Gabriele Vanoni, why a festival of Italian contemporary music in Boston?

The Italian music scene has a lot to offer: It is situated between the music cultures of France and Germany in many respects, but it has also its own great and rich tradition. It often presents a fresh and unusual point of view on the contemporary music scene. Unfortunately, the support for music in Italy is not as good as in other countries, as the fact that half (if not more) of the Italian composers currently active, live and work mostly abroad. Therefore, festivals like Suggestioni among others are aiming at making this music known a little more. My hope in the long run is to install a continuous collaboration within the Italian scene and the world of American contemporary music, either at US universities (like this year and last year with Harvard and Boston Universities) and/or with American group such as the Talea Ensemble who were our guests last year.

When you compare the Italian and US scenes for contemporary classical music. What are the differences? Are there any communalities?

It is very hard to condense a question like this into a few sentences. What I see is that the Italian scene lives this funny paradox: it is not really big, it has a few world-renowned festivals (Biennale di Venezia, Milano Musica, etc.) and a few more local institutions, but it is pretty much stylistically confined, and it generally has difficulty to grow and survive, due to the lack of funding and support. The General Consulate of Italy in Boston is a happy exception in this respect. On the other hand, I feel in the US there is definitely more space for artistic development. But if we focus on the “content” level, I sometimes think that the price of a (welcomed) broader range of freedom is maybe a little less use of critical sense. Again, this is a broad generalization, and such a topic should be expanded and discussed in greater detail in order not to be misunderstood.

Has your own experience in the US changed the way you go about composing? If so, how?

Indeed so. I think back to my year in Milan Conservatory with great affection and as an intensive learning experience, but it was at Harvard during my studies with Julian Anderson that my compositional voice started to find its own space and contours, and I hope this work continues today. The lack of “stylistical pressure”, in this case, was indeed a piece of luck!

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Gabriele Vanoni was born in Milan in 1980. After a few experiences as a very young composer at Yamaha schools, he started studying music at the Conservatory of Milan, where he graduated in Piano and Composition.

After his studies in Milan, he continued his education with a PhD in Music Composition at Harvard University, where he’s currently enrolled. This experience allowed him to get to know closely the US music scene, where he met and worked with some of the most interesting composers of today, such as Helmut Lachenmann, Julian Anderson, Brian Ferneyhough, Tristan Murail and Chaya Czernowin, his current teacher.

Thanks to this wide range of experiences and encounters, his music has recently spread internationally and has been now largely performed in Europe (Italy, Norway, UK, Russia) and Americas (United States, Canada, Mexico), in venues such as Carnegie Hall, Biennale di Venezia, Moscow Conservatory, Milan State University, NYU, BIT Teatergarasjen in Bergen and Accademia Chigiana di Siena, among many others. Likewise, various soloists and ensembles have now been involved in performing his music, like the Moscow Studio for New Music Ensemble, Mario Caroli, Gustav Kuhn, Nouvel Ensemble Moderne with Lorraine Vaillancourt, Lost Cloud Quartet, Ensemble Fa and Barrie Webb. His music has also been awarded prizes and mentions in local and international competitions (among others: Concorso del Conservatorio di Milano, 3rd Jurgenson Competition, Concorso Filarmonica, Previsioni Musica 2009, Bohemians Prize, IBLA Grand Prize New York).

Casting a Rolls Royce Silver Cloud from 1956. Photo by m:con Agentur Mannheim

By Paul Michael Coleman

Paul Michael Coleman: I am delighted to have Marios Joannou Elia with me here at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Marios, an internationally acclaimed composer for his pioneering and visionary works, composes not only for concert halls and opera houses, but also for large-scale multimedia events. Marios, I read in the press that your guitar music has been recently performed in two festivals in Poland, in Nysa and Wroclaw, in fully booked concert halls ending with standing ovations. Last Monday you had a piano piece performed by Michael Finnissy during the “New Works Festival” in Southampton. You are now here in London working in the studio for a new composition that is going to be premiered beginning of January. Afterwards, end of January, follows a premiere of your work “Cicadas” in New York City, at the Steinway Hall. And of course, you have being continuously working on the huge spectacle “autosymphonic” for 250 musicians. For this 2-Million-Euro event, you are the general music manager as well. This is just an example of what you are currently doing – how do you manage all this?

