Durban's weekend line-up: where culture meets community and music takes centre stage
The DOC will perform a captivating concert of striking melodies along with the debut of a new Spring overture at NG Kerk, Umhlanga, on Saturday, May 17, at 3pm.
This weekend promises to be an unforgettable experience for Durbanites, featuring a tapestry of events that celebrate music, community spirit and environmental awareness.
Durban City Orchestra in Concert
Music-lovers have an opportunity to listen to the Durban City Orchestra (DCO) perform at an afternoon concert.
The DOC will perform a captivating programme of striking melodies from Mozart, Coleridge-Taylor and Mussorgsky, along with the debut of a new Spring overture.
The concert will also showcase the talents of Tsepho Ntswelengwe, who will perform the Mozart Horn Concerto.
Where: NG Kerk Umhlanga, 34 Herrwood Dr, Herrwood Park.
When: Saturday, May 17, at 3pm.
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Daily Maverick
3 days ago
- Daily Maverick
Vienna's Golden Hall: A journey of musical triumph and humbling embarrassment unfolds
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A surprising number of spy thrillers of the 20th century take place here, my favourite being John le Carré's A Perfect Spy, in which he used Vienna as a backdrop for his Cold War spy story. But I want to concentrate on cultural Vienna, a city with fewer people than Soweto, the locus of my amazement and humiliation. My love of classical music and opera has taken me to many magnificent venues – The Met in New York, the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, London, Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Italy, among them, each with its own special beauty. But nothing prepared me for the magnificence of the Golden Hall in Vienna's Musikverein, which is home to the renowned Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. It was a drizzly grey day when we, a party of four in the city to celebrate a friend's milestone 70th birthday, arrived at the imposing building. Immediately I noticed that we were hopelessly underdressed — me in sneakers and under a cosy, unflattering puffer jacket covering a bulky sweater and casual slacks. It was 11am on a Sunday morning, but this 'subscription concert' (where you buy a season ticket and therefore have first pick of seats), inspired Vienna's societal elite to don their finest garb. People dress up for these events, and oh, what a spectacle it was. Formal fashion Women glided along in floor-length, mid-length and short evening gowns, some covered in sequins that ignored the daylight etiquette rule (though whose rule that is remains unknown). Furs, high heels, one tiara, gleaming jewels; men in jacket and tie or dress suits with traditional white silk opera scarves… the fashion was formal. Scent wafting off the concertgoers perfumed the foyer. Traditionally guttural German tripping of tongues sounded unusually melodic and sweet. 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Dotted in between were women in demure black, mostly on violin or percussion instruments. The introduction of women musicians in the orchestra is a new phenomenon — it was, astonishingly, the sacred preserve of men until 1997. This concert taking place on a cool damp Sunday morning in the City of Dreams was particularly special and highly unusual for Vienna: all the main roles — composer, conductor and piano soloist — were played by women. Up first was Lithuanian composer and pianist Raminta Šerkšnytė's 2009 composition, Midsummer Song, for which the instrumentation was described as 'string orchestra with optional percussion with one performer: triangle, shaker, rain stick, wind chimes and vibraphone'. The 50-year-old composer named nature 'with its metaphorical comparison to the archetypical states of the human mind' as her main inspiration, describing her work as a 'pantheistic song, like a long journey to eternal light and to our inner peace of mind'. It was melodic. I found it moving. I loved it. But they're a hard lot to please, these knowledgeable Vienna music lovers. A woman seated close by muttered: 'I doubt that will ever be played in this hall again!' Dark-haired and petite with a powerful waving conductor's arm, 38-year-old Lithuanian Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla (her credentials include serving as musical director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra), was more warmly received. Not so much the globally controversial 38-year-old Beijing-born American pianist Yuja Wang, whose skimpy attire fashion sense has been universally criticised. She emerged from the wings in a silver bare-backed bandage dress that barely covered her modesty, finished off with six-inch Louboutin red-soled heels. Sequined, modest-gowned women in our box bristled. 'She lets down women,' my neighbour whispered. 