Music
1932 results
Page 159

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.

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.

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.

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.
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.

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.

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.

Articles
4 minute read
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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.

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.

Articles
4 minute read

1807 & Friends season finale
The Archduke also rises
Three of the city's most active chamber musicians transmit a chronic infection to their audience.

Articles
4 minute read