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If New York philanthropy could be likened to a game of Monopoly, Rolex’s pieces would be neatly arranged in and around the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

The status timepiece brand has partnered with The Metropolitan Opera, which presents its productions in the iconic Lincoln Center Theater on New York’s Upper West Side, since 2011, while one of Rolex’s newest “Testimonees,” the brand’s moniker for its brand ambassadors, is Yannick Nézet-Séguin, music director of The Metropolitan Opera since 2018.

Now Rolex is expanding its reach in the performing-arts campus, signing a three-year partnership with Film at Lincoln Center in late January. With its focus on celebrating cinema and nurturing the next generation of film artists, the non-profit Film at Lincoln Center dovetails with the timepiece brand’s ongoing “Rolex and Cinema” initiatives.

“Rolex is genuinely committed to the art and craft of great cinema, and we’re...

The 67th Grammy Awards nominations have recognized musicians Hans Zimmer, Atticus Ross and films such as Twisters and The Color Purple with nods across multiple categories.

Zimmer is nominated for the Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media category with the Dune: Part Two (2024) soundtrack and also for the Best Song Written for Visual Media category with “Love Will Survive” from The Tattooist of Auschwitz, which he wrote with Kara Talve, Charlie Midnight and Walter Afanasieff. Barbara Streisand sings the song from the series based on Heather Morris’ book of the same name.

Atticus Ross is nominated as a composer with collaborator Trent Reznor for the score soundtrack to Challengers (2024) starring Zendaya, Mike Faist and Josh O’Connor. Ross, along with Leopold Ross and Nick Cuba, has two nominations in the same category — Best Score Soundtrack For Visual Media — with FX’s Shōgun, which also netted many trophies at the 2024 Emmys. Ross...

Paris-based Totem Films has acquired world sales rights, excluding Canada, to Canadian filmmaker Sofia Bohdanowicz’s “Measures for a Funeral” in advance of the film’s world premiere in the Toronto Film Festival’s Centrepiece program.

Margot Hervée, Totem’s head of sales and acquisitions, first encountered Bohdanowicz’s work a few years ago. “It immediately resonated with me,” she told Variety. “We’re thrilled to now have her as part of the Totem family and to represent her latest film.”

Vortex Media is the film’s Canadian distributor.

As part of today’s announcement, Totem has shared with Variety a first teaser for “Measures,” which stars Deragh Campbell as Audrey Benac — a “family detective” character she has played in previous Bohdanowicz films, including the feature “Ms Slavic 7,” which premiered in Berlin in 2019 and also screened in Toronto.

Filmed in Canada, the U.K. and Norway, “Measures”— which won the...

Bradley Cooper is still recovering from the Best Actor Oscar loss to Cillian Murphy. Cooper earlier revealed to multiple sources that he spent six years in training to play the role of American conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein in Maestro. His six-year training was put to intense scrutiny when his conducting scene from Maestro was examined by classical music experts.

Bradley Cooper in Maestro (2023)

According to the experts, Cooper did a decent job than most other actors, who they knew butchered the music scenes. However, there were pretty basic flaws in the conducting that may force fans to question the time spent on training for the musician’s role.

Classical Music Experts Find Mistakes In Bradley Cooper’s Conducting Scene In Maestro

Bradley Cooper’s conducting scene in Maestro was analyzed by two classical music experts

Bradley Cooper started his Oscar campaign for Maestro well before any other actors by...

Bradley Cooper was in character as Leonard Bernstein a year before shooting his biopic 'Maestro'.The actor plays the legendary composer in the film which he wrote and directed acting opposite Carey Mulligan who played Bernstein's wife Felicia Montealegre - and Carey has revealed Bradley was speaking in the composer's voice in phone calls to her 12 months before they started filming.She told Variety: "He did so much prep. He prepped to the point where he walked on set and didn’t have to think — like you say. And I think to be able to direct it and write it and star in it and all that stuff, he needed to get everything out of the way. So he was ringing me a year before in full Lenny voice and everything."She added: "I’d be putting the kids to bed, and I’d get a FaceTime with him as Lenny: 'Ok.

The greatest film score of 2023 isn’t eligible for an Academy Award. That’s because Leonard Bernstein composed it between 1944 and 1977, multiple pieces that collectively form the musical backdrop of “Maestro,” Bradley Cooper’s film about the 20th century American composer-conductor.

The classical excerpts functioning as dramatic score include Bernstein’s ballets “Fancy Free” and “Facsimile,” parts of his Broadway scores for “West Side Story” and “Candide,” his opera “A Quiet Place,” music for the film “On the Waterfront,” portions of his second and third symphonies as well as his “Mass” and “Chichester Psalms.”

