Classical Music
Nearly three decades after he left us, Bernstein’s music seems to be in good hands and anything but forgotten. And his larger musical influence strongly endures.
A winning reminder of Sir Neville Marriner’s impressive stylistic range as a conductor, a fine recording of a much-loved and -played Richard Strauss tone poem, and a striking, powerful presentation of the string quartets of James MacMillan.
Aspects of America, from the Oregon Symphony and its music director Carlos Kalmar, is at once superbly played, astutely programmed, and aesthetically necessary.
Jonathan Nott does right by Ligeti and Herbert Blomstedt does the same for Mozart. You didn’t know that Evgeny Kissin, the piano virtuoso, was also a composer? Join the club.
A triumphant disc from A Far Cry, some fresh thinking from Giuseppe Sinopoli and the Israel Philharmonic, and Thomas Hampson, a great purveyor of American song, focuses on Chicago.
Overall, this was classy cello playing. Colin Carr relied on, and brought out, the inherent architecture of the Bach suites.
Four new albums: the standouts include the finest Andris Nelsons/BSO Shostakovich collaboration to date and the Neave Trio’s wonderful new French Moments.
Colin Carr supplied an extraordinary performance of Bach’s Six Cello Suites.
Conductor Aapo Häkkinen explores Robert Schumann’s writing for chorus;Andrew Manze caps off his three-volume Mendelssohn symphony survey with a glorious performance of the oddball Symphony no. 2.
Strong discs from Edward Gardner and the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Francois-Xavier Roth and his Paris-based period-instrument ensemble Les Siècles, and the National Orchestral Institute Philharmonic, an ad-hoc summer orchestra comprised of some of the U.S.’s finest conservatory musicians.
Theater Commentary: Theater for Young Audiences — What Role Can It Play In Saving Our Democracy?