Review

Theater Review: “The Tattooed Man Tells All” — Memories of a Survivor

November 22, 2020
Posted in , ,

Peter Wortsman has made a valuable contribution with this play; it is a rare theatrical account about how living through the Holocaust shaped survivors.

Classical CD Reviews: François-Xavier Roth and Schumann, Herbert Blomstedt and Brahms, and Daniel Barenboim and Elgar

November 21, 2020
Posted in , , ,

Françoix-Xavier Roth delivers a must-have cycle of Robert Schumann’s symphonies; Herbert Blomstedt’s Brahms’s Symphony no. 1 is spacious, restrained, and – too often – dull; Daniel Barenboim’s latest Elgar installment features a regrettably unsung masterpiece.

Theater Review: A Raucous Zoomified “Much Ado” — “Thou Art Muted, Don Pedro”

November 21, 2020
Posted in , ,

Hub Theatre’s virtual production of Much Ado About Nothing recognizes Zoom’s potential for farce and leans into it: this is a rollicking delight of a show that refuses to take itself seriously, to everyone’s benefit.

Film Review: “Sound of Metal” — A Test of Character

November 20, 2020
Posted in , ,

To Sound of Metal’s credit, the narrative remains open-ended, refusing to descend into a predictable “Hollywood” story of triumph over adversity.

Theater Review: “On Beckett / In Screen” — Bill Irwin Honors Samuel Beckett

November 19, 2020
Posted in , ,

Bill Irwin’s homage to Samuel Beckett explores what makes the writer so fascinating, even inspiring, for those who appreciate the knockabout beauty of his despair.

Book Review: “Before the Coffee Gets Cold” — Would You Like Time Travel with That Latte?

November 19, 2020
Posted in , ,

To his credit, Kawaguchi is a canny enough craftsman to give the time tripping cliché a healthy spin.

Book Review: “V2” — Robert Harris’s Gentler, Kinder World War II

November 19, 2020
Posted in , ,

This is history from a distance. Harris’s characters feel more real when they’re working out the equations that will make a missile fly or fall than when they’re fleeing a double agent or a misfiring rocket.

Classical CD Reviews: Listening During COVID, Part 2 — A Lute, a Particularly Silken Steinway, and Mahler Himself Playing in a 1905 Piano Roll

November 18, 2020
Posted in , , ,

A trio of recordings help us rethink and rehear composers as varied as Barbara Strozzi (from the seventeenth century), Chopin, and Mahler.

Jazz Album Review: The Yellowjackets Celebrate Turning 40 — With a Big Band

November 17, 2020
Posted in , , ,

Now that ¾ of the Yellowjackets are eligible for Social Security, the emphasis is more on confirming a legacy of creative compositions and expanding their art of arranging with a broader range of colors.

Book Review: “Kraft” — A Pitch Perfect Satire of Neoliberal Dreamin’

November 17, 2020
Posted in , ,

A powerful allegory for our techno-crazed, consumption-addicted, soul-crushing times.

Recent Posts

Popular Posts

Categories

Archives