Buzz

MEDIA COVERAGE OF “A TORONTO SYMPHONY”

• BBC News - Tod Machover: composer’s social media symphony for Toronto (VIDEO)
• CBC – A Toronto Symphony (AUDIO)
• NPR – Scott Simon - Sounds Of Toronto’s Streets Liven Symphony (AUDIO)
• Global News – Full Story – An Urban Symphony (VIDEO)
• The Guardian - Tod Machover: how to crowdsource a symphony
• Toronto Life - The Argument: Musical visionary Tod Machover crowd-sourced a symphony for Toronto—now other cities want one too
• International Arts Manager - Electric dreams: Composer and inventor Tod Machover on music and participatory practice
• Symphony – Going Public (on crowdsourced symphonies) Spring 2013 issue
• Discovery Channel – Daily Planet features “A Toronto Symphony” (VIDEO, starting at 3:00)
• Global News - The Crowd Sourced Symphony: An Aural Tribute to Toronto
• Musical Toronto - News flash: CN Tower to make Toronto Symphony Orchestra début on Saturday night
• Toronto NOW - Tod Machover: What does Toronto sound like anyway?
• Toronto Star - Toronto gets the symphony treatment
• Canadian Jewish News - New symphony features the sounds of Toronto
• Musical Toronto - A Toronto Symphony composer Tod Machover keeps adding interaction weeks before premiere
• Boston Globe - Sounds of a city: A new template for collaboration in Toronto
• Toronto Life – Found Sounds
• Musical Toronto - Toronto school children become engaged composers in Toronto Symphony experiment
• Smart Planet - Q&A: Tod Machover, composer and inventor
• CBC Music - Tod Machover’s music app lets you be part of A Toronto Symphony
• Wired UK - Watch Tod Machover’s full Wired 2012 talk about his Toronto symphony
• PBS MediaShift - How Tod Machover and the City of Toronto Are Creating a Symphony
• The Guardian - The orchestra as mass collaboration
• CBC - Help Tod Machover compose A Toronto Symphony
• CBC Metro Morning – Toronto’s Sound
• Torontoist - Tod Machover Crowdsources a Symphony
• Toronto Life - Guitar Hero brain Tod Machover calls on Torontonians to help compose a musical portrait of the city
• Toronto Standard - What Does Toronto Sound Like?
• Toronto Star - Composer Tod Machover invites Torontonians to create music for the TSO
• Toronto Globe and Mail - TSO to perform a Toronto-made symphony next year
• Toronto Star - Toronto to get its own symphony at the TSO

“Death and the Powers” a Finalist for 2012 Pulitzer Prize in Music

“Death and the Powers doesn’t point the way to a new era of opera. It’s there. Now.” – Philadelphia Inquirer

“Machover is a remarkable composer.  [His] technological inventions in giving to sounds, through electronics, new sonorities, new eloquence, have been widely and amply acclaimed.  But I’d like to stress what a good opera composer he is, bringing the ‘traditional’, necessary skills to a far from traditional work. Machover has a command of expressive vocal gesture.  He sets words sensitively, with a feeling for the natural weight, stress and length of syllables rare today.  Voices and instrumental/electronic sound are well balanced.  The final duet is a moving modern addition to the great line of father-daughter exchanges: Boccanegra-Amelia, Rigoletto-Gilda, even Wotan- Brünnhilde.  This was a grand, rich, deeply serious new opera, presented by a team with manifold coherent accomplishments.” — Opera Magazine 1/11

GENERAL FEATURES

• Fanfare Magazine – Hypercollaborations: An Interview with Tod Machover
• Wired UK - Tod Machover invents instruments, robot operas –- oh, and Guitar Hero
• WBUR – Visionaries: “A Musical Innovator”
• Los Angeles Times Musical therapy is making breakthroughs
• Cannes Lions Seminar on Technology and Creativity (video)
• Prague Quadrennial Magazine – A Composer at the Edge of Sound
• The Guardian (UK) – The MIT factor: celebrating 150 years of maverick genius
• BBC’s Music Matters in Boston – April 23, 2011
• David Harrington of Kronos Quartet speaks about Chomsky-Machover project
• Variety: Smart instruments: Musician’s tools play along with you
• Tod Machover on NPR’s Morning Edition
• TEDx Aldeburgh – a rough guide
• Classical Music Magazine on Aldeburgh project
• Tod’s work at the MIT Media Lab was featured in China’s Lifeweek Magazine
• New York Times Opinionator – On Future Performance
• NewMusicBox – Tod Machover: Technology and the Future of New Music

REVIEWS

• New Creations Festival – Jeux Deux
• Collected reviews of “…but not simpler…”
• Collected reviews of “Hyperstring Trilogy