“I think of the score as the co-star of the film,” says the composer’s oldest daughter, Jamie Bernstein. “We knew that Bradley wanted to use our dad’s music in the score, but I don’t think, in the beginning, we even grasped how much of a presence it would wind up having in the film.

Bradley Cooper spent six years learning how to conduct a six-minute piece of music for 'Maestro'.The 48-year-old actor directs and stars in the Netflix biopic as composer Leonard Bernstein and revealed the extreme lengths he went to for a scene that captures his character conducting the 1976 London Symphony Orchestra in Ely Cathedral.Speaking at a Q and A in New York City, Bradley said: "That scene I was so worried about because we did it live. That was the London Symphony Orchestra. I was recorded live, I had to conduct them. And I spent six years learning how to conduct six minutes and 21 seconds of music."The 'A Star Is Born' actor thanked his "wonderful teachers" for helping him to recreate Bernstein's style with the baton.Bradley explained: "I was able to get the raw take where I just watched Leonard Bernstein (conduct) at Ely Cathedral with...

Much of the buzz around Bradley Cooper’s “Maestro” so far has revolved around his shocking physical transformation into famed conductor Leonard Bernstein, but the actor-director-writer’s prep for the role might also blow some people away. Speaking at a recent Los Angeles screening for the film in a conversation moderated by “Hamilton” Tony-winner Lin-Manuel Miranda, Cooper revealed that he spent a whopping six years learning how to conduct just over six minutes of music in the style of Bernstein himself so he could record a crucial scene in “Maestro” live on set.

The scene in question recreates Bernstein’s famous conducting of the London Symphony Orchestra at the Ely Cathedral in 1976. The sequence is the film’s most rousing, as it fully showcases Bernstein’s musical genius and shows off Cooper’s staggering performance in all its full-bodied glory.

“That scene I was so worried about because we did it live,...

Bradley Cooper is admitting just how “terrified” he was to portray Leonard Bernstein for the Netflix film “Maestro.”

Cooper, who also directed, produced, and co-wrote the feature, said during a special New York City tastemakers screening Q&a at the Whitby Hotel moderated by Lin-Manuel Miranda that he spent six years mastering how to conduct a six-minute sequence. The post-screening panel also included Cooper’s co-stars Matt Bomer and Carey Mulligan, and the movie debuted to a standing ovation.

The scene Cooper referenced captures Bernstein famously conducting the 1976 London Symphony Orchestra in Ely Cathedral.

“That scene I was so worried about because we did it live,” Cooper said. “That was the London Symphony Orchestra. I was recorded live, I had to conduct them. And I spent six years learning how to conduct six minutes and 21 seconds of music.”

Cooper credited his “wonderful teachers” for helping him reenact Bernstein’s conducting.

“I...

10 November 2023 — Today, Lise Davidsen, the most in-demand soprano in the world right now, releases her new album, ‘Christmas From Norway’ via Decca Classics/Universal Music Canada. Hailed as “The living, breathing meteor of the current opera world.” (The I Paper), Lise Davidsen‘s forthcoming album presents a delightful and personally selected collection of traditional Norwegian Christmas music and classic festive favourites, spreading the warm glow of the Scandinavian Christmas spirit. Reflecting on the project, Lise expresses her long-standing desire to create this album. “For Scandinavians, Christmas serves as a beacon of light in the midst of a lengthy winter. Perhaps that is why we embrace it so wholeheartedly.” says Lise.

The ‘Norwegian Starlight’ (quote) is unstoppable: this season alone Lise has starred in the BBC’s Last Night of the Proms, where she ‘swept all before her’ (The i Paper), alongside cellist and label-mate Sheku Kanneh-Mason, during an event she...

26 October 2023 — Directed, written, produced by, and starring Bradley Cooper in the title role, opposite Carey Mulligan, Maestro is a towering and fearless love story chronicling the lifelong relationship between Leonard Bernstein and Felicia Montealegre Cohn Bernstein. A love letter to life and art, Maestro at its core is an emotionally epic portrayal of family and love. Deutsche Grammophon is delighted to be releasing the original soundtrack album for the movie, which has already garnered widespread critical acclaim. All the music in the film was chosen by Cooper, and the new recordings on the soundtrack were made by the London Symphony Orchestra and Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who also worked closely with the actor-director as conducting consultant before and throughout the film-making process.

The album will be released digitally on November 17, 2023, and on CD and vinyl on December 1. A taster track featuring an excerpt from the Finale of Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 “Resurrection”, with soprano Rosa Feola,...

