Music
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Viktor Ullmann’s The Emperor of Atlantis or Death Quits
Boston Lyric Opera Mordant, Bitterly Humorous
By: - Feb 02nd, 2011Viktor Ullmann’s “The Emperor of Atlantis or Death Quits†at Boston Lyric Opera is a wry, mordant, bitterly humorous contribution to the theater of the absurd. (Indeed, what could be more absurd than writing an opera in a concentration camp?) And, against all odds, it is deeply humane and absurdly hopeful. We who are about to die, serenade you.
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Herb Snitzer's Glorious Days and Nights
A Jazz Memoir
By: - Jan 29th, 2011The book by Herb Snitzer Glorious Days and Nights: A Jazz Memoir includes a stunning portfolio of 84, vintage, black and white portraits and performance shots of mostly deceased jazz musicians. There is also a compelling and richly anecdotal narrative of a life, he was born in Philadelphia in 1932, chronicling America's greatest original art form. Along the way he was an editor of the seminal publication Metronome.
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The Collegiate Chorale's Rousing State of the Union
James Bagwell Conducts at Alice Tully Hall
By: - Jan 27th, 2011While our pols gathered in the well of the House of Representatives to listen to the state of the union, the Collegiate Chorale made clear that not much has changed about our state of the union since New York was Nieuw Amsterdam.
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Newport Jazz and Folk Festival Now Non Profit
Founder George Wein Remains in Charge
By: - Jan 26th, 2011The famed Newport Jazz Festival® and Newport Folk Festival®, held in Newport, RI, since 1954 and 1959 respectively, have returned to their original roots as non-profit events. The Festivals will now be produced under the umbrella of Newport Festivals Foundation, Inc., a newly-formed 501(c)(3) organization. They will still be produced by George Wein and his veteran staff.
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Hot Tuna at the Colonial Feb 9
Charlie Musselwhite Also on Bill in Pittsfield
By: - Jan 25th, 2011Hot Tuna Blues is coming to the Colonial for a one-night only concert on Wednesday, February 9 at 7:30pm. The performance joins Rock and Roll Hall of Famers Hot Tuna (Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady) with Chicago blues icon Charlie Musselwhite and singer-songwriter Jim Lauderdale.
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Met Orchestra and Levine at Carnegie
DeYoung and O'Neill Master Mahler
By: - Jan 24th, 2011The connection between Mozart and Mahler is not immediately apparent, but both pieces chosen for Sunday afternoon's program concern farewells. Mozart's Posthorn Serenade celebrated the end of the school year and the departure of students. Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde, the deep sense that the composer had little time to live. Mozart's goodbye was full of musical puns and play, aptly captured by the Maestro and orchestra. The Mahler was sung wrenchingly as the orchestra both set the tone and enriched the songs. The sound at Carnegie is of course incomparable.
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Opera Boston's Cardillac
Hindemith's Opera Feb. 25 and March 1
By: - Jan 19th, 2011Opera Boston continues its 2010-11 season with the New England premiere of Paul Hindemith’s 1926 opera Cardillac, in a new production starring baritone Sanford Sylvan, at the Cutler Majestic Theatre (219 Tremont St., Boston). Performances take place Feb. 25 and March 1, 2011 at 7:30 p.m. and Feb. 27 at 3 p.m. Sung in German with English titles.
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Tangelwood Rocks
Earth Wind and Fire and Steely Dan
By: - Jan 19th, 2011Rock and Roll Hall of Fame bands Earth, Wind, and Fire and Steely Dan are being added to the 2011 Tanglewood season line-up. Earth, Wind, and Fire will perform on Saturday, June 25, at 7 p.m. in the Koussevitzky Music Shed as part of the band’s 40th anniversary tour. Steely Dan will perform on Tuesday, July 26 at 7 p.m. in the Shed. Tickets for both events go on sale February 6, 2011.
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Tanglewood and Mass MoCA Butt Heads
Wilco and Earth Wind and Fire Conflict on June 25
By: - Jan 19th, 2011The Wilco Solid Sound Festival is set for June 24 to 26 at Mass MoCA. Tanglewood launches its season the following Fourth of July weekend with three dates for perennial favorite James Taylor. In a surprise move Tanglewood has announced a prequel to the Taylor weekend. It will present the vintage soul group Earth Wind and Fire on Saturday, June 25, while Wilco will rock in North Adams. What gives?
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Wilco Solid Sound Festival at Mass MoCA
Tickets for North Adams Event June 24 to 26
By: - Jan 18th, 2011After months of hints and rumors it is now official. The Wilco Solid Sound Festival returns to Mass MoCA in North Adams June 24 to 26. There are many changes and improvements. Unlike last year patrons may now opt for single day tickets which are cheaper than a weekend pass. But there are a limited number of one day tickets so if that's your preference plan to act swiftly.
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Tosca at the Metropolitan Opera
Radvanovsky Offers a New and Satisfying Tosca
By: - Jan 15th, 2011Sondra Radvanovsky debuted as Tosca this week at the Met. If the production is still trying to find its legs, the singers are certainly ready to go and wonderful.
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Renee Fleming Stunning at Carnegie
Intimate Concert Performance by Opera Diva
By: - Jan 12th, 2011Renée Fleming swept onto the stage at Carnegie Hall on Tuesday January 11. Her long gold dress with pleated skirt and rhinestone shoulder caps dazzled as did her voice. At the end of the evening with a blizzard forecast, she exclaimed surprise that the house was packed, but no one who heard her sing thought it odd at all. "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stayed this audience…†(Herodotus, it turns out, not McKim, White’s etching on the US Post Office Building).