Marios Joannou Elia: It is a matter of self-organization and endless working process. The projects I am especially interested in, like “autosymphonic”, have a high-qualitative musical character that is eminently motivating. Moreover, I am interested in bringing music, in an unconventional and contemporary way, towards a responsive audience. In the case of “autosymphonic”, 16.000 spectators are expected, which is a huge responsibility for my team and myself. This requires an active engagement, both in creating the music but also during its realisation.

Paul Michael Coleman: Your signature is that you use vehicles in your music in a highly extensive manner. Is it difficult to work with such ‘instruments’ and how did all begin?

Marios Joannou Elia: I employ vehicles in a very systematic and musically complex manner. The machinery alone does not provide me with a particularly artistic per-spective. It has to be extensively investigated before being applied in the music. Be-sides, this is how the works are composed – in juxtaposition with, for example, a symphony orchestra and a choir. In 2003 I was working on a composition specifically written for the space of the Volkswagen Transparent Factory in Dresden. I wanted to use the entire main hall of the factory in the music, thus providing a number of practical difficulties, such as the coordination of the musicians that were placed everywhere in the space and in dif-ferent heights. Then, I thought that the VW Phaeton car that is manufactured there was the perfect machine to achieve this. So it was primarily applied as an assisting component for the conductor, but also for a variety of musical applications. Furthermore I make use of bicycles, Harley-Davidson motorcycles, shipping and aviation elements. In 2008, in the opera “The Hunt”, I have employed six cars such as an Aston Martin, a Jaguar and a Ford Mustang as part of the plot as well as part of the musical instrumentarium.

Paul Michael Coleman: Tell us about your music that you are now developing here in London.

Marios Joannou Elia: These days I have been working in the studio with audio pro-ducer Nick Elia creating a trio for cars: a Mercedes-Benz SLS-AMG from 2010, an old-time Aero 6218R from 1934, and for the first car ever built, the patented tricycle by Carl Benz from 1886. This is the most complex musical piece I have to date com-posed, in which the interactivity between the automobiles and their performers is highly coalesced. The three automobiles will be performed by an ensemble of 14 percussionists. The car trio is an integral part of “autosymphonic”. It will be premiered on January 6th 2011, celebrating the New Year in the city of Mannheim in Germany, in Rosengarten Concert Hall.

Paul Michael Coleman: Tell us bit more about “autosymphonic” and the employment of the automobiles…

Marios Joannou Elia: It is a one-hour symphony, consisting of a large orchestra, choir, two vocal ensembles, percussion ensemble and electronics. In addition to this, I am employing a car orchestra of 80 automobiles, including old-timers, super sport cars, limousines, tracks, busses, tractors etc. Since May I began casting numerous types of automobiles all over Germany. To date I have cast circa 120 cars of all types and ages, including Rolls Royce, Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Maserati and Cadillac. The music will involve a scenery construction of laser, lights, videos, urban screening, LED projections, etc. The symphony is especially commissioned for the 125th anniversary celebration of the car in Mannheim, Germany and is going to be the highlight event of the so-called “Automobile Summer” in Baden-Württemberg.

Paul Michael Coleman: So Marios, when and where will “autosymphonic” be pre-miered?

Marios Joannou Elia: On the 10th of September 2011, in the central square of Mannheim. It will be an open-air production in which the latest technological devel-opments will be applied, but also new ones have to be specifically developed, in order to enable a three-dimensional acoustical irradiation. For example, the 360-degree spatialization system will produce a holographic effect of the music projection. Hence, the square will be transformed in an ‘arena’ of musico-visual events.

Paul Michael Coleman: Is it a central feature in your work to reflect the technological development within music in respect to the evolution of the car as a burgeoning multimedial functional apparatus?

Marios Joannou Elia: I do follow the developments of the automobile culture in the conceptual sense, however I reflect it in an idiosyncratic artistic expression. The issue of interaction between humans and machines is of central meaning in my work and it also finds multifarious application in “autosymphonic”. Current and future-oriented technological developments show the high degree of amalgamation between the two elements. On the one hand, the automobile behaves autonomously with human mannerisms. On the other hand, humans adopt machine-like features. In both situations a form of hybridism occurs. In this context, the aspect of hybridism is essential in my music.

