Greg Sandow

Something happened as I got ready to write this column—I thought I got bored with the music I was going to write about. I guess that’s an occupational hazard for critics, since …

Greg Sandow

Warwick, NY: When you read this, it’ll be around Labor Day, time for going back to school, for work, for the concert season, and for other urban pursuits. But I’m writing in the …

Greg Sandow

Disagreement can be fascinating. Take, for instance, the response to my recent column about piracy. I put forth some grand theories, about how piracy serves, in effect, as publicity, without clearly hurting …

Greg Sandow

I want to say a few things about a brave and sweet—but probably mistaken—book by Allen Shawn, called Arnold Schoenberg’s Journey.
And as I start to write, I realize I’m obsessed, at least …

Greg Sandow

1. Piracy is a bad word…
It brings me images of ships that fly the skull and crossbones. They’ll capture us, steal our stuff, make us walk the plank. They’re a threat, not …

Greg Sandow

Not long ago, I was writing about serialism and made an all too common mistake.
I was trying to explain—to people who don’t know much about music—how serial writing got popular among composers …

Greg Sandow

New music concerts are often informal, especially if we compare them to more normal—or, if you like, stuffier, more ritualized, even constipated—mainstream classical events. This especially interests me because I teach a …

Greg Sandow

I’d like to think new music is thriving. Certainly there are reasons for thinking it is. Last year I served on an awards panel for ASCAP; we looked at hundreds of applications …

Greg Sandow

Not long ago I heard the Cleveland Orchestra play a Harrison Birtwistle piece in Carnegie Hall. This was a New York premiere, with an enticing title, The Shadow of Night, and I …

Greg Sandow

A while ago I saw a Godard film, one of his later ones, Soigne ta droite from 1986, which like all Godard’s later films isn’t easy to understand. It’s even hard to …