Spotlight
Our classical music critics supply their favorites, albums and concerts, from over the past year.
First recordings of major works and splendid recordings of some others, from Handel to Raff and from Boston’s Musicians of the Old Post Road to the astonishing operatic soprano Aleksandra Kurzak.
Up until the end, it seems, Jimmy Cliff was still seeing clearly — and eager to share that vision with us.
The aftermath of a terrorist act becomes an opportunistic event for those selling us a certain bill of partisan geo-political goods… while simultaneously diminishing our latitude as citizens.
Our financial establishment is being hijacked in a car driven by a greedy, vengeful man, his industry cronies and a doormat Congress cowering meekly in the back seat.
Perhaps asking that Judy Chicago’s exhibition not come was a necessary strategy in the short term, to help end Israeli brutality. But the lesson her show teaches us is necessary in the long term, so that Israelis will stop glorifying that very same brutality.
Raise a glass to Lenny Bruce, champion for—and martyr to—Americans’ First Amendment right to free speech. October 13, 2025, is the hundredth anniversary of his birth in Mineola, New York.
Now is a time for artists and arts organizations to stand shoulder to shoulder with other fields and disciplines that produce care in our communities.
My hunch is that not only theater critics but audiences will find the parade of tried and true tiresome.
Arts Feature: Best Movies (With Some Disappointments) of 2025
Our demanding critics choose the best films (along with some disappointments) of the year. And there is plenty of disagreement.
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