Music

1932 results
Page 108
Montalbano: The mezzo upstaged the soprano.

Choral Arts sings Rossini's "Petite Messe'

Joyful Christianity, for a change

Rossini, a master of comic opera, gave us a good-natured, beautiful mass for Saturday night— a piece that offers all the charm and grace of a romance with a happy ending.
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 4 minute read
Papageno's birdcatcher song gave me the perfect image of a chase.

Composer's quandary: Ideas vs. music (Part III)

Composer's quandary (continued): When the idea says ‘Yes,' but the music says ‘No'

Throwing out music is one of the composer's most necessary jobs. People ask composers how we get ideas, but ideas are easy. The hardest part is throwing out every idea except the one that's perfect.
Kile Smith

Kile Smith

Articles 6 minute read
Kirschschlager: A voice from toe to head.

Hugo Wolf's "Spanish Songs': Dual recital

This composer was depressed?

The charming British tenor Ian Bostridge and the pitch-perfect Austrian mezzo Angelika Kirchschlager make something of an odd couple. But they found their chemistry toward the end of a recital of Hugo Wolf's delightful Spanish Songs.

Articles 3 minute read
Roberts: Like a cheerful human whistler.

Tempesta di Mare's Bach with alterations

Bach without his organ

Tempesta di Mare sustained an old Baroque tradition, remodeling six of Bach's organ works to suit other instruments.
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 3 minute read
Did Debussy really 'hear' the sea?

Two birds, one composer (Part II)

The composer's quandary: What does emotion really sound like?

Watching a fight between two birds had inspired me. Now came the real challenge: to pinpoint my emotion and translate it into music. Generic emotion, I knew, produces generic music, just as it produces bland acting, uninvolving painting, and vanilla poetry.
Kile Smith

Kile Smith

Articles 5 minute read
20 publishers rejected Harry Potter for fear that his story wouldn't sell.

Shostakovich and free speech (3rd comment)

Shostakovich's problem, and ours

Even in a “free” society, creative people must confront the challenge that Shostakovich addressed in Stalin's Soviet Russia with his “Classical Symphony”: What do you do when your creative impulses conflict with the demands of the people who pay for your work?
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 6 minute read
Djupstrom: The excitement of a tightrope act.

Michael Djupstrom's contemporary pieces

The other side of the street

Like many young composers, Michael Djupstrom gives his work titles that link to stories and personal experiences. But in his case that's not necessary.
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 3 minute read
Yannick took Bruckner outdoors. (Photo: Chris Lee.)

Yannick's new take on Bruckner

Bruckner, unhurried and very Austrian

Never have I heard Bruckner sound so Austrian as he did last weekend under Yannick's baton— not Classical, not Wagnerian, but relaxed in an Austrian way.
Steve Cohen

Steve Cohen

Articles 2 minute read
Goode made the audience forget the problem.

Richard Goode plays late Beethoven

Realms of elation

Richard Goode's annual Philadelphia recital brought a lifetime of engagement to Beethoven's last three piano sonatas, which collectively constitute one of the summits of musical literature.
Robert Zaller

Robert Zaller

Articles 5 minute read

Orchestra's "inter-war' concert (2nd review)

A tyranny Yannick never knew

Yannick Nézet-Séguin is only 37, with no conscious memory of Stalin or Hitler. Yet he instinctively grasped the emotions of composers who suffered under those tyrants.
Steve Cohen

Steve Cohen

Articles 3 minute read