So you want to compose serious music?

Beyond 'grandma music': A guide for modern composers

This is an exciting time to be a composer— there are many directions to choose from. Not all of them are ridiculous. Here's one struggling young composer's attempt to make some sense of all the possibilities.

Be'eri Moalem

Jul 04, 2009 · Articles · 8 minute read

Opera Company's "Rape of Lucretia' (3rd review)

A good thing in a small package

The Opera Company's production of The Rape of Lucretia demonstrated how much can be done on a small stage with a modest budget. But the opera suffers from the insertion of religious Christian doctrine into a story that predated Christ by five centuries.

Steve Cohen

Jul 04, 2009 · Articles · 3 minute read

Dolce Suono's "New Voices'

Setting T.S. Eliot to music (among other innovations)

Dolce Suono and the American Composers Forum present seven world premieres for an unconventional foursome— a good showcase for the variety and sheer likeability of the work that young composers are turning out.

Tom Purdom

Jun 30, 2009 · Articles · 4 minute read

Michael Jackson and his demons

The man who had everything (except the world's empathy)

Why am I, a classical pianist, so haunted by the passing of a pop music celebrity I didn't even know? Michael Jackson's songs reveal a man who struggled with demons but wanted to change himself and, indeed, the whole world. But he lacked the necessary tools, and the uniqueness of his situation assured that he would never develop them.

Maria Thompson Corley

Jun 29, 2009 · Articles · 5 minute read

Philadelphia Orchestra's Berlioz Requiem

The French contender in the heavyweight Requiem division

When the extra brass units sounded from the balconies and the chorus and Orchestra started going full blast, the heavens really did open. Nobody does Dies Irae like Berlioz.

Jun 29, 2009 · Articles · 2 minute read

Opera Company's "Rape of Lucretia' (2nd review)

Raging and raping: Christians and Greeks together

The Rape of Lucretia is the only musical creation I know of that places both the Judeo-Christian and the Greco-Roman traditions on the same stage.

Tom Purdom

Jun 25, 2009 · Articles · 4 minute read

"Battle Hymns' at Hidden City Philadelphia (1st review)

Making sense of war: Musicians invade the Armory

The Hidden City Arts Festival presents a remarkable choral and dance response to war that merits comparison with the works of writers like Hemingway and George Orwell.

Tom Purdom

Jun 19, 2009 · Articles · 6 minute read

Orchestra's season finale

Odd couple: The Orchestra's difficult season ends

The Philadelphia Orchestra ended its season with a program that unprofitably yoked Debussy's meandering composite, Images, with the Shostakovich Fifth Symphony. The latter, though unevenly played, sent the musicians home with a standing ovation that, one hopes, will leave them with a final good memory of what has been a difficult year.

Robert Zaller

Jun 18, 2009 · Articles · 4 minute read

Opera Company's "Rape of Lucretia' (1st review)

Raping Lucretia, raping Europa

The Opera Company of Philadelphia's deft staging of Benjamin Britten's The Rape of Lucretia is both a welcome revival of a pioneering work of chamber opera and, in the midst of our own current wars, a timely reminder of man's inhumanity to man.

Robert Zaller

Jun 15, 2009 · Articles · 3 minute read

The Crossing's unique niche

Class act

Donald Nally's choir, The Crossing, occupies a unique niche in the musical ecosystem: Its singers perform new and unfamiliar music for a small chamber choir. It presents novel, beautiful, complex music that requires precise coordination and first-class voices.

Tom Purdom

Jun 13, 2009 · Articles · 4 minute read