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point being this is probably one of the last places you'd find a published racist review of a classical Venezuelan musician
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Point is - in which paper here would one find something like this in these days? No rhetorical question, I'd love to read one of the last years. I'm talking just about papers, not about Herr Neumann having a chat in the opera foyer.
The terrific efforts of El Sistema are very admired here, for what I ever read. Mind you that one of these Sistema children is now a bass player in the BPO. The astonishing aspect about it was less his origin, than his age. Bloody 17 y.o.! Plus he was invited by the BPO, which is fairly unusual. To light up this Kafkaesque thread a bit, here's a bit eye candy for the female warriors in this discussion:
(Mind you, ladies: this is
EXACTLY that sort of guy, who won't take out the garbage later on!)
Racially motivated incidents are a far too serious topic to conjugate it up and down with the same old stereotypes without any incident or basis. Even determined dudamelniks might agree, that any sort of harsh critic on Dudamel (be it booing, be it a damning review) must not be motivated by sinister motivations: he is young (not even 30!), he received the total marketing make up of Deutsche Grammophon, he got the job in L.A. - he has to substantiate a lot! Younger conductors can have terrible times (Franz Welser-Möst vs. London Philharmonics in the 90's), it's more than interesting, that the far majority of his performances here received very friendly reviews.
Maybe the one who booed was the disappointed guy who stole the wallet!
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I would also remind you that Berlin is not equal to all Germany and not Austria and certainly not Bayreuth (which is its own little bed of Wagnermania, and Wagner does not equal all opera either!).
It is a large metropolitan European capital and at any time you are going to have a lot of non-Germans in the audience at one of the big three opera houses. So who knows who booed -- it could have been a Brit! I've also been warned "Don't think all of Germany is as cool [read: progressive] as Berlin;" point being this is probably one of the last places you'd find a published racist review of a classical Venezuelan musician. Perhaps Misch can weigh in?
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True, Berlin was, is and will be a red town. Mind you the NSDAP in Berlin consisted of less than 500 members at the end of the 20's, the Nazis had to send their sharpest tool, Goebbels, to Berlin. Somehow Berlin became the symbol of all the bad sites in German history, it's totally wrong. Very vital and cosmopolitan place.
27-03-09, 11:17 AM
[Just so there's no misunderstanding, I'm NOT referring to any present company when I remark upon this phenomenon!]
It was, in fact, a pleasant communique recently received that re-invigorated my curiosity. 