Gkids has announced the acquisition of the North American rights for the upcoming French sci-fi animation film “Mars Express,” directed by Jérémie Perin in his feature debut.

The film’s synopsis reads: “In 2200, private detective Aline Ruby and her android partner Carlos Rivera are hired by a wealthy businessman to track down a notorious hacker. On Mars, they descend deep into the underbelly of the planet’s capital city where they uncover a darker story of brain farms, corruption, and a missing girl who holds a secret about the robots that threatens to change the face of the universe.”

Perin’s debut was part of the official selection at the Cannes and Annecy film festivals this year.

“Mars Express’ is a film we have been excited about for years, since we saw the very first footage,” said Gkids president David Jesteadt. “This is a timely and provocative story set in...

Paul Thomas Anderson’s longtime costume designer (Hard Eight; Boogie Nights; Magnolia; Punch-Drunk Love; There Will Be Blood; The Master; Inherent Vice; Phantom Thread; Licorice Pizza) Mark Bridges on Bradley Cooper’s Maestro: “It was very important to me to keep the audience in tune with the passage of time.” Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

At the press conference for Bradley Cooper’s Maestro (Spotlight Gala selection of the 61st New York Film Festival), starring Cooper as Leonard Bernstein and Carey Mulligan as his wife Felicia with their three children Jamie (Maya Hawke), Alexander (Sam Nivola), and Nina (Alexa Swinton), were producer Kristie Macosko Krieger, screenwriter Josh Singer (Oscar win with Tom McCarthy for Spotlight), Jamie Bernstein (daughter of Leonard Bernstein), costume designer Mark Bridges (Oscar wins for Michel Hazanavicius’s The Artist and Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread), prosthetic makeup designer Kazu Hiro, production designer Kevin Thompson, production sound mixer Steve Morrow,...

Here’s a look at this week’s biggest premieres, parties and openings in Los Angeles and New York, including Selena Gomez’s Rare Impact Fund Benefit, a Loki launch event and the New York Film Festival.

New York Film Festival

The annual film fest kicked off on Sept. 29 with the premiere of May December, followed by a screening of Maestro on Monday.

Jessica Elbaum, Sophie Mas, Christine Vachon, Samy Burch, Todd Haynes, Pamela Koffler and Grant S. Johnson attend the red carpet for ‘May December’ Fred Berner, Lesli Klainberg, Amy Durning, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Kazu Hiro, Kevin Thompson, Mark Bridges, Nina Bernstein Simmons, Jamie Bernstein, Alexander Bernstein, Kristie Macosko Krieger, Steven Morrow and Josh Singer attend the red carpet for ‘Maestro’

Sinners y Santos launch

On Friday, new nightclub Sinners y Santos, situated within Level 8, launched in Downtown LA. The opening saw a surprise performance by The Chainsmokers and drew...

“This whole project began a good 15 years ago,” explained Jamie Bernstein, daughter of famed composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein, at the New York Film Festival’s Spotlight Gala Premiere of “Maestro” at David Geffen Hall in Lincoln Center. “The evolution of this film has been so intricate and profound, and so many things happened along the way, and so many new people arrived along the way — most significantly Bradley Cooper, who came into the picture about five or six years ago and changed everything.”

SEERevisiting Carey Mulligan’s 2 Oscar nominations in honor of ‘Maestro’

Cooper co-wrote, directed and produced “Maestro” in addition to starring as Leonard Bernstein. The film tells the story of the music legend’s life and career, with special attention given to his relationship with his wife Felicia Montealegre (Carey Mulligan). “I’m used to going deep on research,” said co-writer Josh Singer. “And I love nothing...

Leonard Bernstein’s children Jamie, Alexander and Nina were in complete awe the first time they saw Bradley Cooper as the renowned conductor and composer.

“It took our breath away, it made us gasp,” Jamie Bernstein told Variety at the North American premiere of “Maestro” at the New York Film Festival. “In some pictures, we could tell a little bit that it was Bradley, but there were certain photographs where we would go, ‘Oh my God!’ It was so amazingly perfect.”

“I had a FaceTime call come in, and I didn’t recognize the number. But I chanced it, and it was my father as an old man!” added Nina Maria Felicia Bernstein. “Obviously, that was not my father as an old man, it was Bradley. I could not stop laughing. He had the cigarette and the glasses, it was so spot on.”

Bernstein’s children attended the NYFF premiere...

“Maestro” director and star Bradley Cooper made an inconspicuous appearance at the New York Film Festival premiere, skipping press in solidarity with SAG-AFTRA.

