Jonathan Blumhofer
What’s clear is that something needs to give and, after nearly thirty-five years of labor-management harmony, it’s apparent that the Met’s problems start at the top.
To judge from the BSO’s responsive playing and the audience’s enthusiastic responses, director-designate Andris Nelsons can’t do much wrong these days. Of course, a decade ago, neither could James Levine.
The emphasis of Monadnock’s coming concerts is, quite happily, American music by composers with strong ties to New England. It’s hard to imagine a more appropriate place to hear such fare or a better group of musicians to play it.
Classical CD Review: San Francisco Symphony’s “West Side Story” — A Brashly Invigorating Performance
The music of West Side Story sounds grippingly urgent and colorful as ever in the hands of one of America’s best orchestras and conductors.
Cuarteto Casals brings out Mozart’s playfulness, Luzerner Sinfonieorchester delivers a solid Dvorak’s Sixth, and James Brawn continues to brilliantly play Beethoven’s piano sonatas.
The Commonwealth Lyric Theater has again brought to the fore an underperformed, unfamiliar masterpiece well worth getting to know. Good for them and lucky for us.
Thanks to CLT’s pluck and commitment to underperformed repertoire, Boston audiences have the chance to check out the rarely performed opera “Mozart and Salieri” for themselves.
Howard Hersh hails from northern California, and, as in John Adams’ “City Noir,” the music on Hersh’s album, “Angels and Watermarks,” embraces polyglot West Coast culture in various ways.
While 1962’s Symphony owes a clear debt to Stravinsky and Britten (especially its last movement), it sounds like nobody but Irving Fine. This is a score that orchestras ought to be lining up to play.
Classical Music Commentary: Closing Thoughts on the Discovery Ensemble
For those who got to know the Discovery Ensemble over its truncated life, this was a vital ensemble, one that regularly embodied all that’s good about classical music.
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