Conductor Revisits Recovery of Bach ‘St. Mark Passion’
By David Stabler
EUGENE, Ore. – Scholars have long known about a 1731 St. Mark Passion, but only its text survives. The Oregon Bach Festival's new artistic director Matthew Halls collaborates on a reconstruction based on Bach's funeral ode BWV 198.
To Visitor’s Ears, Chicago SO’s Hall Detailed, Coherent
By Richard S. Ginell
CHICAGO – What does a good concert hall sound like? I pondered that as I made my way toward venerable -- some would say fabled -- Orchestra Hall to hear this city's orchestra on its home turf for the first time.
Muti, Chicago SO Dazzle In Pairing Schubert, Mahler
By Ken Keaton
CHICAGO – Their Schubert was all loving warmth, the Mahler a long journey to an overwhelming climax. As a visitor I wondered: Do they consistently produce work of such quality? If so, Chicagoans are indeed fortunate.
Chicago Symphony Bassoonist Shines In Mozart Concerto
By Mike Telin
CHICAGO – Before bidding Riccardo Muti and his colleagues farewell, David McGill confirmed his stature as a great wind player of our time with a performance of musical refinement and insight that was one for the memory book.
Brevard Festival Harmonizes Stars With Young Talent
By Paul Hyde
BREVARD, N.C. – Peripatetic Boston Pops conductor Keith Lockhart leverages his classical clout to draw eminent soloists to this Blue Ridge festival where students play alongside the pros. The 78th summer begins with Itzhak Perlman.
Operatic Portrait Of Gertrude Stein Illuminates An Era
By Paul Horsley
ST. LOUIS – Ricky Ian Gordon's new opera 27, with Stephanie Blythe as Gertrude Stein and Elizabeth Futral as Alice B. Toklas, is a touching glimpse of their Paris life, with cameos of Picasso, Hemingway and others in their circle.
Forget Mythology, It’s Musicology As Witty Opera Fare
By Richard S. Ginell
OJAI, Calif.– Haydn feels neglected; Mozart wants Amadeus royalties; Beethoven is grumpy. In a new opera by Steven Stucky and Jeremy Denk, the composers seek a scholar's help, and the Sub-Dominant's a femme fatale.
Pianist-Composer Adds Sparkle To Mozart ‘Coronation’
By Rick Schultz
OJAI, Calif. – Timo Andres performs his recomposition and completion of Mozart's "Coronation" Concerto with the New York-based chamber orchestra, The Knights. It's no party trick, he says. The Ojai Fest will stream it live.
LA Master Chorale Caps 50th Season With 3 Premieres
By Richard S. Ginell
LOS ANGELES – New works included Esa-Pekka Salonen's glistening Iri da iri, which chorale members themselves commissioned, and high-schoolers joined Francisco Núñez, who reprised his own swinging samba Es Tu Tiempo.
Spoleto Fest USA Turns Modernist With 2014 Lineup
By Perry Tannenbaum
CHARLESTON, S.C. – A new sense of adventure pervades Spoleto Festival USA, where the scales have tipped toward newer works. Among this year's offerings is the U.S. premiere of Michael Nyman's opera Facing Goya.
Domingo, Fleming Bring Starry End To LA Opera Year
By Richard S. Ginell
LOS ANGELES - Renée Fleming and Plácido Domingo are helping Los Angeles Opera end their season, but not together. She's singing Blanche in A Streetcar Named Desire; he's Athanaël in Thaïs. Both triumph.
Cunningly Novel Production Of Janáček’s ‘Vixen’
By Daniel Hathaway
CLEVELAND - Digital animation is the motor that drives the Cleveland Orchestra's inventive version of The Cunning Little Vixen at Severance Hall led by Franz Welser-Möst and featuring a splendid cast.
Chicago SO Fetes Three Composers In ‘Truth to Power’
By Nancy Malitz
CHICAGO - A Chicago Symphony festival will celebrate Shostakovich, Britten and Prokofiev under guest Jaap van Zweden, who admires the composers' ability to "create beautiful flowers in the darkest of times."
38th Spoleto USA Promises Eclectic Bundle Of Events
By Paul Hyde
CHARLESTON, S.C. - British composer Michael Nyman awaits the U.S. premiere of his opera Facing Goya, a surreal meditation on the painter's long-lost skull, among artistically diverse offerings from classical to circus arts.
Rouse and Adams Scores Make Carnegie Debuts
By Heidi Waleson
NEW YORK – The first two concerts in the fourth and final "Spring for Music" featured the New York Philharmonic and Seattle Symphony, the latter in the Pulitzer-winning Become Ocean by John Luther Adams (right).
Piccolo Concerto Takes Soloist To Fetching Heights
By Daniel Hathaway
CLEVELAND – Gabriela Lena Frank rose to the occasion after the Cleveland Orchestra commissioned a concerto for its principal piccolo, Mary Kay Fink. The premiere shared a program with music by Rouse and Mozart.
Higdon & Holst Oratorios Keep Choristers Aloft
By Leslie Kandell
NEW YORK – The New York Choral Society's pairing of music by Jennifer Higdon (right) and Gustav Holst pointed out similarities and differences in the composers' approach to the time-honored genre of the oratorio.
Haunting Opera About Nun-Poet Belies Its Origin
By Mike Greenberg
FORT WORTH – Composer Daniel Crozier and librettist Peter M. Krask's With Blood, With Ink languished without a professional staging for years until the Fort Worth Opera gave it a handsomely staged and well-sung production.
New Gilmore Star Blechacz To Join Silver Celebration
By Lawrence B. Johnson
Polish pianist Rafal Blechacz, winner of the 25-year-old Gilmore International Keyboard Artist Award, heads to Kalamazoo as the seventh star in a constellation of winners. He will perform twice during the anniversary fête.