Paul Michael Coleman: Thank you very much, Marios, for a highly enlightening dis-cussion.

Herr Oswald, warum ein Festival für Neue Musik in der Abgeschiedenheit der steirischen Berge? Woher kommt die Motivation, was sind Ihre Ziele?

Peter Oswald: Das Gesäuse ist eine magische Region, ein fantastischer Ort dessen musikalische Implikationen bereits im Titel anklingen. Als ich zur Programmierung des Festivals eingeladen worden bin, habe ich sofort ja gesagt.

Inhaltlich spannen die Konzerte des Festivals einen weiten Bogen um ein Repertoire, das vom Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts bis in die unmittelbare Gegenwart reicht. Welche Schwerpunkte setzen Sie als künstlerischer Leiter in der Zusammenstellung der Programme?

Peter Oswald: Das Arcana Festival ist ganz bewusst als Festival konzipiert, dass zur Repertoirebildung der Moderne beitragen will. Wir verzichten nicht auf Uraufführungen (fünf Werke werden für das Festival geschrieben), wollen aber ganz bewusst Werke, die wir als unverzichtbar empfinden programmieren. So ist eine Komposition von Edgar Varèse, der das Festival seinen Namen verdankt, auch heute noch moderner als viele Kompositionen, die 2010 uraufgeführt werden.

Ihr Festival ist Teil der Regionale10, ein größeres Festival für zeitgenössische Kunst im Bezirk Liezen der Steiermark. Über den konkreten Bezug auf das “magische Gesäuse” hinaus, inwieweit bezieht das Arcana Festival auch lokale und regionale Musiker und Komponisten in das Programm mit ein?

Peter Oswald: Das Arcana Festival bezieht regionale Musiker in zwei konkreteten Projekten mit ein. Zuerst in dem Musikvermittlungsprojekt “Von Sternen, Nebeln und Galaxien…” der Firma Georg Fischer, des größten Arbeitgebers der Region. Hier erarbeiten drei professionelle MusikerInnen mit MitarbeiterInnen der Firma (und somit auch regionale MusikerInnen) ein neues Werk. Bezug nehmend auf Iannis Xenakis “Pleiades”, und beim zweiten Projekt “Schwarzer Peter” begibt sich das Arcana Festival auf die Spuren eines legendären Wilderes, der Ende des 19 Jahrhunderts in einer konspirativen Beziehung mit den Bauern der Region gestanden ist. Bei diesem Projekt, dass in einer atemberaubenden Naturkulisse, nach 550 Höhenmeter Aufstieg zu erleben sein wird, nehmen Blasmusikkapellen und Chöre der Region teil. Auch werden MusiklehrerInnen der Region eingebunden, die den Aufstieg in mehreren Stationen musikalisch in einer “Klangpromenade” gestalten.

Ein wichtiger Teil des Arcana Festivals ist der gesamte Komplex der Musikvermittlung. Sie bieten unter anderem Workshops zur Komposition für jedermann, Konzerte an untypischen Orten, musikalische Wanderungen, eine musikalisch-kulinarische Performance, sowie traditionelle Einführungsveranstaltungen an. Zusätzlich gehen Sie in einem “Labor” der Frage nach dem Verhältnis von Neuer Musik und den Naturwissenschaften nach. Wieviel Vermittlung braucht die Neue Musik? Ist das alles unter dem Aspekt des Marketings zu sehen oder tut sich hier eine neue Kultur des Erlebens auf, die das Erfahren der Musik durch das Publikum in den Mittelpunkt des Interesses rückt?

