Review
This is demanding contemporary music that succeeds at the trick of pulling you in — and makes you glad to be there.
Five more feature films of great interest and their links, carefully chosen to get you through the continuing travails of the coronavirus.
This San Francisco Symphony release proves to be a fitting send-off for music director Michael Tilson Thomas; there’s much to admire in the Seattle Symphony’s playing of Carl Nielsen’s first two symphonies; fiery energy from both violinist Arabella Steinbacher and the excellent Münchener Kammerorchester make their new disk a gem.
Though it’s inconsistent, Oliver Tree ‘s debut album offers an ample display of songwriting acumen along with his determined eccentricities.
It’s hard to critique a novel that flies under such a resplendent banner, a wholesale rejection of the dead and decaying world of trends and war and meaninglessness.
“Ornette was looking for those notes, the ones that feel no pain.”
The play’s swift running give-and-take is chillingly beguiling, its myriad allusions arousing your curiosity as you consider the characters’ positions and conclusions yourself.
For fans of David Lang and/or one of the country’s best choirs, this is a can’t-miss release; Christopher Rouse’s Fifth is about as fresh and engaging a Symphony as the composer wrote; Hub New Music plays the daylights out of Robert Honstein’s Soul House.
The Rental chugs along predictable genre rails, its characters settling into the expected “types” as screws are gradually turned on them by whoever’s surveilling from a distance.
The solo format at Alexandra Palace recalled his recent “Conversations with Nick Cave” tours, a similar chance for the singer to deconstruct his songs at the piano, except that he never addressed an imagined audience beyond his lyrics.
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