Classical Music
The Takács Quartet have won the kind of acclaim that most chamber groups can only dream of, and their concert in Boston made their enviable reputation understandable.
Read MoreWhy, Rita Costanzi asks incredulously, do harpists, albeit occasionally, marry other harpists: “Does the word masochist mean anything to you?”
Read MoreWith “In Seven Days,” Thomas Adés seems to have developed a musical language that’s complex yet not forbidding: there’s no sense that his music is weighed down by expectations of the past, even as he freely refers to archaic compositional forms.
Read MoreTeams of string coaches were deployed to make this quartet of actors look like they knew what they are doing with their instruments, but no critic has noticed how completely unrelated the motions of their left hands — finger placement and vibrato — are to the music that is played, with the exception of Christopher Walken, who looks like he is playing his cello correctly and producing real music.
Read MoreHandel & Haydn Society captured all of this and then some with a vigorous, focused performance that was a marvel of controlled fury.
Read MoreSaariaho’s music is often lush and vibrant, to be sure, but it also can lose track of its musical purpose and meander excessively from time to time. Not so in “Circle Map.”
Read MoreConsidered by some to be a guardian of ancient music, Jordi Savall has inspired adulation for a variety of reasons, but in the end it’s because he plays the viol or viola da gamba better than just about anyone else alive.
Read MoreNovember features a number of visits from celebrated performers, from Kelly O’Connor and Thomas Adés to the Takács Quartet. Music for Food also presents its second concert/benefit of the season.
Read MoreThat Symphony Hall was probably a third empty is inexplicable, but, if you missed any of these concerts, it’s truly your loss. These were among the BSO’s benchmark performances of the last decade.
Read MoreIf you think contemporary music is the domain of fusty academics and has no bearing on (or relationship to) the outside world, you really need to check out “Canzonas Americanas.”
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