Peter Oswald: Ich bin überzeugt davon, dass jede Musik Vermittlung braucht. Der Vermittlungsgedanke ist dementsprechend in den letzten Jahren immer mehr in den Vordergrund getreten. Ich habe in meiner mittlerweile 25-jährigen professionellen Tätigkeit die Erfahrung gemacht, dass die Lebenswirklichkeit des einzelnen in einem direktem Verhältnis zu Neuer Musik, zu deren Struktur, zur Wahrnehmung stehen, und dass Neue Musik nicht ein “Spezialisten-Medium” ist. Deshalb sollte die Musikvermittlung den Menschen dort abholen, wo er sich in sozialer, bildungsmäßiger und psychologischer Hinsicht gerade befindet. Natürlich ist ein Quäntchen Marketing dabei, da wir volle Hallen sehr schätzen, und dies wesentlich auch zur guten Stimmung bei den Künstlern beiträgt. Entscheidend ist aber die Neue Kultur des Erlebens, die, wie Sie ja schreiben, die Erfahrung von Musik durch den einzelnen/einzelne HörerIn in den Mittelpunkt des Interesses rückt.

Auf Ihrem preisgekrönten Musiklabel Kairos veröffentlichen Sie zusammen mit Barbara Fränzen seit über zehn Jahren Neue und Neueste Musik. Wie empfinden die zahlreichen Komponisten mit denen Sie zusammenarbeiten diese neue Erfahrungs- und Eventkultur? Ich könnte mir vorstellen, dass der eine oder die andere diesen Entwicklungen eher skeptisch gegenübersteht und darin eine “Verflachung” der Musikkultur sieht.

Peter Oswald: Sämtliche bei Kairos veröffentlichten Komponistinnen empfinden aufgrund der spezifischen Kairos Philosophie die publizierten Werke nicht als Eventkultur, sondern als einen spezifischen und originären Zugang zu im sonstigen Musikleben verschütteten Aspekten einer Partitur (das sinnliche Erleben von Musik!). Deshalb kann von einer Verflachung der Musikkultur keine Rede sein, sondern von einer perspektivischen Vertiefung.

Vielen Dank, Herr Oswald, für das spannende Gespräch.

Das Gespräch führte Matthias Röder.

Mobtown Modern

Matthias Röder speaks with the founders of mobtown modern, saxophonist Brian Sacawa and composer Erik Spangler, about recliners and drinks at New Music concerts, how alternative listening environments and video projections create remixes of well-known repertories, and what’s coming up next in Baltimore’s most innovative New Music series.

Zeitschichten.com: Erik, together with Brian Sacawa, you are curating mobtown modern, a new music series at the contemporary museum in Baltimore. What’s the concept behind mobtown modern and why are you teaming up with a museum?

Erik Spangler: The main purpose of mobtown modern is to introduce a wider audience to a range of new music that we personally find inspiring, and to shape a total experience for the listener that is more welcoming than the academic concert hall. We are working in partnership with the Contemporary Museum because we have a shared understanding of new music as a vital form of contemporary art, and they are generously donating a space to us in which we can design our ideal listening environment.

Zeitschichten.com: What constitutes such an ideal listening environment?

Erik Spangler: When I say “ideal”, I should clarify that it is not acoustically ideal for everything that we are doing, but that we are able to consciously shape the environment to our purposes. It is a blank space that we are able to redesign ourselves, thinking consciously about setting the general atmosphere. We typically create a lounge type of environment, with some very comfy recliners in the first few rows of our semi-circular seating arrangement, and some cocktail tables set up behind the rows of chairs. We set up a bar at the back, next to my DJ table, where people can grab a drink at any point during the event. How many times have you wished for that during a classical music concert? Behind the performers we have two large screens where our video artist, Guy Werner, projects his visual interpretations of the music. Guy also does unique lighting design for each of our shows. There are many different ways that you can experience this space as a listener, and I think it welcoming to a wider variety of people than the traditional concert hall.

Zeitschichten.com: The mobtown modern concert programs are always structured around a central theme. Last year’s October concert, for instance, was entitled “Sound Ecology” and featured music that was inspired by environmental sounds. The series’ first concert was dedicated to non-academic compositions (“To Cool For School”) while “Man vs. Music” showcased pieces that are extremely difficult to play. What is your aim in presenting themed concerts? Do you think that New Music needs mediation in order to be understood or enjoyed by the public?

