Music

During the coronavirus pandemic, millions of people are turning to streaming music services for entertainment and distraction — but how are streaming numbers holding up?At first glance, they seem strong. This week, the Philadelphia rapper Lil Uzi Vert’s “Eternal Atake” holds the top spot on Billboard’s album chart for a second week, with the equivalent of 247,000 album sales in the United States, including 349 million streams — barely down from last week, thanks in part to a “deluxe” version of the LP that included 14 additional songs. And a brand-new album by the Weeknd is shaping up to be a hit, racking up more than 100 million streams around the world on Friday, its first day out.But there are also early signs that the streaming market overall may be down slightly — or, at least, that people’s listening patterns have shifted during the crisis. In the United States, the total number of streams of the top 200 songs on Spotify last week dropped 14 percent from the week before, according to publicly available data from the service; around the world, the decline was 11 percent.Yet that is just the top 200 songs. Older pop hits have been gaining traction as people look to comfort music, and niches like family music have been swelling during the crisis. As the data comes in, it may take several weeks for these trends to become fully clear.On Billboard’s chart, the former One Direction member Niall Horan opened at No. 4 with his second solo album, “Heartbreak Weather.” Lil Baby’s “My Turn” is No. 2, Bad Bunny’s “YHLQMDLG” holds at No. 3 and Jhené Aiko’s “Chilombo” fell three spots to No. 5.The “Frozen 2” soundtrack — which had opened at No. 1 in December — rose eight spots to No. 10 after Disney released the film early to its streaming platform, Disney Plus, “surprising families with some fun and joy during this challenging period,” as the company said. More

The New York Philharmonic canceled the remainder of its season on Monday, bowing to the reality that the coronavirus pandemic will silence large-scale performances in the city for months to come.The orchestra said that it was anticipating a loss of roughly $10 million in revenue because of the decision, and that its endowment had declined by about 14 percent since the crisis began.“There’s nothing I can compare this to,” Deborah Borda, the Philharmonic’s president and chief executive, said in an interview. “The human toll and the possible economic ramifications are simply stunning, and they’re simply not known yet. We don’t have a playbook for this. We’re inventing it as we go along.”In canceling the season, which was to have run through the second week of June and included a European tour in the beginning of May, the Philharmonic said that its musicians’ health benefits would be maintained through the end of their current contract, in September.But pay will be reduced in stages. The musicians will earn their full salaries through March, then receive the orchestra’s base pay (roughly $3,000 per week) in April and 75 percent of that amount (about $2,200 per week) in May. They and the Philharmonic will meet as conditions progress to determine compensation for June and beyond.“We don’t know what this is going to look like,” said the trombonist Colin Williams, the chairman of the musicians’ negotiating committee. “Everything changes every 12 hours. So we’re going to have to get together and reassess.”“We’re all coming together in this unprecedented situation to make sure the institution is as insulated as possible,” he added. “But we’re very grateful for the leadership of Deborah Borda and the board that they’re trying to take care of the musicians.”Ms. Borda said that the relatively small size of the orchestra made it possible to maintain wages, even if reduced — compared with far larger organizations like the Metropolitan Opera, which will not compensate its unionized orchestra, chorus and stagehands after this month, beyond health benefits.“The orchestra is our family,” Ms. Borda said. “It’s 100 people. It’s a different situation than the Met, which has close to 1,000 union employees.”She said the orchestra would be working this week on a plan to further reduce operating costs, including potential pay cuts for senior management and administrative staff. Asked about the possibility of administration layoffs, she said: “I have not finalized that plan yet. The Philharmonic will reopen, and we need to have staff to execute that and put up the fall season.”She added that the orchestra would encourage patrons not to seek refunds for their tickets to canceled performances, which add up to about $1 million in revenue. The Philharmonic is also turning to the challenge of preserving sales for next season, which it said had been strong before the outbreak.“We’ll do all right at fund-raising,” Ms. Borda said. “Of course we’ll take some hits. But I’m more concerned about: Will people buy tickets for next fall?”As part of their agreement with management, the musicians gave broad permission for the dissemination of archival recordings, which will be available through a new portal, NY Phil Plays On (nyphil.org/playson). And every Thursday evening, a past performance will be streamed on Facebook.Ms. Borda was pessimistic about the fate of the Philharmonic’s outdoor concerts in city parks, scheduled for June, as well as its planned tour of China in the beginning of July, though neither has been canceled. More plausible, though still uncertain, are the orchestra’s performances at the Bravo! Vail Music Festival in Colorado, scheduled for late July.The pandemic’s economic repercussions arrive at a delicate moment, as the Philharmonic and Lincoln Center proceed with long-delayed plans to renovate David Geffen Hall, the orchestra’s home. The project is expected to cost $550 million, of which nearly $200 million remains to be raised, and construction is scheduled to begin in May 2022. Ms. Borda said that meetings about the renovation had continued this month.“We’re going to come through this,” she said. “I don’t see a doom-and-gloom future.” More

