Youthful Mozart Opera, With Some New Twists, Is Glittering Vocal Show
BOSTON – Mitridate, written when Mozart was 14, consists mainly of a parade of arias notable for their punishing tessitura and relentless coloratura. The starry cast at Boston Lyric Opera met every challenge with uniform brilliance.
Even Greatest Voices Can Succumb To Nerves Or Imbibing Nasty Stuff
PERSPECTIVE – The tenor drank bleach, and one of the great singing careers of that era ended in an instant. With the biopic Maria Callas, which focuses on the years after her voice loss, the fragile lives of singers have taken center stage.
Through Different Prism: Rachmaninoff, Wagner As Festival Novelties
LUCERNE – A Rachmaninoff concert by the Lucerne Festival Orchestra under Riccardo Chailly hardly captured the composer, and a historically informed Walküre, brought from Dresden and led by Kent Nagano, seemed mainly an anomaly.
Vänskä And Minnesota Wrap Mahler Cycle With Sonically Glorious Third
DIGITAL REVIEW – It took longer than intended, but Osmo Vänskä’s valedictory recording project with his former ensemble, the Minnesota Orchestra, was finally completed this year. It may be the best-sounding Mahler cycle on discs.
Recapturing The Magic In Three Eclectic Ballets By A Neglected Master
DIGITAL REVIEW – Founding conductor Gil Rose leads the Boston Modern Orchestra Project in a CD devoted to works by Chicago native John Alden Carpenter (1876-1951) that reflect influences ranging from Tin Pan Alley to "serious music."
Born Of A Competition, String Quartet Festival Carves Its Own Niche
BANFF, Alberta – The Isadore String Quartet and the Viano Quartet, recent winners of the triennial Banff International String Quartet Competition, returned to the site of their triumphs as guests of a festival sprung from the celebrated competition.
In Valley 6,000 Feet Up, Gem Of A Music Festival Sparkles Four Decades
SUN VALLEY, Idaho – Situated in this flower-laden resort town, the Sun Valley Music Festival is unlike anything else in its posh setting: It's free. Writers from the Music Critics Association of North America had a close look at the spirited event.
Weinberg Opera Rarity And ‘Hamlet’ In Concert Score High At Salzburg
SALZBURG – This year’s Salzburg Festival boasts an impressive variety, from a new staging of Weinberg’s The Idiot, the summer's hit, to recitals and a concert treatment of Thomas’ opera Hamlet – in which the melancholy Dane is crowned king!
Britten Opera Revels In Dream Al Fresco Setting, And In Midsummer, Too
WORMSLEY ESTATE, U.K. – A Midsummer Night’s Dream, with its intimate forest setting, is the perfect summer-festival opera. How fitting to see it at Garsington Opera, an al fresco enterprise located in a woods between London and Oxford.
Not Quite Traditional: ‘Ring’ Without The Rhine, But Rewards Are Golden
ZURICH – At its best, live opera is a visceral experience. Zurich Opera delivered just that with Wagner’s full Ring cycle. Conductor Gianandrea Noseda led the Philharmonia Zürich with a fine cast headed by Tomasz Konieczny's Wotan.
Batons, Bowings, Beats: A Maestro’s New Guide To Modern Masterworks
BOOK REVIEW – Leonard Slatkin’s new book belongs to a distinguished tradition, reflecting a lifetime of study and podium experience at the highest level. And it can be absorbed by anyone with a working knowledge of how to read music.
Quasi-Robotics Concert, Where AI Perhaps Stood For Almost Involved
SAN FRANCISCO – The 10th season of the San Francisco Symphony's SoundBox series ended with a conceptually fascinating program called “Press Play,” curated by “Carol Reiley and her robots.” But it needed more AI compositions.
An Oboe Ode To Joy: Youth Meets Diversity In A Profusion Of Delights
SEATTLE – Artistry and camaraderie shared top billing at Oboe / Oboe, a high-spirited concert presented by Emerald City Music, whose creative series aspires to open classical music to younger and more diverse audiences and performers.
To Orchestra In Need, Guest Conductor Brings Affinity Of An Old Friend
SEATTLE – in its search for a new music director, the Seattle Symphony has played under the wide-ranging styles of seven different conductors this season, but the high-level playing under David Robertson conveyed an aura of mutual comfort.
Energized Spoleto USA Runs Brash Gamut From Barber To Balloon Pops
CHARLESTON, S.C. – An imaginative revival of Barber's Vanessa was the 2023 festival highlight, but the offerings around town also included edgy and outré works along with standards like The Rite of Spring and the New World Symphony.
On Portland’s Vibrant Music Scene, New Is Nourished Everywhere
PORTLAND, Ore. – This city has become a busy hub for new music. Its vigorous creativity ranges from chamber ensembles dedicated to contemporary music to companies that explore the latest operas. The place is jumping.
A Ring Of Authenticity: ‘Das Rheingold’ Played On Period Instruments
PERSPECTIVE – Kent Nagano led the early-music ensemble Concerto Köln in
a version based on lengthy research by a special committee that sought the sound Wagner might have hoped for when composing the piece in the 1850s.
Michael Tilson Thomas Returns To SF Podium In Warm Homecoming
SAN FRANCISCO – His characteristic erect posture unaltered by the recent physical and emotional challenges of brain-tumor surgery, MTT, who turns 77 on Dec. 21, led the San Francisco Symphony in his own music and Schumann's.
Hail, Bright Abode! Life (And Art) Reaffirmed At The Resurgent LA Opera
LOS ANGELES – Defiantly back in business after a long pandemic-induced hiatus, the LA Opera took a giant step toward normalcy by staging Wagner’s Tannhäuser, the company’s first production of anything by Wagner in eight and a half years.
Not Bass, Not Baritone, Davóne Tines Revels In A Register All His Own
PERSPECTIVE – Tines, who has burst onto the world's music stages, commands a range of more than three octaves, from low D to high E-flat. He says he is neither a bass nor a baritone: “It’s a broader conception of how to think about voice.”