'Prostitute,' another woman said under her breath, but loudly enough to be heard. Transfixed Then Wang began playing that most popular concerto ever written, Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 in B Flat Minor, her fingers expertly moving across the keys, her short black hair flying, her small body swaying, vibrating, moving to the music. We were transfixed as the exposed muscles in her shoulder blades rippled. My humiliation (and my friend's embarrassment) came at the first lull in the music when, with much enthusiasm and vigour, I began clapping. My neighbour waved her hands wildly in my face, shouting at me in German. Someone interpreted: She says stop clapping. You DO NOT clap between movements. The typical concerto is in three movements, or sections: a fast movement in sonata form, a slow and lyrical movement, and then another fast movement. I now know that the convention is that you do not clap until the end, a red-faced lesson learned in Vienna, in the beautiful Golden Hall. I remained seated and silent during the Sibelius Lemminkäinen Suite that ended the concert. What is it with women and the arts through the ages? I saw a series of exhibitions across London and Vienna — Dürer, Bruegel, Arcimboldo, Bassano, Edvard Munch, Goya, the impressionists Monet, Renoir, Van Gogh, Picasso, Cézanne. Not one single woman artist among them. Did women choose not to paint or sculpt or draw? The art history books tell us it was not encouraged and they were left to expend their creative energy on traditional arts more suited to women — like embroidery. I must admit that I was surprised by how recent was the admission of women to the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. I wonder, too, why these older women concertgoers perpetuate women-hating stereotypes. Calling a young woman a prostitute because of her fashion choice seems a bit archaic in 2025. DM Charmain Naidoo is a journalist and media strategist.


The Citizen
3 days ago
- The Citizen
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Fellow singer and now TV host Kelly Clarkson advised Taylor to re-record her first album so she can own the new material. @taylorswift13 just a thought, U should go in & re-record all the songs that U don't own the masters on exactly how U did them but put brand new art & some kind of incentive so fans will no longer buy the old versions. I'd buy all of the new versions just to prove a point 💁🏼♀️ July 13, 2019 'It's something that I'm very excited about doing because my current contract says that starting November 2020—so next year—I can record albums one through five all over again. I'm very excited about it because I think that artists deserve to own their work. I just feel very passionately about that,' she said in a 2019 interview, confirming the re-recording of the work. Later on that year, the American Music Awards (AMA) awarded Taylor the Artist of the Decade award, which meant she'd have to perform some of her old material. 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The South African
5 days ago
- The South African
Taylor Swift reclaims her music masters in landmark deal
Taylor Swift, after years of public battles, heartbreak, and determination, now finally owns her first six albums. This move is a masterclass in standing up for your rights, regardless of how powerful your opponents are. 'All of the music I've ever made now belongs to me,' Taylor announced. 'I've been bursting into tears of joy… ever since I found out this is happening.' The saga began in 2019. Scooter Braun, a music mogul, bought Taylor's former record label, Big Machine, according to the BBC . With it, he got the rights to her first six albums. Imagine working for years, only to see someone else reap the rewards of your creations. Taylor called out Braun for 'incessant, manipulative bullying.' She felt betrayed. 'After 20 years of people dangling the carrot in front of me and then yanking it away, I almost gave up hope that it could ever happen,' she wrote. But she never gave up. In music, whoever owns the master recording controls how the songs are used. Want your hit in a movie, advert, or video game? The master owner decides. Taylor always kept her publishing rights, but without the masters, she couldn't call the shots. 'I do want my music to live on… but I only want that if I own it,' she told Billboard. The price for freedom wasn't small. When Big Machine first sold, the catalogue fetched $300 million (about R5.6 billion). Rumours swirled that Taylor paid up to $1 billion (over R18.7 billion), but insiders say that's too high. Still, it's a staggering sum—proof that music is big business. Taylor Swift didn't just sit back. She fought back. She started re-recording her old albums, releasing 'Taylor's Versions' packed with bonus tracks. Fans loved them. 'The success of the Eras tour is why I was able to buy back my music,' she said. That tour raked in over $2 billion (about R37.5 billion) in ticket sales. This victory is a beacon for artists everywhere, including in South Africa. 'Every time a new artist tells me they negotiated to own their master recordings. I'm reminded of how important it was for all of this to happen,' Taylor said. Let us know by leaving a comment below, or send a WhatsApp to 060 011 021 1. Subscribe to The South African website's newsletters and follow us on WhatsApp, Facebook, X and Bluesky for the latest news.