Erik Spangler: We have organized each of our events around a central theme because we like to program the music very intentionally, like a “concept album,” in a way that creates links between the pieces. The flow from one piece to another, the dramatic arc of the event, is also really important. I personally think that anything we can do as presenters of challenging new music to draw an audience in, to create meaningful connections, should be looked into. New music doesn’t necessarily need mediation, but we see it as another opportunity for creativity.

Zeitschichten.com: When you say “creativity,” do you imply that the act of listening requires a creative mindset and that this mode of listening is fostered by a non-traditional performance venue?

Erik Spangler

Erik Spangler: We do see the non-traditional performance venue as a way of fostering a listening mindset that encourages you to hear the music through the lens of today’s culture, rather than through assumed concert-going traditions of the past. This specially designed listening environment automatically creates a “remix” of the music by presenting it in a different social context than the one in which it was probably envisioned by the composer. We also remix the musical compositions by presenting them in relation to new visuals. Sometimes the music is more directly remixed with the addition of new electronic layers, new instrumental arrangements, and DJ interludes between pieces.

Zeitschichten.com: Erik, as a composer you connect classical contemporary and hip hop styles, working mostly with electronic media. What are your main influences when it comes to electronic music?

Erik Spangler: I continue to work with both acoustic instruments and electronic media in my composition work, although electronica has become more central for me since it enables me to regularly perform my own music as a DJ. During my last several years as a composition graduate student I was inspired to start sampling from my acoustic compositions and to incorporate these sounds into instrumental Hip Hop, Dub, and Drum & Bass beats. My biggest influences in this area of composition have been DJ Krush, DJ Spooky, Blockhead, Prefuse 73, and Amon Tobin.

Zeitschichten.com: Many of your past concerts featured a prominent visual component, for instance in the form of special lighting or video projections. Brian, as executive director of the concert series you are – among other things – in charge of hiring musicians. Are musicians generally happy about the visual component of the concerts or do you need to convince them that the visuals do not distract the listeners but rather enhance their understanding and perception of the music?

Brian Sacawa

Brian Sacawa: We’re lucky to have the opportunity to be working with very open minded musicians who share our desire to enhance the listening experience through multimedia means. So far, none of our musicians have objected to the use of video during our shows.

There has been one instance when a composer objected to the addition of a video layer to his work and we were happy to accommodate him. I can understand this perspective and realize that some composers may want their works to stand alone and not be enhanced or “polluted” by a video presentation. I’ve definitely been to concerts that combined music and video poorly; I’m thinking of particular instances when the music, which should be the main focus of the evening, becomes subservient and almost like a soundtrack for the video being presented. That’s definitely not what we’re after. We try to overcome this issue by having our video mixed live during the performance so it’s more reactionary to the music, making the VJ an active participant in the performance as he improvises a video layer to the music. We’re fortunate to have Baltimore-based video artist Guy Werner working as our primary VJ. Prior to each concert, Guy listens to the pieces and gets a general idea of the theme and images he’ll use as source material. He then prepares banks of samples for each piece—just like a DJ bringing a big record bag to a turntable gig—and then improvises a new video layer live during the performance. Using this method for the video, we could perform any piece several times and never have the same exact visual material.

Zeitschichten.com: You have frequently participated in the mobtown modern concert series as a performer. Do the video projections have an impact on your interpretation of a work? Is there a dialog between musical performance and video projections?

Brian Sacawa: Since the projections are always done behind the performers, I can’t say that they have any influence on my interpretation of any given work. However, there is definitely a dialog between the video projections and the musical performance, but that comes exclusively from the video end. As I mentioned, our video artist Guy Werner, prepares banks of samples based on the feeling he gets from listening to a recording of the work prior to the concert. So he has a general “theme” of what his video will be though everything he does during the performance in terms of mixing and effects is purely improvisatory and influenced by the dynamic of the live performance.

Zeitschichten.com: In terms of the equipment needed for the series, what is the biggest challenge of not staging the concerts in a traditional hall?

Brian Sacawa: I think we’d have the same types of challenges in terms of equipment even if we had our concerts in a traditional hall. Not many concert venues have the sort of video and audio capabilities that we require for our series. If anything, having the shows where we do, in a kind of loft-like space, makes things easier for us; we’re not locked having thing in a certain space and so on. It’s more flexible and gives the option of changing things around if we feel like it.

