by Kenneth Woods | May 25, 2024 | A view from the podium
I’ve just been listening to this latest interview between Rick Beato and Ted Gioia. Gioia is one of today’s most interesting and illuminating cultural commentators, and it’s especially interesting to hear him in dialogue with someone like Rick Beato, who has been so...
by Kenneth Woods | Mar 29, 2024 | A view from the podium
What follows is a Twitter thread I wrote in response to some excellent recent essays on UK arts funding. I’ve been thinking about a very important and balanced essay from Richard Bratby on the promise and perils of private arts funding in the UK. His description...
by Kenneth Woods | Mar 23, 2024 | A view from the podium
Maybe it’s the curmudgeon in me, but I was never a fan of the all-star charity track. From “We Are the World” to “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” I always found most of the songs saccharine and cloying, and the constant change of superstar vocalists off-putting. Perhaps...
by Kenneth Woods | Oct 25, 2023 | A view from the podium
Thought for the day. A colleague I admire was talking today about how one might make the lists of orchestral audition excerpts more diverse. I take a different view. The professional orchestra audition process, especially in America, has got to be one of the hardest...
by Kenneth Woods | Jun 18, 2023 | A view from the podium
It’s been an amazing weekend seeing Philip Sawyers’ new oratorio Mayflower on the Sea of Time come to life. Huge congrats to Philip S and to librettist Philip Groom for a piece that blew the roof off Worcester Cathedral. The word I keep coming back to is...
by Kenneth Woods | Mar 27, 2023 | A view from the podium
It was heartbreaking to learn of the death of Christopher Gunning, although I’d been aware he had been unwell for some time. Chris was the sort of person one felt lucky to know. He could be incredibly funny, even wicked. His vault of amazing and amusing...
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