Composer says values of Trump-dominated Kennedy Center ‘are in direct conflict’ with symphony’s message
Philip Glass, the celebrated US composer, has withdrawn the world premiere of his latest symphony at Washington DC’s John F Kennedy Center in protest of Donald Trump’s presidency.
In a statement on Tuesday, the 88-year-old composer said: “After thoughtful consideration, I have decided to withdraw my Symphony No 15 ‘Lincoln’ from the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Symphony No 15 is a portrait of Abraham Lincoln, and the values of the Kennedy Center today are in direct conflict with the message of the symphony.
Drummer who with the bassist Robbie Shakespeare provided the rhythm section for Peter Tosh, Grace Jones and Black Uhuru
Sly Dunbar, who has died aged 73 after a long illness, was one of the most renowned Jamaican drummers, respected internationally for his precision timing and for the inventiveness with which he approached his instrument.
Crafting non-standard reggae rhythms that drew on funk, soul and disco, Dunbar and his bass-playing partner, Robbie Shakespeare, backed nearly every reggae artist of note and collaborated with an array of admirers, including Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, Ian Dury, Joan Armatrading, Madonna, the Fugees and Sinéad O’Connor, though many will remember him best for the outstanding hits that brought Grace Jones to stardom.
Rapper and fashion mogul, legally known as Ye, gives details of mental health treatment and speaks of making amends with those in his personal life
Kanye West has elaborated on his mindset during manic episodes in which he made strongly antisemitic comments.
On separate occasions, the rapper and fashion designer, legally known as Ye, had said “There’s a lot of things that I love about Hitler” and “I’m a Nazi … I love Hitler”, had accused Jewish people of trying “to black ball anyone whoever opposes your agenda”, and designed clothing featuring swastikas.
Musician said he hopes the offer will ‘ease some of the unwarranted stress and threats you are experiencing from our unpopular and hopefully temporary government’
After his death aged 73, we look back at a selection of the hundreds of tracks the Sly and Robbie drummer had a hand in making
It isn’t Sly Dunbar’s most spectacular performance as a drummer – although his playing is right in the pocket: listen to the lightness of his touch on the cymbals and the tightness of his occasional fills – but as recording debuts go, appearing on an early 70s reggae classic in your teens, a single that furthermore went to No 1 in the UK and sold 300,000 copies despite British radio’s disinclination to play it, is quite the impressive way to open your account.
Folk duo Pound & Stevens have transformed, and added to, Holst’s The Planets Suite and tour the new work this week with Britten Sinfonia. Will Pound explains why playing by ear is his greatest strength
I’m a harmonica and accordion player and one half of folk-classical duo Stevens & Pound. As a multi-instrumentalist I am rooted in a folk tradition that is oral, aural and communal. Music and song are passed down by ear, either through recordings or – more fun – traditional music sessions. Here, players and singers get together to share, swap and play tunes, drawing from a repertoire that is always evolving. While collections of tunesare certainly notated, their scores act as a skeleton – providing the basic architecture of pitch and rhythm but rarely offering explicit guidance on how the music should be played.
Delia Stevens and I are about to head out on tour, performing with the Britten Sinfonia and Robert Macfarlane in a new work called The Silent Planet, a recomposition of Holst’s Planets suite. It’s the culmination of 18 months of rehearsals and revisions, and the score for this 60-minute work, orchestrated by Ian Gardiner, totals 165 pages and includes Earth, an entirely new composition.
The singer-songwriter has donated access to his music archive to ‘ease the unwarranted stress and threats’ Greenlanders have experienced from the US government
Neil Young has donated a year’s worth of access to his music and documentary archive to the people of Greenland after the territory’s future became the subject of a fraught dispute with the US.
“I hope my music and music films will ease some of the unwarranted stress and threats you are experiencing from our unpopular and hopefully temporary government,” Young wrote in a statement on his website, Neil Young Archives, which offers comprehensive access to the 80-year-old songwriter’s recorded and live catalogues and other output.
A new Netflix documentary offers the most comprehensive look yet at the remarkable story of one of the UK’s biggest boybands. Roisin O’Connor speaks to director David Soutar about getting the band to trust him with telling it
The mysterious Cornish electronic music pioneer has gained an extraordinary second life in the TikTok era. Writers and musicians explain why his glitchy slipperiness is so in tune with life today
QKThr, an obscure cut from Aphex Twin’s 2001 album, Drukqs, sounds like an ambient experiment recorded on a historic pirate ship. Shaky fingers caress the keys of an accordion to create an uncanny tone; clustered chords cry out, subdued but mighty, before scuttling back into dreamy nothingness.
This 88-second elegy has always been overshadowed by another song on Drukqs, the Disklavier instrumental Avril 14th, which alongside Windowlicker is the Cornish producer’s best-known track. But QKThr has become a weird breakaway success, featuring on nearly 8m TikTok posts, adorning everything from cute panda videos to lightly memed US presidential debates, and a fail video trend dubbed “subtle foreshadowing”.
Singer Billie Eilish condemns celebrity inaction on Minnesota violence, sharing fiery Instagram posts about civil rights and calling out their silence.
Claudia Sheinbaum sent a diplomatic letter requesting more shows, after a worldwide scramble for tickets
Huge demand to see K-pop septet BTS has led the Mexican president, Claudia Sheinbaum, to formally request of her counterpart, the South Korean president, Lee Jae Myung, that he help arrange more concerts in Mexico.
“Everyone wants to go,” Sheinbaum said at her daily morning press conference on Monday, adding she had sent a diplomatic letter to South Korea’s Lee seeking more concerts.
Drummer helped to define the sound of roots reggae and dancehall, and worked with stars including the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan and Grace Jones
Sly Dunbar, the Jamaican musician and producer who created generations of global hits as one half of production duo Sly and Robbie, has died aged 73.
His wife, Thelma, told Jamaican newspaper the Gleaner that she found him unresponsive on Monday morning, with doctors later pronouncing him dead. Other sources close to Dunbar confirmed the news to the Guardian, adding that Dunbar had been unwell for some months.
Rapper, now known as Ye, apologises to his family and to the Black community and says he loves Jews, blaming his bipolar disorder for his ‘poor judgment and reckless behaviour’
Kanye West has taken out a full-page advert in the Wall Street Journal apologising for his antisemitic behaviour. “I am not a Nazi or an antisemite,” he wrote. “I love Jewish people.”
In a letter titled “To Those I’ve Hurt”, he attributed his inflammatory actions, including making profoundly offensive statements and selling T-shirts bearing swastikas, to his bipolar-1 disorder, which he said he developed as a result of medical oversight failing to diagnose a frontal-lobe injury sustained in a car crash in 2002.
To Those I’ve Hurt:
Twenty-five years ago, I was in a car accident that broke my jaw and caused injury to the right frontal lobe of my brain. At the time, the focus was on the visible damage – the fracture, the swelling, and the immediate physical trauma. The deeper injury, the one inside my skull, went unnoticed.
‘I couldn’t think of a line for the chorus – but we had just been to France. I got Baudelaire into the lyrics somewhere, too’
This song was an ode to glam rock. My older sister was really into Marc Bolan and her passion for him and his sound really rubbed off on me. I love the vocal effects and drum sounds on those old records.
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