Music
There are no missteps on this disc. Buster Williams and company make all the complications swing, mightily.
So who knows where the time goes? Sadly, it only goes in one direction. But the past can be gracefully revived.
This effort is the most ‘Hollywood’ score the BSFO has created yet, a plush musical carpet for The Man Who Laughs’s emotional high and lows.
The moral should be to err in favor of the audacious. That’s what this world – and this art form – require.
The show had an undercurrent that brought to the fore all the issues that have put Wynton Marsalis at the center of the culture wars.
By taking the stage with 15 musicians, none of whom is female, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra presents the music as segregated and outdated.
John Prine’s music on The Tree of Forgiveness is alert and nimble – not at all a retreat to the folkie bar.
For a composer who hails from Finland but found his spiritual home in Southern California, Esa-Pekka Salonen’s is a singular musical voice.
Composer Charles Villiers Stanford’s best traits were formidable indeed.

Jazz Commentary: Greg Hopkins Big Band at Ryles — Whither Big Bands?
At this time in the Boston jazz scene, there are no ongoing spaces for big bands and, predictably, the number of such ensembles has shrunk.
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