The idea took root after Jenni Spinner and her wife, Rebecca Kell, watched videos of Europeans, homebound because of the coronavirus, get on their balconies and sing to raise their spirits in the face of crisis.Wouldn’t it be neat, they mused, if they could get the residents of their Chicago apartment building to do something similar?Ms. Spinner said she figured a handful of friends might be game for a karaoke-style communal singalong to “Livin’ on a Prayer” by Bon Jovi, which they said was easy to sing and well known. Thus, a Facebook event page for a “Chicago-Wide Window Sing-a-Long” on March 21 was born.Three days before it was set to take place, 100 people responded that they either planned to participate or were interested in doing so. By the night of the event, that number had swelled to 19,000.“It kind of blew up,” Ms. Spinner said on Monday. She said she and Ms. Kell were planning another singalong for Saturday; this time the tune will be “ABC” by the Jackson 5. She said they would probably continue the singalongs every Saturday until the crisis has lifted.The impromptu musical performances springing up in some of America’s largest cities appear to have started in Italy, which has been ravaged by the outbreak.Italians sang their national anthem from windows and balconies. Some played the violin and others clanged pots and pans. In Florence, the opera singer Maurizio Marchini serenaded the city from his balcony.Much the same way that Italians joined in song to show their solidarity, Chicago and Dallas residents under stay-at-home orders sang from their apartment windows and balconies.In downtown Dallas on Friday, residents joined in a rendition of the Bill Withers classic “Lean on Me.” In New York City, a video showed apartment tenants singing tunes like “Yellow Submarine” and “My Girl.”In other cities, residents have taken out musical instruments to play, while others have joined “virtual parties” on Instagram hosted by a notable DJ and “attended” by headliners like Drake, Naomi Campbell and Sean Combs.Raising your voice in song with others can be an intimate shared social experience — and the song choice matters little, said Steve Waksman, a professor of music at Smith College in Northampton, Mass., about 100 miles west of Boston.“Why do we sing at sporting events? Why do we sing in churches?” he said on Monday. “There is something distinctly communal about singing in harmony. It’s like touching someone without touching them.”Staying away from others is the prime directive of health officials who are imposing more restrictions to help curb the pandemic.But what better way to connect with others — from a distance — than through song?Colin Boyle, a photojournalist, covered the Chicago singalong for Block Club Chicago. He stood in the courtyard of the U-shaped apartment building of about 50 units where Ms. Spinner and Ms. Kell live.“As it gets close to 7 p.m., people started singing and other people started looking out their windows, ‘What’s going on? What’s this singing?’” he said.A Chicago classic-rock radio station also played the song at the appointed hour.Ms. Spinner said she and Ms. Kell were singing loudly, so she could not be sure how many others participated, but she was struck by how it brought tenants together.She described looking out the window: “There are people you rarely talk to hanging out their window and you go, ‘Hey, there you are.’”For his part, Jon Bon Jovi expressed his support in an Instagram post.“In these trying times I am with you with all of my heart and my soul, sending my love to everybody in Chicago and across America,” he said in the post. “Sing it out, baby. We’re all going to come through this together. Be strong.” More

Aurlus Mabele, the Congolese singer who was called “the king of soukous,” the energetic dance hall music that blends traditional African and Caribbean rhythms with pop and soul, died on Thursday in Paris. He was 66.His death, at a hospital, was confirmed by his daughter, the singer Liza Monet, who said her father had contracted the coronavirus. He had had a stroke a few years ago and had been in fragile health.The coronavirus pandemic has continued to surge in France, with more than 16,000 cases and almost 700 deaths as of Monday.Mr. Mabele rose to fame across Africa in the 1970s and ’80s with his up-tempo hits and high-wattage performances highlighted by spectacular dance moves. In his early 20s he founded the musical group Les Ndimbola Lokole in Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo, gaining popularity with recordings of songs like “Waka Waka” and “Zebola.”After moving to France in the 1980s, he helped start the band Loketo, which means “hips” in Lingala, the language spoken in parts of both the Republic of Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo. As the group’s lead singer, Mr. Mabele worked alongside the renowned guitarist Diblo Dibala.The band thrived on developing and playing soukous, a modern variation of the Congolese rumba music. The word soukous is derived from the French word “secouer,” which means “to shake,” and as Mr. Mabele’s band Loketo gained fame, the genre took hold in dance halls around the world, including in France.Before breaking up in the 1990s, the band recorded bouncy songs like “Extra Ball,” “Douce Isabelle” and “Choc a Distance” and sold millions of albums worldwide. The group toured Africa, Europe, the Caribbean and the United States.Performing in Lower Manhattan at the club S.O.B.’s (for Sound of Brazil) in 1989, Loketo “did what it does best: packed the dance floor,” Peter Watrous wrote in his review in The New York Times.“And while the show had its visual side — two women came out and invited audience members to bump and grind onstage with them — it was the intense interlocking of instruments, feeding off Diblo’s guitar figures, that kept the music effective,” Mr. Watrous added. “Like a mosaic, each little part contributed to a bright, gleaming whole that added up to a wicked dance machine.”Mr. Mabele was born Aurélien Miatsonama on Oct. 24, 1953, in Brazzaville. In addition to Ms. Monet (who was born Alexandra Marie), his survivors include 12 other children.His death drew messages of condolence from around the world. Mav Cacharel, a member of Loketo, said on Facebook, “May the peace and protection of the Lord remain in us.” More

