Review

Jazz Album Reviews: Mesmerized By Vinyl — Newvelle, Louis Armstrong, and Stan Getz

September 24, 2020
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Playing vinyl involves holding something in your hand, putting a needle down and, at least on my high end system, listening to sound quality that can mesmerize.

Jazz Album Review: “Artemis” — Inter-generational Jazz That Expands the Tradition

September 23, 2020
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This is state-of-the art modern jazz, alternately hard swinging, contemplative, commercial, and abstract.

Opera Album Review: A Version of One of Rossini’s Finest — Recorded on CD for the First Time

September 23, 2020
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Rossini’s Zelmira is a powerhouse opera that features two coloratura tenors and equally demanding roles for soprano and mezzo.

Television Review: “Pen15” — Season Two Amps up the Angst of Adolescence

September 22, 2020
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Considering how dark 2020 is, it is a good time for a lighthearted remembrance of things past, before the pandemic.

Jazz Album Review: Christian McBride’s “For Jimmy, Wes and Oliver” — A Mighty Cheery Big Band

September 22, 2020
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Inspired by their leader, bassist Christian McBride, the musicians in this big band always sound like they are having the times of their lives.

Jazz Album Review: Butcher Brown’s “#KingButch” — Beautifully Blurring Retro and Progressive

September 21, 2020
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“Best band in the world”? Butcher Brown spends the next 40 minutes or so living up to its boast, as song after song heads off into a different direction without a stumble or misfire.

Opera Album Review: Ermonela Jaho, a Soprano We Need Today

September 19, 2020
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A world-star soprano, in her magnificent prime at age 36, offers her first recital CD, and you can participate in its online “launch.”

TV Review: “Ratched” — A Sensational Sartorial Folly

September 18, 2020
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Ratched is lurid, violent, sexually explicit, outrageous, and has nothing whatsoever to do with Ken Kesey’s novel or Milos Forman’s award-winning film adaptation.

Literary Appreciation: D. H. Lawrence’s “Women in Love” at 100

September 18, 2020
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I hope this centennial will inspire readers to immerse themselves in this enormously important, rich, and vibrant work.

Theater Review: “Seneca Falls” – A History of Women’s Suffrage, Tongue-in-Cheek

September 17, 2020
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The script is not a conventional history of women’s suffrage: dramatic Jean Ann Douglass mobilizes satire, sexuality, suffering, and sarcasm.

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