Music
The show cemented Joe Jackson’s reputation as an inscrutable and enigmatic songwriter, a talented musician and social outsider who speaks for Everyman.
This studio outing emphasizes superb ensemble playing; the result in a beguiling album in which just about every note shines.
“You don’t really know how to perform bluegrass until you interact with others.”
I’d like to close the first week of February with a recap of January’s new releases, the best and the worse.
A memorable evening, headlined by a superb pianist who deserves a full hall, any time, anywhere.
Path of Totality is a distinctive recording, put together with great attention to form and detail — and performed with enormous skill.
Conducting Lumina, Andris Nelsons was entirely in his element, capably drawing out the music’s shimmering gestures — string flourishes, brass fanfares, woodwind filigrees, and the like – from a locked-in BSO.
Pianist Kirill Gerstein’s take on Busoni is exhilarating; the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra serves the forceful music of composer Bernd Alois Zimmermann, and violinist Elina Vähälä does right by Szymanowski’s Violin Concerto.
Fine recordings of symphonies by neglected American composers Florence Price and George Antheil; and a curious album from Cornelius Meister and the ORF Radio-Sinfonieorchester Wien.
In Memoriam — Sanford Sylvan (1953-2019)
Hearing Sanford Sylvan sing made one rich: spiritually, emotionally, musically.
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