Music
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Bernadette Peters Pops Tanglewood
Broadway in the Berkshires
By: - Jul 09th, 2012In one of the best ever Pops programs Keith Lockhart paid tribute to New York composers. Including the Washington D. C. born jazz great Duke Ellington's A Tone Parallel to Harlem. For the second half of the concert he was joined by Broadway legend Bernadette Peters. She performed a number of songs by Stephen Sondheim including two from Follies which she performed this season on Broadway. Awesome.
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Ewa Podles Mesmerizes at Caramoor
The World's Great Contralto is Perfect in Rossini's Ciro in Babilonia
By: - Jul 08th, 2012The event of the summer is Ewa Podles arrival at Caramoor to sing Rossini under the able baton of Will Crutchfield and the Orchestra of St. Luke's.
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Greater Worcester Opera's Carmen at Eagle Hill
A Rousing Close to Season III
By: - Jul 08th, 2012When the opportunity to experience a performance of Bizet’s Carmen, as performed by the Greater Worcester Opera, just a few miles from my home in the boonies, I eagerly joined a few hundred of my neighbors.
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Tempus Fugit for Tanglewood 75th
Christoph von Dohnányi Conducts Sweltering Opening Night
By: - Jul 07th, 2012It was steamy in the Shed last night for the sweltering launch of the gala, 2012, 75th season of Tanglewood. With Christoph von Dohnányi, a Conducting Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center in 1952, the orchestra replicated the very first BSO concert that took place on August 5, 1937. A capacity audience enjoyed the all-Beethoven program, opening with the Leonore Overture No. 3, followed by Symphony No. 6, Pastoral, and Symphony No. 5.
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The Taylors James and Swift at Tanglewood
Annual Franchise Concert Thrills Fans
By: - Jul 03rd, 2012Last night James Taylor performed the first of three annual sold out shows at Tanglewood. With a twenty minute intermission the program started just after seven and ended just before ten. During all that time guest artist Taylor Swift graced us with two duets and a solo of her teen anthem, a thrill to thousands of girls in the audience “Love Story.†More tonight.
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The Wall Is Spectacular At Fenway Park
Roger Waters' Rock Opus is Visually and Musically Stunning
By: - Jul 02nd, 2012Thirty-five years after writing the autobiographical rock opera, Roger Waters is touring the World with a complex projection and animation musical presentation at large venues. Last night, July 1, the epic event was presented at 100 year old Fenway Park. If the 50,000+ crowd can be correctly judged, the high ticket costs were well worth the value. This was a event that was visually stunning and musically memorable.
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Hundred Dollar Valentine by Chris Smither
An Exceptional New CD
By: - Jul 01st, 2012Singer/Songwriter Chris Smither and producer David Goodrich have combined their talents to generate an exceptional CD Chris sings with a voice distinctively his own yet emotionally reminiscent of so many iconic voices that come to my mind.
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Wolftrap Snares Don Giovanni
Tomer Zvulun Stages a High Tech Opera
By: - Jun 30th, 2012The perfect opera is still perfect, but also very currrent. Facebook, phone fotos, and Victoria's Secret all play roles in this terrific, intense production.
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The Hunchback Variations at 59East59 Theaters
Chicago's Theater Oobleck Creates a Masterpiece
By: - Jun 25th, 2012This delightful chamber opera, both funny and moving in its absurdity, is playing in New York after a triumphant world premier in Chicago.
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A Conversation With Herb Gart - Part VII
On Auditioning Record Labels
By: - Jun 24th, 2012I explain to my clients that they are not auditioning for a record company; the record company is auditioning for us. We know you’re great and we are looking for the A&R man who gets it.
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Ear Say III - CD reviews
Those Harmonizing Ladies
By: - Jun 10th, 2012I cannot imagine many of you will have ever heard or even heard of a folk duo from the ‘60s who set the bar for creative distaff harmonizing. Kathy & Carol thrilled us with a blending of voices...
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Fruhbeck de Burgos Conducts the New York Philharmonic
Avery Fisher Hall Barely Contains Monumental Cantatas
By: - Jun 03rd, 2012The color and force of two monuments of twentieth century choral music were performed with drama and grand production by the New York Philharmonic, Orfeon Pamplones and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus.
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A Conversation With Herb Gart - Part VI
Gaffes and Lessons Learned
By: - Jun 03rd, 2012"When Don McLean had been turned down by 72 labels, we signed with a company Mediarts that hadn’t existed when we started looking" Herb Gart reveals to David Wilson in another segment of their dialogue.
