How will the arts respond to Trump?

Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election is being cast as a revolutionary moment in politics. Viewed as a hero by his supporters, and a disaster by his detractors, Trump is one of the most divisive figures to occupy the Oval Office. So will his presidency spark a new era of creative protest – or support - among artists and musicians?

“To my knowledge he’s never contributed a dime to a cultural institution”. The veteran US cultural critic, John Rockwell, gives Tom Service his views on what a Trump presidency might mean for arts and culture. While the president-elect has referenced Steve Reich’s work in one of his books, he has never appeared to be part of the philanthropic gala circuit that donates large sums to the arts in America.

Drawing on decades of experience as a cultural observer, Rockwell outlines how he believes pop music will respond rapidly to Trump as his promises become policy – with experimental and classical music registering their own protests at a more “glacial” pace.

More information:

Anti-Trump protests – BBC News

Is protest music dead?

John Rockwell on Arts Journal

Following his production of Shostakovich’s The Nose at Covent Garden, the controversial Australian opera director describes how shock tactics and radical ideas are helping opera to flourish – and how he fears a new cultural conservatism could hold the art form back.

“The more idiosyncratic and iconoclastic and opera house can be, and the more it can link up in a unique way with its local audience, the more successful it is,” says Kosky, who is Artistic Director at the Komische Oper in Berlin. In a robust defence of his approach to his work, he points to the 700,000 tickets sold every year by the opera houses in the German capital – and rejects assertions that opera is in crisis.

Kosky insists that creative musicians, directors and producers must have freedom to interpret works, and challenges critics who demand that operas be staged as historical artefacts. “If you don’t want to be surprised… with a piece of music you know, then stay at home,” Kosky suggests. “We’re trying to create something that’s living.”

More information:

Barrie Kosky Komische Oper Biography

The Nose at ROH

Opera on 3

Two of the top voices in Indian classical music, Shubha Mudgal and Aruna Shairam, reveal how their different traditions – the northern Hindustani and southern Carnatic – overlap, diverge, and share common roots.

Music Matters turns its attention to Indian classical styles following the 70th anniversary of the launch of Radio 3, which helped introduce the music to a wider audience in the UK.

Joined by the Hindustani tabla master Aneesh Pradhan during their visit to London to appear at the Darbar festival, the musicians guide Tom through ragas, rhythm and the improvisational elements that distinguish their respective traditions, offering a window onto their music, its history and its contemporary performance practice.

More information:

Darbar Festival

World on 3