Jonathan Blumhofer
If there’s anything the U.S. needs in 2026, it’s a recovery of Lincolnesque values—resolve, common sense, understanding, and charity. If such a renewal can get some impetus and sense of direction from a new recording, so much the better.
It’s hard to argue that the decision to forge careers as composer-pianists in the teeth of fin de siècle misogyny and rock-set views of musical gender roles wasn’t an act of defiance.
What have Donald Trump and John F. Kennedy got in common? Besides the office they hold, not much. Certainly not an appreciation for the arts: Trump is to the field what McDonald’s is to fine dining.
Our classical music critics supply their favorites, albums and concerts, from over the past year.
Though none of the works exhibit the stylistic flashiness of Fernande Decruck’s better-known contemporaries, they all suggest a musician of singular—and sometimes idiosyncratic—vision.
The Arvo Pärt compositions here showcase a composer of remarkable stylistic coherence—but never dramatic complacency or creative stasis.
The album ends up paying dividends, not just for fans and students of 20th-century composition, but for anyone interested in the broader reach and global development of classical music in the last century.
Though Sibelius’s music has come to define whatever Finnish music is supposed to sound like, he certainly wasn’t the country’s only active, turn-of-the-20th-century composer.
“Standard Stoppages” is a veritable cornucopia of sounds experienced in multifarious combinations, showcasing a diversity of fresh, inventive, and satisfyingly expressive voices operating at full tilt.
Arts Commentary: The Nelsons Case
Ultimately—and regardless of one’s take on Andris Nelsons as an artist—it’s hard to see how the institution’s long-term interests are served by last week’s developments.
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