Tom Service’s highly recommendable contemporary composers series ended this week with “the most divisive figure of them all:” Karlheinz Stockhausen.

But what made this composer so polarizing? Service provides a link to a very entertaining YouTube-channel where we can experience the composer’s “infectious combination of charisma, blazing intellect and force of will” and points out the importance of intuition and experience in his music.

You can read the full article on Tom Service’s Blog.

The New York Philharmonic moves into the Park Avenue Armory in New York tonight for a Philharmonic 360 concert – “Spatial Music from Mozart’s Don Giovanni to Stockhausen’s Gruppen”.

The 55,000-square-foot Thompson Drill Hall (photo) has been turned into a unique concert space, with the orchestra in three groups surrounding the audience.

Alan Gilbert, Magnus Lindberg and Matthias Pintscher conduct the New York Philharmonic.

Programme:
Pierre Boulez: Rituel in memoriam Bruno Maderna
Mozart: Finale of Act I from Don Giovanni
Karlheinz Stockhausen: Gruppen
Charles Ives: The Unanswered Question

Alex Ross reports that the New York Philharmonic will be performing Stockhausen's Gruppen in June 2012 at the Park Avenue Armory in New York. The concert also includes Boulez' Rituel in memoriam Bruno Maderna.

The concert is not on the NYPhil website yet, but we'll keep our eyes peeled.