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Nina Stemme Debuts at Carnegie Hall in Salome
The Cleveland Orchestra Gives a Sumptuous Performance
By: - May 27th, 2012Nina Stemme, a great Wagner and Strauss soprano, thrills Carnegie Hall with her singing as the Cleveland Orchestra under Franz Welser-Most delivers the gorgeous score.
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The Collegiate Chorale at St. Bartholomew's in New York
Contemporary Voices Rise to the Dome
By: - May 23rd, 2012Chorales often anchored in the Bible moved, arrested and even amused as they were performed in New York by the great Collegiate Chorale.
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Jesse Colin Young -Natick Center For The Arts
Smoother Than Ever
By: - May 23rd, 2012Jesse Colin Young is well remembered and appreciated in this area as was indicated by the full house that assembled Saturday night, May 5th at TCAN’s elegantly refurbished firehouse in downtown Natick. I suspect that many, like myself, had memories somewhat faded around the edge of that moody introspective rebel with long dark locks, brooding expression and clear bright tenor tone.
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Tanglewood Rethinks Labor Day Weekend
Rocking Out with Train, Evanescence and Pops
By: - May 23rd, 2012Train is back on track for Friday, August 31. Followed by Pops, on Saturday, and then a hard rock tandem of Evanescence and Chevelle rounding out a solid Labor Day Weekend in the Shed. This is a dramatic change of policy for Tanglewood making for a weekend with broad audience appeal second only to the Fourth of July. This last blast of summer will surely draw large audiences to Lenox. Then its back to work and school.
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Peter Gelb and the Met Get More Bad News
76 Year Old Opera News Stops Reviewing
By: - May 22nd, 2012In response to ever more devastating criticism Pater Gelb, the general manager of the Metropolitan Opera, is struggling to spin damage control with the media. For the past 76 years, Opera News, circulation 100,000, has enjoyed a close relationship with the Met. It has now announced that it will no longer review the Met and will focus its coverage on other companies.
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Tanglewood 75th Anniversary Celebration
All Star Concert July 14
By: - May 21st, 2012The musical centerpiece of the evening will be the Tanglewood 75th Celebration Concert featuring performances by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Pops, and the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, as well as the Tanglewood Festival Chorus, led by conductors John Williams, Keith Lockhart, and Andris Nelsons. These legendary Tanglewood ensembles will be joined on stage by several of today’s leading artists, including violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, pianists Emanuel Ax and Peter Serkin, and vocalist James Taylor.
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Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society's Grand Finale
Why the CMS is More Valuable than Facebook
By: - May 20th, 2012Your friends are live performers and their instruments playing music, new and ages-old, rocking the wonderful wooden walls to make sounds you can't get canned. Chamber music is all about instruments conversing with each other and you, in the world's universal language. The CMS can teaches us how to do this.
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Wynton Marsalis at Tanglewood August 20
Season Closes with Pops/ Michael Feinstein/ Christine Ebersole Sept. 2
By: - May 16th, 2012While not exactly an overhaul, Mark Volpe appears to be tweaking the programming at Tanglewood. Sticking with the mantra of Tanglewood as the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra means facing the reality or an eroding, senior audience. The annual season ending Tanglewood Jazz Festival has been scrapped replaced by booking A list jazz artists Wynton Marsalis and Christain McBride in Ozawa Hall and Pops in the Shed for a boldy revamped Labor Day weekend. And that's not all.
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A Conversation With Herb Gart - Part IV
Putting Programming Experience to Use
By: - May 13th, 2012The first thing I did was go to the New York folk managers and try to book their clients - Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, Judy Collins and others. However, for whatever reason, they turned me down flat. I then, out of necessity, had to prove that a few managers in New York didn’t ‘own’ the folk scene.
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New York City Opera Triumphs with Orpheus
Rachel Taichman's Production is Perfect
By: - May 13th, 2012The score for Telemann's Orpheus was finally found in 1978, 250 years after its premier in the Goosemarket Opera of Hamburg. Taichman gives it a delightful new twist.
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Billy Budd, The Makropulos Case and Sex at the Met
Janacek and Britten Deliver the Real Goods Without Help
By: - May 12th, 2012Since General Manager Gelb arrived at the Met, every production features a diva in a nightgown. Carmen is the exception, and she symbolizes sex. Productions that precede regnum Gelb were able to be sexy just because they were created to be sexy.
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Luis Miguel at Caesar's Palace September 13 to 15
That's Vegas Baby
By: - May 11th, 2012Latin music superstar Luis Miguel will return to The Colosseum at Caesars Palace for a record sixth consecutive year during Las Vegas Mexican Independence Day weekend 2012 Thursday, Sept. 13 – Saturday, Sept. 15 at 9 p.m. The three night engagement is presented jointly by AEG Live and Caesars Palace.
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