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Met HD La Fanciulla del West Jan. 8
Deborah Voight and Marcello Giordani Star
By: - Jan 06th, 2011The Mahaiwe, Beacon and Clark in the Berkshires will broadcast direct from the Metropolitan Opera this Saturday afternoon. This is the 100th anniversary of the premier of Puccini's opera. It is as exciting today as it was then.
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Wilco Returns to Mass MoCA June 24 to 26
Second Annual Solid Sound Festival
By: - Dec 22nd, 2010Mass MoCA can be such a tease. They have been so coy about admitting that the Wilco inspired Solid Sound Festival will return this year in June. It's still not official but mark your calendar for June 24 to 26. Better start making travel plans and hotel reservations asap. North Adams is sure to be swamped with Wilco fans.
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Lyric Opera of Chicago Snags Renee Fleming
Fleming Named first Creative Consultant
By: - Dec 10th, 2010Soprano Beverly Sills went on from a brilliant stage career to champion opera and music as a superior administrator. Earlier this year, Renee Fleming dismissed her long time public relations maven, a move which suggested that she was contemplating a change from a heavy duty performing schedule to other activities. The Lyric, a brilliant, consistent ensemble company, picked up on the signals and put together a package that will wrap Renee into Chicago. The Met missed out!
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The Metropolitan Opera's Don Carlo in HD
Broadcast Featuring Roberto Alagna Dec. 11
By: - Dec 08th, 2010Verdi's most ambitious opera is both wrenching personal and daring political. The composer worked on the opera for 20 years, and it is hard to imagine Aida, Otello and Falstaff without the insights he gained in his struggle to master the piece. The Met Live in HD broadcast will be seen Saturday at the Mahaiwe, Great Barringtion, Beacon Cinema, Pittsfield and the Clark in Williamstown.
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Tanglewood 2011
Full Schedule June 28 to September 4
By: - Nov 30th, 2010Once again James Taylor will be featured with four concerts at Tanglewood this summer. From an all-Italian Opening Night Boston Symphony Orchestra program under the direction of James Levine on July 8, four appearances by living legend Yo-Yo Ma, a Boston Pops Cole Porter tribute led by Keith Lockhart, and the incredibly popular Film Night with John Williams, to the welcome returns of Itzhak Perlman and Christoph Eschenbach and special appearances by favorite artists Joshua Bell, Stephanie Blythe, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Christoph von Dohnányi, Kurt Masur, and Peter Serkin to the closing BSO performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony under the direction of Lorin Maazel,
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Britten Enchants at Lyric Opera of Chicago
Midsummer Night's Dream Wafts By
By: - Nov 24th, 2010Britten and Peter Pears chose Midsummer Night's Dream to reopen their Festival in Aldeburgh. It camps up Shakespeare in a delicious, other-worldly musicscape. Britten’s music is neither tonal nor atonal, but a special musicscape designed for the dream world on stage, a dream within a dream, play within play. Rory Macdonald conducts this Lyric Opera of Chicago production.
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Dala Enchants at Natick Center for the Arts
A Standing O From a Sold-out House
By: - Nov 22nd, 2010If the Everly Brothers had been sisters... If the Andrews Sisters or the McGuire sisters had been a duo... Dala fulfills the speculation and rouses a full house at the Natick Center of the Arts to their feet.
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Verdi at Chicago's Lyric Opera
Megawattage Singing in The Masked Ball
By: - Nov 19th, 2010The Lyric Opera of Chicago has a way with casting. Like theater in Chicago, the company puts up a matchless ensemble that works together to bring life to operas old and new. This production of The Masked Ball (the Lyric prefers the English translation) is a bit of an exception, even though the mega wattage cast is superb throughout and alone worth hearing. Beware retired singers directing.
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In Durance Vital - Part I
Recent Recordings From Senior Folkies
By: - Nov 17th, 2010To experience artists in top form almost a half century after they first caught your attention is a marvel indeed. I can’t imagine the extent of the dedication and commitment to a craft that is required to be able to do that. The fact that I have at one time or another had personal contact, sometimes brief, sometimes extended, occasionally contentious with most of the principals of the releases listed below only increases my wonder at their durability. I have no bones to pick here and only praise to offer.
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Jim Kweskin & Geoff Muldaur
Jiving at Bull Run in Shirley, Ma.
By: - Nov 15th, 2010These two founding members of the Kweskin Jug Band are reunited and back on the circuit, sharing both their love for traditional American music and the joy of performing together. The badinage was engaging. Jim was the serious lecturer, Geoff the provocateur and congenial but learned clown
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Meg Hutchinson at Eagle Hill
A Berkshire Bard Stretches Out
By: - Nov 08th, 2010I’d like to sing you, a song without words A moment of pause It could all rush by in a day, years full of wanting Years full of waiting For your new life to begin Excerpt from “Something Else†by Meg Hutchinson
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Tosca at Boston Lyric Opera
Art and Politics
By: - Nov 07th, 2010Bostonians of a political mind â€" and who in Boston is not? â€" had the opportunity this fall to see two of the most forthrightly political operas in the repertoire, “Fidelio†and “Tosca,†in quick succession. In “Tosca,†which premiered in 1900, Puccini looked back at that heroic historical period from a century’s perspective.
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Intermezzo at the New York City Opera
Strauss Brilliantly Portrayed
By: - Nov 05th, 2010If only Strauss had had the confidence to fly solo more often, as both composer and librettist. He wanted to be modern and push the envelope. Strauss was often restrained by his partners. But not in Intermezzo, which his regular librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal refused to write because he found the subject matter unseemly. We are given a first rate production of the work at the City Opera until the end of November.
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