As medici.tv’s Chief Content Officer I spend a lot of time thinking about classical music—and a lot of time on the internet. Here’s my selection of the top news items you need to see this week if you want to stay in the know.
Wigmore Hall withdraws from Arts Council England funding scheme after raising over £10 million (BBC)
The BBC reported a surprising announcement from one of the UK’s top classical music venues this week, who revealed that they will voluntarily leave the Arts Council England funding scheme in 2026, citing “onerous” and “crippling” administrative policy, as well as a lack of confidence in the public scheme’s new funding strategy, which many believe prioritizes “grassroots and community work over artists who are at the top of their fields.” In order to become financially self-sufficient, Wigmore Hall launched a fundraising appeal last year and achieved their target of £10 million two years earlier than expected—an amount that should more than compensate for the £344,000 the hall received annually from ACE.
Singer-songwriter Jacob Collier improvises with a full orchestra (YouTube)
Grammy-award winning artist and YouTube phenom Jacob Collier joined the National Symphony Orchestra on stage for a musical feat few would dare to take on: live improvisation with a full orchestra. The 20-minute segment—already viewed over 2 million times on YouTube—begins with Collier working with orchestra sections individually to create chords, rhythms, and melodic fragments, which he then pieces together seamlessly into a brand-new song. Jump to 14:55 to see just the final result or watch the full video to witness him craft the building blocks.
California thief sentenced to four years in prison after stealing over $300,000 of violins and bows (The Strad)
One of the most buzzed-about news items of the end of 2024 has finally come to a close as violin thief Mark Meng was sentenced to 46 months in prison this week. Over many months, Meng posed as a violin collector and convinced music stores across California to lend him valuable instruments—including a Lorenzo Ventapane violin from 1823, valued at $175,000—and bows for trial periods, before eventually selling them to an unsuspecting violin dealer in Los Angeles. Meng’s scheme was detected and investigated by the FBI’s Art Crime Team late last year.
Franz Welser-Möst won’t boycott the US (Operawire / Backstage Classical)
Operawire picked up an interview Franz Welser-Möst gave with a German press outlet in which the celebrated conductor spoke out about the wave of US boycotts announced in recent weeks in the classical sector, arguing that now, more than ever, foreign artists need to support American ensembles and continue to demonstrate the importance of the arts: “Boycotts of American cultural institutions would likely lead to the USA becoming an intellectual desert. And this would support a policy that accepts precisely that: the insignificance of culture.”
Welser-Möst has performed widely in the US and has notably been Music Director of one of the country’s most prestigious ensembles, the Cleveland Orchestra, for over two decades. Here they are in 2023 performing Barber’s Cello Concerto with soloist Alisa Weilerstein:
