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Book Review: The Look of the Sound — The Album Art of Prestige Records

February 19, 2026
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Along with its slew of images — photos, sketches, and ephemera as well as album covers — WAIL offers what amounts to a compelling oral history of the mid-century explosion, not only of recorded jazz but of graphic design and, by extension, a burgeoning New York cultural scene.

Album Review: “Love Life” — Lerner and Weill’s Pioneering 1948 Concept Musical Finally Gets Its First Recording

February 19, 2026
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Lauded in histories of Broadway but rarely performed, “Love Life” proves to be an insightful and effective work of social criticism, nearly eight decades after its premiere.

Arts Remembrance: “Shooting Is the Research” — Frederick Wiseman in His Own Words

February 18, 2026
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To watch a Frederick Wiseman documentary is to see a subject or topic through the filmmaker’s eyes.

Poetry Review: The Art of Letting Go — Gail Mazur’s “World on a String”

February 18, 2026
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The poems in :World on a String” set an example for us all of how to live, to love, to release, and to remember.

Book Review: “The Copywriter” — Of Proust, Pandas, and Poetic Inertia

February 18, 2026
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What stands out for this reader is the humor Daniel Poppick mines from the quotidian.

Jazz Album Review: “American Crow” — Maria Schneider’s Urgent Jazz EP Crows Against Big Tech

February 17, 2026
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Composer and bandleader Maria Schneider is a storyteller, and that’s the best way to approach her music for the first time. You listen like you read a short story, with your full attention, and your imagination synced with all of your senses.

Concert Review: Joy and Virtuosity Meet in “In the Fiddler’s House” at Symphony Hall

February 17, 2026
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Overall, the In the Fiddler’s House concert captured the infectious joy of this wondrous musical genre.

Poetry Review: “Trading Riffs to Slay Monsters” — Song of Pain and Praise

February 17, 2026
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Yusef Komunyakaa and Laren McClung’s goal — achieved through tag-team lyric utterance — is a noble spirituality.

Musician Interview: George Steel on Launching a New Thursday-night Series at the Gardner Museum with Steve Reich’s landmark “Music for 18 Musicians”

February 17, 2026
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“I would say Music for 18  Musicians was probably the most influential piece of American concert music of the last quarter of the 20th century. You could conceivably stretch that to the most influential piece of American concert music since it was written.”

Television Review: “The ‘Burbs,” A Suburban Snooze — Fangless and Flat

February 16, 2026
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Considering its hard-to-fault premise, Peacock’s “The ‘Burbs” should be a lot more fun than it is.

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