REVIEWS OF DEATH AND THE POWERS – Selected press quotes Chicago Opera Theater press quotes

• Opera Magazine – Death and the Powers, review by Andrew Porter
• Chicago Tribune – COT’s dazzling ‘robot opera’ poses provocative new questions
• The New York Review of Science Fiction – Death and the Powers
• MAL Music – Death and the Powers
• A tale of two operas: ‘Vincent’ and ‘Death’
• Examiner – Concert Review: Chicago Opera Theater’s Death and the Powers is magnificent
• The Tech – OPERA REVIEW The dawn of the future dramatic art
• The Contrapuntist – Review: DEATH AND THE POWERS, THE ROBOTS’ OPERA by Tod Machover at Chicago Opera Theater
• Chicago Classical Review – COT’s “Death and the Powers” proves a dazzling, thought-provoking multimedia experience
• New City Stage - Review: Death and the Powers/Chicago Opera Theater
• Chicago Critic - Death and the Powers
• Chicago Sun-Times – “Robot opera less than meets the eye”
• Chicago Now – Review “Death and The Powers”: Life-Altering Experience
• Beyond Words – No Dearth of Power (Part 1), Part 2,  Part 3
• Media Tech Connection – High tech Chicago opera takes a unique futuristic approach
• Philadelphia Inquirer – Monsters & immortals – seriously
• Wall Street Journal – Full-Bodied Arias in a Postorganic World
• Financial Times - Death and the Powers, Cutler Majestic Theatre, Boston
• Boston Phoenix – Tod Machover’s Death and the Powers
• Cambridge Community TV – Death and the Powers: the Robots’ Opera
• Time Out Boston – Review: Death and the Powers: The Robots’ Opera
• Variety Reviews – Death and the Powers: The Robots’ Opera
• Boston Globe – Second Life: ‘Death and the Powers’ from ART
• Boston Herald -Machover’s ‘Death’ is to die for
• Cape Cod Times – ‘Robots Opera’ brought to life through lights, sound
• Opera News – Review of Death and the Powers
• Opéra Magazine (France) – Review of Death and the Powers (pdf)
• Musical America – “An Unlikely Confluence of Powers”
• International Herald Tribune – “Opera With Atmosphere of Brave New World”
• Le Monde -Des robots et des hommes dans le dernier opéra de Tod Machover
• Ventimiglia: Death & the Powers: Flash d’Immagini dal Futuro

FEATURE COVERAGE OF DEATH AND THE POWERS

• Technology Review - Opera, Remixed: My UROP in the Opera of the Future lab
• BBC World Service – The Strand March 15, 2011
• Discovery Channel Canada – Daily Planet feature on Death and the Powers
• Chicago Tonight – WTTW – March 31, 2011
• Chicago Tribune -Cue the robots – opera for the digital era arrives at COT
• Chicago Classical Review – Machover’s “robot opera” to kick off Chicago Opera Theater’s season
• StyleBoston WCVB-TV Plugged In: Feature on Death and the Powers
• The Boston Musical Intelligencer – Machover, Touching with Sound
• The Boston Phoenix - Preview: Love and Robots in Death and the Powers: The Robots’ Opera
• Boston Globe -Powered up and programmed to perform: Chorus of robots in a starring role
• Variety – Opera of the future: Robotic and music combo gives audience something new
• NPR Science Friday – High-Tech Opera Features Robots as Stars
• The Atlantic – “Guitar Hero Goes to the Opera: How the video game’s godfather plans to democratize one of the oldest musical art forms”
• NPR On Point with Tom Ashbrook - “Robot Opera and Immortality”
• Christian Science Monitor – “A thoroughly modern opera: Robots enter a new frontier“
• New Vilna Review – “Music, Technology and Immortality: an Interview with Composer and MIT Professor, Tod Machover”
• The Economist video: Inventing the Opera of the Future
• The Economist – “A Technology maestro”
• PlumTV – “Masters of Innovation: Creativity Wired”
• New Scientist – Musical inventor: The robotic set of my opera emotes
• Buhnen Technische Rundschau – Death and the Powers: A Robot Opera (in German)
  • English translation
• New Vilna Review - “Pinsky and Machover Bring Shadow and Light to NCAC Event”
• Jewish Advocate – “A meeting of mavericks of poetry and music“
• l’Ordinateur individuel-SVM – “Tod Machover: Créateur d’Hyperinstruments“
• Revista Galileu (Brazil) – “Opéra Hero” (pdf)
• The Sunday Times (London) – “Opera gets a Machover”
• NPR – “Back Stage at A High-Tech Opera”
• WBUR – “Q&A: Opera Of The Future, Starring (What Else?) Robots!”
• MIT News – “Disembodied performance”
• Popular Science - MIT’s Opera of the Future Features Singing Walls and Dancing Robots
• Playboy – “2010 Honor Roll List”
• Bowers & Wilkins – “The future of surround sound”
• Big Think – A First in Theater: Robots Performing Opera
• Wired – “Orchestral manoeuvres with ‘Death and the Powers’”
• La Gazette de Monaco – Monaco et le MIT
• BU Today – “Robot, of Thee I Sing: Pinsky’s words help put technology in innovative opera.”
• BBC News – “Is music going back to its roots?“
• Nature – Interview with Tod Machover
• Boston Magazine – “Genius Composition: How professor Tod Machover and a group of MIT scientists are creating the future of music. “
• Smithsonian – “Tod Machover on Composing Music by Computer“
• Scienceline – Echoes from the Future of Opera
• NPR - Tod Machover’s New Opera