In terms of the equipment that we do use for the concerts, again, we have some very dedicated people who contribute their own gear along with their services for extremely reasonable fees.

Zeitschichten.com: As a performer you have premiered many pieces for saxophone and live electronics. What are the skills that one needs to have when performing electro-acoustic music? Is it different from playing with other musicians?

Brian Sacawa: There’s definitely a different type of skill set involved when performing electroacoustic music as opposed to performing with other musicians. First, you really need to know every detail of the electronic part. Often, the only way you know if you are synced up properly is through subtle cues in the electronic part. In some pieces, like Erik’s “pastlife laptops and attic instruments,” this isn’t a huge concern since there is a prominent beat-based layer, while in others, say “Images” by Milton Babbitt, being attuned to shifts in timbre and register can really make or break a performance.

Second, unlike playing with other musicians, an electronic track is completely unforgiving. If you make a mistake the CD playback doesn’t adjust to you. Also, your sense of time has to be ultra-precise. For example, I have performed several compositions by Jacob ter Veldhuis and these pieces are quite rhythmic and sometimes have the live saxophone as much a part of the texture as the electronic part. Being able to blend in both timbrally as well as in perfect tempo is extremely important to the success of a performance of one of these works.

And finally, the most dangerous aspect of performing electroacoustic music is the technology aspect of it. Computers don’t like to work when you want them to. And you have to have good audio equipment to have a great sound during performances. So there’s an added aspect that is often out of your control as a performer, especially when you travel and play in different venues all the time.

Zeitschichten.com: Can you tell us something about upcoming concerts in the mobtown modern series?

Brian Sacawa: We have two concert left this season. Our next concert is the Sequenzathon, a marathon performance of Berio’s Sequenzas. We’ll end this season with a show we’re called “Out To Lunch”, which will feature music be composers who have at one time or another in their careers been called “crazy.” On this concert we’re programming music by Edgard Varese, Eric Dolphy, Frank Zappa, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and Alvin Lucier. We’re also very, very excited about what we’ve got programmed for Season 3, though that’s a secret for now!

Zeitschichten.com: Thanks to both of you for this interview!

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OnClassical is a new e-label that sells music solely via the web. Unlike itunes, emusic, rhapsody, and amazon, OnClassical offers only high-quality downloads that sound exactly like a traditional CD. Zeitschichten.com spoke to the label’s busy founder, Alessandro Simonetto, about music in the age of the internet, OnClassical’s business philosophy, as well as their upcoming projects (they will soon license music for commercial uses).

Zeitschichten.com: Your recording label OnClassical distributes its recordings solely via the internet. The music can be downloaded in .wav format without any copy protection (DRM-free). What brought you to this unusual business model?

Alessandro Simonetto: I have always thought that trust in the buyer is a great way to get respect from them. In this sense the philosophy of Creative Commons was a pleasant discovery and confirmation, so that control no longer depends on such entities as the royalty societies and other authorities, but on the artists themselves. With respect to OnClassical, it also means replacing the interest of the many (very often these are small record labels, agents, or producers) with the interest of the individual, because the interests of the many limits the artist in every way. So, in the end, it is the artist who benefits the most.

Zeitschichten.com: According to your business model customers can decide how much they would like to pay for the recordings. Possible prices start at 6 Euros (= $9) and go all the way up to 20 Euros (= $30). The artists will get half of this amount, which is many times more than they would normally earn per CD. Apart from this, how do artists benefit from working with your label?

Alessandro Simonetto: The average price paid is normally 7.50 Euros so musicians get about 3.00 Euros which is 50% minus half the IVA (Italian tax) and bank fees. Buyers, not infrequently, pay up to 12 Euros, more rarely up to 15 or 20 Euros, especially when they return and are satisfied with a previously purchased album (this fortunately happens!).
Artists also benefit from an unrestricted advertising on the Web and in music magazines, trade shows, and conferences, especially here in Italy. We have just printed a CD that contains the best of productions by onclassical.com for each instrument; selected artists have been included free of charge and have the CD for free.
Finally, signing a contract with OnClassical means not having to pay for distribution, and the contract is never exclusive (i.e. the holder of the record remains the artist) and he or she can record at less than half the price we normally ask for a recording.

