A really excellent essay by @timgrierson.bsky.social on art, artists, awareness, nostalgia, & selective blindness. Bravo 👏 www.avclub.com/leaving-neve...

Excellent Friday the 13th listening. Eeee!

"Take a second and think about it. Would you rather really grow from an experience of actually doing some work and critically thinking about the things you're writing or talking about, or just taking nothing away from it and just use a robot?" www.npr.org/2026/01/28/n...

This Is The Way

Ties directly into the continued dominance of the Mar-a-Lago aesthetic.

"Nostalgia is not a strategy." www.youtube.com/watch?v=uStu...

I learned so much about music & writing from the work of Andrew Clements. It seems unreal he's gone. #RIP www.theguardian.com/music/2026/j...

What is the shooting of an unarmed protester in a stopped car by masked thugs if not political violence? What about them blocking her access to a doctor or first responders? Where's the NYT op-ed for Renee Good doing politics the right way?

This is why hating and mocking AI relentlessly and publicly is vital work.

Not regretting my decision to post-secondary teaching for a second. I've been saying this for years, and it's been like screaming into a void.

Very much related to this. thelocal.to/investigatin...

Point here being: slop will continue slopping, and that slop is contingent on theft, nonconsensuality, and exploited labor.

Discount veg: excellent for soups/chowders/pasta sauces. Favourite: Roughly chop peppers-eggplant-zucchini; place in roasting tin (w lid); add a bit of oil + salt + mix. Roast in 375C oven 90-120 min, turning a few times. Remove to stovetop. Add veg stock/dairy/boiled water; mash / blend; add s-p.

Yikes so much bot traffic today/this week... is it me? (Maybe it's me.)

The logical endpoint of decades-long focus on STEM & not humanities/arts/literature.

This is brilliant

Dear pro-AI students

Opera, Ozzy (Osbourne), Susan Sontag, grunge – & how I marked the tenth anniversary of my mother's passing: www.theoperaqueen.com/2025/10/08/e...

This is excellent.

AI, do my laundry & cleaning so I can write. #sigh

Dear post secondary-institutions:

On opera, singing, camaraderie, real connections, the big four human emotions, embracing your past, and... maybe Wotan just wants a coffee? #music My conversation with bass-baritone Nicholas Brownlee: www.theoperaqueen.com/2025/08/19/n...

😱 !

"A good score is [...] like a map. But sometimes the map changes, or the things you notice on the map change once you’ve been on the actual terrain..." On Fauré, flexibility, drama, & working on Pénélope in Munich: my chat with conductor Susanna Mälkki www.theoperaqueen.com/2025/08/12/s... #music

#RIP director Bob Wilson (1941-2025). An utterly singular talent. (Photo: from Act 2 of Turandot, Teatro Real; by Javier del Real)

Speaking with bass-baritone Gerald Finley was a real pleasure: history (Joseph Rouleau); inspiration (German art song); Canadiana (mosquitoes) -- and he was so great in his Munich recital recently. My new feature for The Globe & Mail: www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/article... #music

Seriously excellent conversations this week, with conductor Susanna Mälkki & bass-baritone Nicholas Brownlee – about various mythologies, ideas on theatre & music, & so much more. Coming soon to theoperaqueen.com.

Soo I’m talking about this a lot with people!!! Because people don’t have tastes or arousals any more it seems , they have “positions” they think they win with

NEW: Pay-for-play; demons, staging reality "as it is", remembering Pierre Audi, and much more. My latest: www.theoperaqueen.com/2025/06/21/r... #music

"Du wirst alle Erfahrungen brauchen können, denn wenn es nur die Musik gibt, worin liegt dann der Sinn?" www.br-klassik.de/aktuell/news...

🎯

Enraging

"... the inequities are baked in, and that's the point." jill.substack.com/p/the-proble...

Ich war, wo ich von je gewesen, wohin auf je ich geh': im weiten Reich der Weltennacht.

Show us your writing process in a gif

"...this is how the ultra-rich think: if you aestheticize the environment hard enough, maybe people won’t notice you’re torching it." Very brilliant writing by Louis Pisano. louispisano.substack.com/p/the-bezos-...

Dear students (& most post-secondary institutions in Canada tbh):

Pay writers. Pay writers. Pay writers. Pay writers. Readers – & artists – get the benefit of expertise through paid work. This goes triple for arts writing. Not paying writers perpetuates an inequality that already plagues so much of the classical music world. Again: writing is WORK. Pay writers.

"I am allergic to the suggestion that music needs to be attached to claims about something else to be worthwhile – be that its ability to make money, or aid focus (and productivity), or to optimise health. Can’t it just be for its own sake?" www.theguardian.com/music/2025/a...

NEW: my conversation with tenor John Daszak – on singing, showmanship, conductors, directors, his Ukrainian roots, singing Russian works, & much more: www.theoperaqueen.com/2025/04/09/j... #opera

This firmly includes educational institutions also, many of whom have (alarmingly) swallowed the AI hype whole.

When real financial literacy becomes a thing #LOL

V uncomfortable with seeing AI referrers at my website (i.e. perplexity ai) -- is there a way to limit this, or am I hoping against hope? cc @chronotope.aramzs.xyz

#RIP Sofia Gubaidulina, one of the true greats x youtu.be/xxfk2SZh8do?...

Ahead of today's BBC Radio 3 broadcast of Der Wald, here's a good interview from 2023 with @jkaconductor.bsky.social -- on Smyth, scores, and capturing "that fizz of excitement": www.gramophone.co.uk/features/art...

Recommended listening.

"Meine Kollegen und ich leben gleichsam in einer Enklave und viele von uns vergessen, wie viele Menschen noch nie in einem klassischen Konzert waren." www.concerti.de/interviews/j...

Excellent exchange today w soprano Jacquelyn Stucker – on singing, acting, her upcoming Metropolitan Opera appearance (as Mozart's Countess) & her role in the soon-to-premiere new opera We Are The Lucky Ones at Dutch National Opera. Conversation coming soon to theoperaqueen.com (Photo: Dario Acosta)

A brilliant & very timely interview (auf Deutsch) on Russia, Ukraine, music-making, conflict, culture, choice, & survival via @vanmagazin.bsky.social : van-magazin.de/mag/oleh-kur... ((Photo © Rebecca ter Braak)