Classical Music
Some substantial works by composer Felix Mendelssohn remain overlooked.
Cellist Nicolas Altstaed’s recording features a fascinating pairing of pieces by Salonen and Ravel, a stirring reminder of the mysterious powers of common origins and creative invention. Don’t miss it.
I have heard many recordings of Bach’s work, but none had the vibrancy of what I heard in Jeremy Denk’s Sunday concert.
A new recording of Ferdinando Paër’s Leonora gives us characters we love (or love to hate) in a fresh light
A major contribution to the recorded repertory, making clear just how effective Saint-Saëns’s The Yellow Princess could be on stage, its nowadays objectionable title repudiated by its varied and nuanced approach to the evocation of the exotic.
I am beginning to suspect that Franz Schreker was the most effective of the many semi-forgotten opera composers who were active in the German lands during the first decades of the twentieth century (that is, ones less well known today than Strauss, Berg, and Kurt Weill).
Marvelously accomplished albums from American mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato and Canadian soprano Barbara Hannigan.
Two first-rate albums: pianist Lara Downes successfully reconsiders Scott Joplin and the New York Youth Symphony plays Florence Price and others with panache.
A varied buffet of fresh musical experiences from recent decades and from the mid-1700s.
Music Commentary: Jean Sibelius’s Violin Concerto — The Universal Concerto?
Sibelius’s Violin Concerto is almost something of a phenomenon now: in just eight months, I’ve heard it played by three different fiddlers — Baiba Skride, Lisa Batiashvili, and Inmo Yang.
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