Classical Music
Discs dedicated to overlooked composers Harold Shapero and Peter Lieberson are well worth your attention. Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra don’t do well by Charles Ives’ final symphony, but the three preceding symphonies fare better.
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A round-up of fresh performances of Beethoven Concerti.
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A welcome political homage to Woody Guthrie, a new recording of Ethel Smyth’s 1931 choral symphony makes a strong case for a full reconsideration of her output, and David Lang’s rejiggering of Beethoven’s Fidelio is both stirring and timeless.
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Telemann’s music here is a delight, often resembling, in style, appeal, and high craftmanship, what we find in Handel’s operas and oratorios.
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Bravo to the Bru Zane folks for this latest triumph! I encourage opera lovers to get to know this treasurable Spanish (or faux-Spanish) work by the pioneering master of nineteenth-century operetta.
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Agrippina (1709), an enormous hit at the Met this past season, proves, by turns, gripping, sardonic, and exquisite.
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Rossini’s Zelmira is a powerhouse opera that features two coloratura tenors and equally demanding roles for soprano and mezzo.
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A world-star soprano, in her magnificent prime at age 36, offers her first recital CD, and you can participate in its online “launch.”
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Lovers of Baroque opera will welcome this release: the first recording — and a very accomplished and communicative one —of an important opera by a pioneer and master.
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Antônio Carlos Gomes’s Lo Schiavo (The Slave) receives its first major recording — and stakes its claim in the repertory.
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The 20th Annual Francis Davis Jazz Critics Poll: The Institution Continues