Music

1916 results
Page 76
Yannick: giving the Celebrant a run for his money.  (Photo: Pete Checchia/Philadelphia Orchestra)

Philadelphia Orchestra plays Bernstein's 'Mass' (first review)

Singin’ the liturgical blues

Leonard Bernstein’s Mass was, with 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the flop of his career. Its belated Philadelphia premiere, despite an elaborate production, showed why.
Robert Zaller

Robert Zaller

Articles 5 minute read

Tempesta di Mare, Café et Catastrophe

A novel brew and a classic tale

Tempesta di Mare celebrated coffee and recounted a Greek tragedy in a recreation of an 18th-century French musical salon.
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 4 minute read
A Spain where the sun never shines. (Photo: Kelly & Massa.)

The trouble with Verdi’s ‘Don Carlo’

Sympathy for a tyrant

Verdi's Don Carlo is an opera that’s better heard than seen. Because the unevenness of its dramatic line tends to undercut the beauty of the music, Don Carlo is worth attending only for the chance to hear vibrant voices — which, happily in this case, were mostly magnificent.
Dan Rottenberg

Dan Rottenberg

Articles 7 minute read
Well, John Williams is happy when major orchestras perform his work. (photo by Alec McNayr via Creative Commons/Flickr)

The Philadelphia Orchestra plays John Williams

Time warps

Stéphane Denève’s program with the Philadelphia Orchestra was a mixed bag, stylistically and musically, with the lightweight John Williams thrown in with a Magnus Lindberg premiere and a Prokofiev masterpiece.
Robert Zaller

Robert Zaller

Articles 5 minute read
Boudewyns and friend: If it quacks like a wolf....

Philadelphia Orchestra’s ‘Peter and the Wolf’

The wolf, defanged

At Saturday’s performance of Peter and the Wolf, narrator Michael Boudewyns unveiled an elaborate array of symbolic props in an effort to offer the audience something for the eye as well as the ear.
Dan Rottenberg

Dan Rottenberg

Articles 3 minute read
Richard V. Correll, “Paul Bunyan: Creation of San Juan Islands,” 1937.

Lyric Fest: 'I'll Make Me a World'

The world, with all its sorrows

Lyric Fest joined the Singing City chorus in a highly emotional portrait of the wonders and difficulties of human life.
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 4 minute read
Takács Quartet: Defining 'the most perfect expression of human communication ever devised.'

Takács Quartet at the Perelman

Music in its best and purest sense

The Takács Quartet, in its annual Philadelphia appearance, showed again why it’s one of the world’s best, a few tonal lapses notwithstanding.
Robert Zaller

Robert Zaller

Articles 5 minute read
A stage filled with musical instruments, but no people

The BMI 'music spy' controversy

Paying the piper: Should music be free?

People were outraged to learn that BMI and other copyright protectors are sending "spies" to clubs and other live-music venues. Not too surprisingly, there's another side to the story.
Bruce Klauber

Bruce Klauber

Articles 3 minute read
The Curtis Institute around the time of its founding in 1924.

Curtis Presents the Dolce Suono Ensemble

From Barber and Rorem to Kramarchuk and Zhou

Dolce Suono presented the work of Curtis composers in eight pieces that sampled 91 years of musical creativity.
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 4 minute read
A 1797 natural horn in the Musée de la Musique, Paris. (Photo by BenP via Creative Commons/Wikimedia)

Vox Ama Deus presents Bach's Mass in B Minor

The Grand Unsurpassed J.S. Bach Variety Show and Cabaret

Valentin Radu added a touch of informality to the annual Vox Ama Deus Good Friday concert.
Tom Purdom

Tom Purdom

Articles 3 minute read