Music

Electronic Art Pop Album Review: FKA twigs’ “Caprisongs” — Hypnotic Mixtape

January 31, 2022
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The format may be different, but FKA twigs remains as hypnotic as ever on her album Caprisongs.

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Opera Review: Arabs on the Operatic Stage — Meyerbeer’s 1814 Comic Opera about the Mysterious ‘East’

January 26, 2022
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Long before the often-prejudicial portrayals of Middle Easterners in Hollywood films, opera composers crafted insightful works from 1001 Nights.

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Jazz Album Review: Guitarist Dave Stryker’s “As We Are” — A Successful Synthesis

January 24, 2022
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Unlike a lot of modern jazz releases, this isn’t so much about displaying virtuosity (though all the musicians are virtuosos) as it is about setting a mood and a groove and dancing on top of it.

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Listening During Covid, Part 8: A Remarkable Black British Composer, an American Master, and an Award-Winning Salieri Premiere

January 23, 2022
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CD recordings keep bringing us unexpected treasures, including chamber works by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor and Samuel Adler, and the (by turns) exquisite and powerful opera Armida by Mozart’s contemporary — who was not his murderer — Antonio Salieri.

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Music Album Review: “Dawn FM” — Pop Programming for a Lonely, Postapocalyptic Afterlife

January 22, 2022
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This album is a remarkably mature effort. The Weeknd reflects on his long career while expanding on his earlier accomplishments.

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Opera Album Review: A Scandalous Liaison Makes a Wonderful Opera: Lennox Berkeley’s “Nelson”

January 18, 2022
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Berkeley’s Nelson reinforces my sense that many fine composers of the twentieth century have largely slid off the map because they did not cater to the obsession of many critics and academics with “the New at all cost.”

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Classical Album Review: United Strings of Europe’s “Renewal”

January 16, 2022
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A young ensemble, the USE is a technically accomplished one and, regardless of the interpretive strengths or weaknesses of each reading, the group’s sheer skill level is evenly impressive.

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Classical Music Album Review: Boston Modern Orchestra Project Plays John Harbison

January 15, 2022
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A surprisingly moving collection, all of it mightily played and sung by musicians who clearly intuit John Harbison’s musical language.

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Music Remembrance: Singer Ronnie Spector — 1943-2022

January 13, 2022
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Brian Wilson tweeted: “I loved her voice so much and she was a very special person and a dear friend. This just breaks my heart. Ronnie’s music and spirit will live forever.”

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Jazz Album Review: Emile Parisien Sextet’s “Louise” — Deeply Lyrical, Disciplined, and Free

January 10, 2022
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Soprano saxophonist Emile Parisien’s new disc is deliberately, and satisfyingly, international.

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