Fitting for a film that focuses on legendary conductor Leonard Bernstein, the starry premiere marked a homecoming given its location: David Geffen Hall, home of the New York Philharmonic. On Sept. 23, 1962, Bernstein and the Philharmonic performed the inaugural concert at the venue. Bernstein served as the orchestra’s conductor from 1958 to 1969 and laureate conductor from 1969 to 1990.

Before the lights in the auditorium dimmed, Cooper was spotted sporting a buzz cut and chatting with notable guests, including Netflix’s Scott Stuber, Laura Dern, Shawn Levy and Jeremy Strong.

Carey Mulligan, who leads the film opposite Cooper as the conductor’s wife Felicia Montealegre, did not attend.

The NYFF premiere marks the first time Cooper has publicly supported the film, after skipping its world premiere at the Venice Film...

Kazu Hiro said he “wasn’t expecting” the controversy; “I feel sorry that I hurt some people’s feelings.”

Kazu Hiro, make-up designer on Bradley Cooper’s Maestro, has responded to the controversy around the nose of Cooper’s lead character Leonard Bernstein, saying “I feel sorry that I hurt some people’s feelings.”

Speaking at the press conference in Venice for the Competition title, Hiro said “I wasn’t expecting [the controversy] to happen. My goal and Bradley’s goal was to portray Lennie [Bernstein] as authentically as possible.

“Lennie had a really iconic look that everybody knows,” said Hiro, who earlier...

Exclusive: With the Venice Film Festival opening tonight, all eyes are on Italy to give us some early clues as to what some of the most anticipated movies of the season will be delivering in terms of their awards potential. Certainly one of the more eagerly awaited expected contenders is Bradley Cooper’s Leonard Bernstein movie, Maestro.

It comes with one of the most impressive pedigrees of the year — not only because it is Cooper’s second directorial effort, one in which he not only stars as Bernstein but also co-wrote (with Josh Singer) and was one of six producers along with such legends as Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese. Cooper’s hit first film as director, A Star Is Born with Lady Gaga, also was chosen for Venice in 2018, a boost that gives a star-driven film worldwide attention in an instant. That was the hope when Netflix decided to bring Maestro to the Lido,...

Sophie Desmarais plays talented young conductor wrestling with relationships.

Visit Films has acquired worldwide sales rights excluding Canada for Days Of Happiness, Chloé Robichaud’s upcoming world premiere in TIFF Special Presentations.

Days Of Happiness will premiere on September 9 and stars Sophie Desmarais as Emma, a conductor and rising star on the Montreal stage who has a complicated relationship with her father and agent Patrick.

Emma must confront her emotions if she is to succeed in navigating her career and her romantic relationship with Naëlle, a newly separated cellist and mother of a young boy.

Sylvain Marcel and Nour Belkhiria...

On May 14, 2023, 60 Minutes on CBS will feature three compelling stories: an exposé on the investment arm of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a dive into the world of sperm whales, and an interview with renowned conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin.

The Church’s Firm

60 Minutes reporter Sharyn Alfonsi will delve into the $100 billion fortune amassed by the secretive investment arm of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A whistleblower has alleged that, rather than using the funds for charitable purposes, hundreds of millions were spent to bail out businesses connected to the church. Alfonsi interviews David Nielsen, a former senior portfolio manager at the church’s firm, who reveals his involvement in a federal investigation and his decision to come forward. The segment is produced by Guy Campanile.

The Sperm Whales of Dominica

Cecilia Vega takes viewers off the coast of Dominica, home to hundreds of sperm whales,...

New York, NY — April 6, 2023 — The 92nd Street Y, New York (92Ny), one of New York’s leading cultural venues, presents Simone Porter, violin & Rohan De Silva, piano, play Strauss and more, on May 6, 2023 at 7:30pm Et. Tickets start at $25 and are available at 92ny.org/event/simone-porter-violin.

Young violinist Simone Porter makes her 92Ny debut in the newly renovated Buttenwieser Hall, showcasing the talent that has been making both audiences and critics take notice. Her solo set includes the New York premiere of Drishti – a work written for her by Indian American composer Reena Esmail, and named for a focus concept in yoga – and Esa-Pekka Salonen’s Pierrot Lunaire-inspired Lachen Verlernt, a piece that has become a contemporary touchstone of the solo violin repertoire. Porter and De Silva close the program with Strauss’s lyrical E-flat Major Sonata.

Program:

Andrew Norman, Sabina

Biber, Passacaglia

Reena Ismail, Drishti (द्र...

Works & Process at the Guggenheim presents Champion—an opera by Terence Blanchard, with a libretto by Michael Cristofer—featuring performances by members of the cast and a moderated discussion about the work’s forthcoming company premiere at the Metropolitan Opera. Tickets available now at worksandprocess.org.