MEDIA RELEASES

• PRWeb – Robotic Opera Wrestles with Love and Death
• PRWeb – “New Robot Opera Explodes Boundaries”
• Promotional Trailer
• Kirshbaum Demler – Death and the Powers: The Latest Opera from Tod Machover

MORE COVERAGE OF DEATH AND THE POWERS

• Chicago Tribune - Adventurous times for classical music lover
• Chicago Classical Review - The Top 10 Performances of 2011
• high SCORE New Music Center - The medium is the message in Tod Machover’s opera ‘Death and the Powers
• Eternal Arigato, Mr. Roboto
• Medill Reports – ‘Death and the Powers’ takes operatic look at immortality
• Examiner – ‘Operabots’ spice up MIT’s ‘Death and the Powers’ opera
• Blast – Stage Review: “Death and the Powers: The Robots’ Opera” from the A.R.T.
• Metro – ‘Death and the Powers’: Farewell to conventional theater
• PC World – MIT Robots Take Stage In New Opera
• City’s Best Boston – ‘Death and the Powers’: A Robot Opera By Tod Machover
• Robot Living – Death And The Powers: The Robots’ Opera
• Wicked Local – Waltham resident’s opera has tech in tune
• Chicago Journal – “Musical Machinery: Will machines get smarter than people? New opera sings the question”
• Stuff at Night – “Robo Roles”
• Musical America Yearly Directory
• New Vilna Review – An Interview with Robert Pinsky
• Duran Audio – Death and the Powers Monaco: MIT teams up with AXYS for a Royal Premiere in Monaco
• Animation World Network – A Night at the High-Tech Opera
• Bowers & Wilkins – Tod Machover’s robotic opera premieres in Monte Carlo
• Boosey & Hawkes – Machover: Death and the Powers premiere in Monte Carlo
• Vimeo – iPad Opera live mix “Death and the Powers”
• David V. Lu’s blog – Operabots are Go: Death and the Powers
• Post Position/Nick Monfort – Death and the Powers arrives
• TED Blog - Tod Machover talks about his new robotic opera, Death and the Powers
• GearLog – The Singularity. In Opera Form. With Robots.
• Cool-O-Rama -Death and the Powers World Premiere
• Slice of MIT - Death and the Powers: The Future of Music
• Monaco City Out – Death and the Powers to premiere in Monte Carlo
• Consulate General of Monaco - Monaco’s Fall Energy Summit with M.I.T. to Focus on the Future
• World Science Festival - Death and the Powers is here
• Gizmodo - Robot Opera Is Less Madame Butterfly, More “Oops I Dropped a Butterfly Screw”
• Playbill – Diane Paulus and Karole Armitage Collaborating on Death and the Powers Opera
• Brian Dickie’s blog: More about Death and the Powers
• Fast Company – 5 High-Tech Operas that Radically Transform the Stage
• Chicago Tribune -Opera Theater puts innovation on calendar
• A.R.T. – Death and the Powers Workshop
• Aspen Institute (video) – Transforming Music: Tod Machover
• Networked Music -Hyperinstruments, Sonitronics, and Musical Propulsion

TWITTER BUZZ!

SallaSavolainen:  anyone in america, go see an opera called “Death and the Powers” !!! i was in the world premiere in monaco. just fyi. GO !

carolbeggy: Chicago Opera Theater’s Brian Dickie is still beaming from Death And the Powers premiere in Monaco. See you in March:

cacestlamusique:  DEATH and the POWERS in Monte Carlo, Monaco: An outstanding and robotic world premiere!

SELECTED ARTICLES ABOUT TOY SYMPHONY

• New York Times - ARTS ONLINE; From a Few Colored Lines Come the Sounds of Music
• Joshua Bell on Composition, Hyperviolins,  and the Future of Music
• Boston Phoenix – Child’s Play