At 70, Marcia Ball is a non-stop pro, particularly at pacing. Early barn burners gave way to the slow blues of “Just Kiss Me.”
Music
Classical CD Reviews: Luciano Berio’s Coro, Leonard Bernstein’s “Mass,” and Shostakovich’s “Babi Yar”
The relative infrequency of big Berio releases makes new recordings of his major works into significant, contemporary music events; Dennis Russell Davies’ new recording of Bernstein’s Mass is done in by lax vocals and a paucity of emotional consistency; Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra supply a great Shostakovich Thirteenth Symphony.
Music Preview: Circles Around the Sun — Celebrating Legacies
Circles Around the Sun has established a distinctive niche within the expanding universe of “Grateful Dead as genre,” appealing to the core audience for Dead music without having to pull songs from the group’s songbook.
Book Review: “Leonard Bernstein and the Language of Jazz” — Prominent from the Start
Perhaps the book’s most impressive accomplishment is to make a kind of systematic case for Leonard Bernstein’s larger compositional output.
Concert Review: Steven Osborne and Paul Lewis — A Very French Duo Piano Recital
It was as if the pianists were performing in a small drawing room for a few friends, not at Jordan Hall.
Music Review: Drive-By Truckers — Triumph Over Tragedy
The band has tackled the Trump era with an urgent political edge on two recent albums that have surely lost them a share of good ’ole boys who were part of earlier audiences.
Concert Review: The Noah Preminger Group — Balancing the Cerebral and the Physical
Composer Steve Lampert wrote “Zigsaw” at the request of saxophonist Noah Preminger, whose group recorded it for one of 2019’s most provocative albums.
Concert Review: Lucas Debargue and the Boston Philharmonic at Sanders Theatre
A pianist of real character and refinement – plus a huge career in Europe – Lucas Debargue was on hand to lend his musicianship to a relatively rare outing of Franz Liszt’s Piano Concerto no. 2.
Concert Review: Skylark Vocal Ensemble — Sublime Storytime
Storytelling is big business in concert halls these days, and as a yarn spinner Sarah Walker is in a class her own.
Opera Album Review: The Most Neglected Master of Opera? Carl Maria von Weber, Early and Late
New recordings of Peter Schmoll and His Neighbors and of Euryanthe pose an embarrassing question: why is the opera repertory so narrow?