestra’s Executive Director, and I recently had lunch with a mutual friend who holds a prominent position at Lincoln Center […]

Read the full article →

Cause for Hope

May 21, 2018 George's Blog

There is a significant ray of sunshine out there.  Perhaps the biggest cause for hope regarding the future of classical music revolves around the efforts of one José Antonio Abreu, a Venezuelan musician and educator who died in March 2018, age 78. Dr. Abreu’s brain-child, El Sistema, a publicly financed voluntary music education program founded […]

Read the full article →

Did You Know?

March 20, 2018 George's Blog

We are indeed proud of our digital presence…especially of our four productions distributed by American Public Television (APT).  Bach to the Future, our initial televised Discovery Concert, was recorded at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in the spring of 2002 and broadcast for the first time by public television affiliate WHYY in Philadelphia on […]

Read the full article →

Maestro Bernstein At 100

February 20, 2018 George's Blog

Conductor and educator Leon Botstein penned a thoughtful and substantive article entitled The Legacy of Leonard Bernstein for the Fall 2017 issue of Symphony, the publication of the League of American Orchestras. Noting Bernstein’s great success as a composer, he goes on to say: “The range of Bernstein’s talent was itself astonishing.  Although Bernstein took […]

Read the full article →

← Previous Entries