Zeitschichten.com: When you say that contracts are never exclusive, does this mean that the artist could also distribute their CDs via an alternative distribution channel?

Alessandro Simonetto: Yes. We ask only the artists who record with us to publish online only at onclassical.com. This situation enables us to cut back the recording fees which we applicate to our artists.

Zeitschichten.com: In addition to producing new albums you also take over the distribution of CDs that were produced by others (i. e. self-produced by independent artists). Do you see yourself as a competitor to places like CD-Baby when it comes to music distribution? Or is this service envisioned more as a complement for those artists who already record with OnClassical and would like to sell older recordings via your website as well?

Alessandro Simonetto: Yes, the recordings which we publish, but which we do not produce directly – in other words, the recordings sent to us by the artists – can be advertised through other web sites. Let me stress some important points about our competitors:
OnClassical sells only high-quality audio albums: as a matter of fact only 0.5% of CDs received so far have been published (i.e. one in every 200 disks; and about 75% of the times, these few disks have also been revised!).
At OnClassical we take a great deal of care in selecting performances (while at CDBaby and 90% of other sites there is a lot of minor quality work and sadly no selection).
CDBaby claims $35 per disc to publish it. They also ask for $20 for the bar code required to distribute MP3 files at the various shops and $4 for every CD sold! The artists then have to add all the shipping costs for every 5 CDs sent. If we consider that every CD has a cost of 1 Euro, and that artists usually have to print at least 1000 CDs, then they would spend at least 1000 euros (which equals approximately $1300!). We call that real torture. OnClassical does not ask for any of this; all it requires is quality.
OnClassical sells .wav files (not .mp3 o hard CDs) for the reason
specified here.
OnClassical gives the artist a respectable niche alongside a family of other important artists (this is certainly not the case with 90% of the other web sites).
So I think it should be clear to all why we do not consider CDBaby or other websites as our competitors.

Zeitschichten.com: Given that your label is geared towards audiophiles who often put a lot of value on packaging as well, are you thinking about offering traditionally packaged CDs at some point? Or will you limit yourself to the distribution of high-quality sound files only?

Alessandro Simonetto: For the moment we will only distribute files, not CDs. With our philosophy, infact, we would like the user to make his own packaging with the instruments that are now readily available to anyone (e.g. printers, burners, etc.). This important preference helps users save costs.
I am thinking, instead, of suggesting a good burner, possibly an open source one (but so far I haven’t found a suitable one!), and of offering the file from the mastering session so that the process of making the CD would become immediate. I am also considering the idea of hiring the services of a professional graphic designer to work on new captivating covers.

Zeitschichten.com: What are your current recording projects? What music will come out soon?

Alessandro Simonetto: Our next records include Bach’s Goldberg Variations in a trascription for two pianos by Joseph Reinberger; then organ works by Mendelssohn (we will record the complete set eventually), Reubke, and Liszt.

Zeitschichten.com: In twenty years from now, how will the music industry look like? Will people still buy recorded music? Will there be more concerts? Or less? What is your prediction of the future?

Alessandro Simonetto: That’s a dangerous question! Frankly I am not a soothsayer, but I can say what I would like to see happen: first, computer and data transmission will become the only electrical appliance, so the music will be heard directly from the network (without having to worry about saving it) in very high definition. I hope the current rights protection system and the distribution of royalties will disappear, leaving space for other, more fluid and transparent ways of paying artists. I also hope the economic system – but not our identity and privacy! – will become increasingly more electronic and easy to use.
As for concerts I believe these will still be held; yet, maybe they’ll differ slightly. For instance, I think we pianists will play at home – not so much with our hands but rather with ideas, or our minds – and people will listen from their own homes.
I think that one’s performances in the future will not be filtered by technical limitations (for instance, the body, the shoulders, the arms, the hands, one’s agility). And maybe even music recordings will be performed by non-musicians: clearly, there will always be a difference between professionals and non, but even mere music lovers will be able to interpret music thanks to new technology.

Zeitschichten.com: Thank you for this interview!

Visit OnClassical’s website at http://www.onclassical.com/ or find them on facebook.