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Classical Album Review: Rautavaara & Martinů Piano Concertos

July 30, 2023
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Move over, Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, and Bartók: the pantheon of great Third Piano Concertos is growing.

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Classical Album Review: HK Gruber conducts Kurt Weill

March 31, 2023
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This gripping and engaging release from HK Gruber and the Swedish Chamber Orchestra manages to thread the needle between the various strands of Kurt Weill’s musical personality.

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Classical Album Review: Missy Mazzoli’s “Dark with Excessive Bright”

March 11, 2023
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Missy Mazzoli’s scoring is generally airy and virtuosic, yet Dark with Excessive Bright doesn’t seem to add up to more than the sum of its parts.

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Classical Album Review: Khachaturian Piano Music

October 2, 2022
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Soviet Armenian composer Aram Khachaturian, at his best, was compelling. Granted, he wasn’t working at this level in every piece. But most of his bigger works are better than not.

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Classical Album Review: United Strings of Europe’s “Renewal”

January 16, 2022
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A young ensemble, the USE is a technically accomplished one and, regardless of the interpretive strengths or weaknesses of each reading, the group’s sheer skill level is evenly impressive.

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Classical Album Review: “Scenes from the Kalevala”

November 29, 2021
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This disc highlights various, early-20th-century works inspired by the Kalevala, the Finnish creation epic. It is a fantastic demonstration of creative programming and invigorating orchestral performance.

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October Short Fuses – Materia Critica

October 7, 2021
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Each month, our arts critics — music, book, theater, dance, and visual arts — fire off a few brief reviews.

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Classical Album Review: Escher String Quartet — Barber & Ives String Quartets

September 19, 2021
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Here is an outstanding recording from the Escher String Quartet of music by two stylistically divergent 20th-century American composers, Samuel Barber and Charles Ives.

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Classical Album Review: Saint-Saëns Symphonies courtesy of the Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège and Jean-Jacques Kantorow

June 15, 2021
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A welcome entry in complete sets of Camille Saint-Saëns’ five symphonies — a composer of his caliber deserves a wealth of viewpoints.

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Classical CD Review: A Vibrantly Harrowing “Bluebeard’s Castle”

April 30, 2021
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If this is your first Bluebeard’s Castle, Susanna Mälkki’s recording makes for a fine, occasionally inspired, introduction.

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