Music
By Caldwell Titcomb The operas of Lee Hoiby don’t come around often, but the best known of his seven stage works is Summer and Smoke, based on the play by Tennessee Williams. I still vividly remember the 1952 New York production of the play, which put off-Broadway firmly on the map and elevated the late…
By Caldwell Titcomb There are many who claim that the Berlin Philharmonic is the greatest symphony orchestra in the world. Whether true or not, this formidable institution visited Boston’s Symphony Hall this week, led by Sir Simon Rattle (b. 1955). From 1980 to 1998 Rattle raised the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra to the top…
By Caldwell Titcomb Boston now knows what the international shouting has been about this year. In the field of classical music, the greatest buzz has focused on the frizzy-haired young conductor Gustavo Dudamel and his Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela (SBYO), which came to town for a November 7 concert in Symphony Hall.
Ben Ratliff, Coltrane: The Story of a Sound (Farrar, Straus & Giroux) Reviewed by J. R. Carroll During an interview in Japan in 1966, John Coltrane was asked what he would like to be in ten years. Coltrane replied, “I would like to be a saint.” Lewis Porter, author of the definitive study John Coltrane:…
The Decemberists are passionate, intense and they put on one hell of a show.
The Pogues are back and they’re ready to rock. By Ira Kantor BOSTON, Mass.– For the iconoclastic (and newly reunited) band The Pogues, the moment of truth has arrived. It’s 8:30 p.m. and Boston’s aged Orpheum Theatre has just gone dark. Cheers and applause rattle the walls. Is the worst going to happen or will…
I knew something had changed when I was in a crowded downtown bar, filled with twenty-somethings sipping Red Bull and vodka and Pabst Blue Ribbon, and the opening chords of “Ring of Fire” evoked instant cheers and singing. The hype surrounding “Walk the Line” officially secured Johnny Cash a spot on the must-have music list…
It’s no surprise that it took both the band and the audience several songs before either was able to relax and mutually enjoy the enormity of what took place Monday evening at Avalon. The club was packed, with little space to either move or breathe, by 8:30 p.m. as fans awaited the reunited Alice in…
Indie rockers Snow Patrol (who performed at Avalon last Friday) are from Northern Ireland but formed the group in Scotland. Their fourth full-length album Eyes Open (Interscope) which they released on May 1 has only reached number 34 on the U.S. charts, but it was number one on the UK and Ireland charts.
When a band is as new and as hyped as Wolfmother, there are two factors that determine whether it will have lasting power. The first is live performance – can the band translate the energy of a hit record to the stage? The second is the all-important subsequent album.
Arts Commentary: What Might the Kennedy Center Best Become?