Review

Theater Review: Commonwealth Shakespeare Company’s “Much Ado” — “A Giddy Thing”

July 29, 2022
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Shakespeare’s text has been streamlined for easy consumption on a summer’s evening — there’s no intermission, lots of physical comedy, and a party vibe.

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Listening During Covid, Part 13 — Music of Brazil and Other Latin American Countries, Religious Consolation from Post-WW I England, and an Operatic Novel

July 29, 2022
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New recordings serve up fine performances of music from Latin America, Brazil, and post-1918 England. And a novel sends its main character back two centuries into Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro.

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Classical Album Review: What Is American — PUBLIQuartet

July 28, 2022
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American-ness in music is impossible to define and constantly in flux, yet the threads that connect it all together – at once beautiful, tragic, humorous, ironic, whimsical – are all somehow recognizable.

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Classical Album Review: Weill & Shostakovich Symphonies

July 28, 2022
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Taken together, this is a release that showcases both the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra and its chief conductor – as well as their repertoire choices – in a brilliant light.

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Book Review: “The Crossroads of Civilization” — Vienna as Bridge Builder Between East and West

July 27, 2022
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Angus Robertson has written a thoroughly enjoyable history of Vienna that is both accurate and entertaining.

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2022 Newport Folk Festival Review: An Occasion for Awe

July 27, 2022
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The Newport Folk Festival’s biggest secrets were cleanly hidden and tightly executed with the day-capping revelations of Paul Simon and Joni Mitchell.

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Jazz Concert Review: Two Trios Bring Compositional Acumen to Spontaneous Collective Improvisation

July 27, 2022
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Such a beautiful evening of music — two relatively concise sets, one an hour long, another a little less — adding up to an integral whole.

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Jazz Album Reviews: Two From Guitarist Albare — One Sedately Traditional, the Other More Satisfyingly Adventurous

July 26, 2022
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Albare Plays Jobim: A Tribute to Antonio Carlos Jobim is a traditional Brazilian offering, content to offer soothing Bossa Nova rhythms; Freedom is more unconventional, merging Brazilian beats with jazzier improvisations.

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Book Review: “Making Tracks: A Record Producer’s Southern Roots Music Journey”

July 26, 2022
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A music aficionado-turned-record producer shares his indelible memories of life on the road and in the studio, working with such artists Sleepy LaBeef, Irma Thomas, James Booker, Solomon Burke, Buckwheat Zydeco, and Ruth Brown.

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Film Review: “Medusa” — “She’s Beautiful and She’s Screaming”

July 25, 2022
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Brazilian director Anita Rocha Da Silveira’s latest film is a genre-spliced howl of feminine fury in the face of right-wing Christian conservatism.

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