Lil Uzi Vert, perhaps the defining rap star of the past few years, is a cipher, a whirlwind, an alien. An accident of history. A chemical recombination of what hip-hop success sounds, looks and, maybe most importantly, feels like in an era in which the old gatekeepers have been all but sidelined. Breakout hits? One or two. Radio? Not so much. Promotional dog-and-pony show? As if.For a straight-to-the-internet age, he is an unmediated presence — a tough talker and an in-the-clouds dreamer, a visual eccentric who deploys mystery to his advantage. He’s as thrilling in the shadows as in the spotlight. Few artists in any genre inspire more fervor, more devotion, more curiosity, more exuberant joy.It’s been three years since his last album, but raucous festival performances, occasional bursts of social media activity and an online black market in leaked songs reinforce his fame — he is a rapper far more successful than the sum total of his hits.The release of his long-awaited second studio album, “Eternal Atake” — followed a week later by the deluxe edition, subtitled “LUV vs. the World 2,” with a whole new album’s worth of songs — is a relief: Finally, a new data dump. “Eternal Atake” topped the Billboard chart with the most streams for any album since 2018; this week, with numbers for the deluxe edition included, it holds strong at No. 1.ImageLil Uzi Vert’s “Eternal Atake.”Image“Eternal Atake (Deluxe) — LUV vs. the World 2.”Of the rap surrealists of the last few years — Young Thug, Playboi Carti, Gunna and so on — Uzi is perhaps the most pointed, the most familiar with the structuralists who preceded him, and the one who still harbors affection for them. The sometimes blistering, sometimes disorienting “Eternal Atake” resolves these interests. It is part old-fashioned bluster, part flamboyant style exercise, all rowdy thrill.As ever, Uzi’s rapping voice is a whimsical chirp. His melodic approach borrows from pop-punk and R&B as well as the digitally decaying style popularized by Lil Wayne in the late 2000s (though in a couple of places here, he appears to lean back from the affectation, rapping with a more conventional tone). And the production throughout is anarchic: video game and anime soundtracks, plenty of rough-edged low-end, the occasional elegiac pop flourish.His lyrics rely on variations on a handful of themes: the particularities of his sexual escapades, the ease of relieving other men of their girlfriends, his enemies, how proximate his enemies are, the tightness of his pants. (It’s true, and comes up at least twice: “My pants they so tight don’t know if they for her or him,” “I can’t do my dance ’cause my pants, they from France.”)Occasionally, how he talks about these things is surprising. “I look the moon in its face/me and the moon relate” is as psychedelic as any Jim Morrison musing. “Now statistically I can’t win every time/but you know the score prolly like 10 to 3” is a strikingly specific admission of humanity.His most invigorating rapping comes during the first few songs of “Eternal Atake,” one blown-speaker tremor after the next: “Lo Mein,” then “Silly Watch,” and then “Pop,” a kind of free-associative narrative of excess with a casually blunt rhyme scheme. This is Uzi rapping at his most sturdy, using pacing and cadence as much as melody.But that sort of orderliness isn’t an essential part of his arsenal — the typical Uzi song is one filigree after the next, lace not denim. He creates his own funhouse-mirror reality.While the original “Eternal Atake” is an almost wholly solo affair, the deluxe addition includes a raft of collaborations, featuring the similarly melody-melting classmates Chief Keef, Young Thug, Nav and others. The songs here are a more motley mix, but almost as effective as the ones on the main album.To his guests, Uzi offers a worldview to get lost in — he doesn’t cede an inch. For the outsiders, it’s a brief visit to an extraterrestrial land. For Uzi, the Earth never held much meaning.Lil Uzi Vert“Eternal Atake”“Eternal Atake (Deluxe) — LUV vs. the World 2”(Generation Now/Atlantic) More