Champion

An Opera by Terence Blanchard

Libretto by Michael Cristofer

Monday, March 20, 7:30Pm

Tickets 35–45, Choose What You Pay

Experience highlights from six-time Grammy-winning composer Terence Blanchard’s haunting “opera in jazz.” Following their triumphant 2021 collaboration on Fire Shut Up in My Bones, Met Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin, director James Robinson, and choreographer Camille A. Brown reunite with Blanchard to explore the life of boxer Emile Griffith. Blanchard’s first opera, Champion tells the story of Griffith’s rise from obscurity to world champion, his struggle with his sexuality, and how a knockout of a homophobic rival in the early 1960s led to tragedy.

Update The Metropolitan Opera has announced that it will “no longer engage with artists or institutions that support Putin or are supported by him.”

The announcement, made on the Met’s website in a brief video statement by General Manager Peter Gelb, comes several days after another major New York cultural institution, Carnegie Hall, announced that Russian conductor Valery Gergiev and pianist Denis Matsuev, both longtime Putin supporters, would not participate in a performance of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra this past weekend.

In Gelb’s video statement, the general manager says, “While we believe strongly in the warm friendship and cultural exchange that has long existed between the artists and artistic institutions of Russia and the United States, we can no longer engage with artists or institutions that support Putin or are supported by him.” Gelb states that the new policy will remain in effect “until the invasion and killing has been stopped,...

Madison Square Garden and Carnegie Hall, two of New York’s most iconic venues, announced their reopening plans today as the city continues its climb out of the pandemic shutdown era. Leading the charge will be band Foo Fighters, with a June 20 concert that marks Msg’s return as a full-capacity arena rock venue.

The Foo Fighters news comes a day after Bruce Springsteen announced his June 26 return to Broadway in a revival of Springsteen on Broadway and Mayor Bill de Blasio broke news that a massive concert in Central Park, with Clive Davis recruiting talent, will take place in August.

Carnegie Hall, meanwhile, said today that it will reopen in October, with its 2021-2022 season to include more than 100 performances presented on the Hall’s three stages and across New York City. Presented from October through June, the season will feature performances encompassing classical, jazz, and popular music, with...

For decades the Academy of Music Anniversary Concert and Ball has been among Philadelphia’s most highly anticipated charity events of the year in support of one of the region’s most important cultural landmarks.

On Saturday, January 26, 2019, supporters of the Academy of Music will come together for a concert featuring Academy Award-winning actor Dame Helen Mirren and The Philadelphia Orchestra led by Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Mirren, a multi-faceted performer of stage and screen, whose father played viola with the London Philharmonic, will help to celebrate the legacy of the Academy of Music, the Orchestra’s original home. Immediately following the concert, guests will enjoy an evening of spirited music, dinner, and dancing.

“The Academy of Music is a beacon of historic Philadelphia, and The Philadelphia Orchestra’s annual visit is a treasured moment,” said Philadelphia Orchestra Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin. “I am thrilled to be returning next month with Helen Mirren,...

When an un-darkened Moor marched onstage during the Metropolitan Opera’s new production of Otello, he seemed confused, as if he had just crashed the wrong Act I. “Esultate,” he sang, non-exultingly. For a moment, it looked as though the Met’s season was off to a wobbly start. The chorus milled, the storm dissipated, and an all-black-clad cast seemed uncertain as to who was on whose side. Fortunately for Venice, Verdi, and the opening-night audience, Yannick Nézet-Séguin was in the pit to enforce order and wildness, violence and wit. Otello is Verdi’s opera of extremes. The weather is at its most murderous, the title character most tormented, the bad guy most depraved — and all those drastic states come geysering out of the orchestra. Woe to the singer who dithers in the face of that musical hurricane. Nézet-Séguin was not about to let that happen. The conductor kept the...

My usual explanation in this space: I am especially interested in piano and choral music, plus symphonies, so that’s what I get the most promos of. Other stuff obviously gets through my filters, but the percentages of what comes in inevitably affect what comes out, i.e. this list. That said, in terms of number of centuries spanned, rather than genres or formats or whatever, I think I'm covering as much or more musical territory than most critics. By the way, look for a shorter list of my favorite classical reissues of 2012, to follow in a day or two.

1. Tokyo String Quartet, Jon Manasse, Jon Nakamatsu Brahms: Piano Quintet, Clarinet Quintet (Harmonia Mundi) There were recordings this year that were more important in terms of bringing new repertoire to light, or featuring young artists, or bringing classical into the 21st century, or being more controversially newsworthy. Examples of all of those follow.