Music
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Opera Orchestra of New York Presents Meyerbeer
Eve Queler Triumphs
By: - Mar 04th, 2011Eve Queler's last performance with her Opera Orchestra was a brilliant performance of L"africaine, an underappreciated Giacomo Meyerbeer opera with libretto by the incomparable Eugene Scribe. She started with Richard Tucker in the role of Vasco de Gama, and ended with Marcello Giordani. An epic opera for an epic moment in her career.
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Hindemith' s Cardillac at Opera Boston
Rarely Staged and Now We Know Why
By: - Mar 03rd, 2011From the superb orchestral playing and the passionate conducting of Opera Boston’s music director Gil Rose to the committed singing of the entire cast - but especially Sanford Sylvan, for whom the production was mounted - to the well-conceived and well-executed stage direction, one could not have hoped for a better production of a tough modern opera.
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Jansen and Barnatan Perform at Poisson Rouge
New York's Hot Venue for Music New, Newer and Old
By: - Mar 02nd, 2011Le Poisson Rouge on Bleeker Street in Greenwich Village packs an audience in nightly for intimate performances of all kinds of music. On Monday, Janine Jansen and Inon Barnatan performed their magical dialogue.
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James Levine to Leave BSO September 1
Status of Tanglewood Commitment Unclear
By: - Mar 02nd, 2011Because of a number of health related issues, absences, recoveries and setbacks the tenure of James Levine as Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra will end on September 1. He assumed the position in 2004. Levine serves in a similar role at the Metropolitan Opera where no statement on his status has been released. Having cancelled the remainder of the BSO season it remains to be seen whether he will be able to resume his duties at Tanglewood for the coming season.
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Maestro Levine Steps Down in Boston
Five Years of Health Issues Forces a Change
By: - Mar 02nd, 2011No one wants to see the Maestro go, but in fairness to the Boston Symphony, artists, and the audience, the time had come for a change.
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Wilco Announces Solid Sound Festival Lineup
Levon Helm's Band Among Highlights
By: - Mar 01st, 2011In what promises to be one of the most diverse lineups on this year’s festival circuit, the Chicago rock band Wilco, who headline Friday, June 24 and Saturday, June 25, will be joined by iconic American singer Levon Helm and his band, Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore, soul singer Syl Johnson, jazz trumpeter Dave Douglas, alternative country twosome The Handsome Family and more.
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Dmitri Hvorostovsky's Song Fills Carnegie Hall
Faure, Taneyev, Liszt and Tchaikovsky
By: - Feb 22nd, 2011Dmitri Hvorostovsky's voice is as distinctive as the songs he choses to sing, and was unforgettable in his most recent Carnegie Hall performance. He is in Boston on February 27 at Symphony Hall.
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James Levine Conducts The Bartered Bride
Juilliard and the Metropolitan Opera Join Forces
By: - Feb 18th, 2011Hopefully this union of the Met and Juilliard will result in more early productions of future Met stagings. The Bartered Bride, a favorite of Maestro Levine's, proved a wonderful jumping off point for the alliance. Levine had his young orchestra sounding wonderfully close to the Met Orchestra. The staging by Stephen Wadsworth bodes well for the future Met production.
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Girl of the Golden West: Chicago Lyric Opera
Deborah Voigt and Marco Vratogna Star
By: - Feb 15th, 2011Debate about whether or not this opera is Italian, disappointment that the arias were shorter than usual, ignoring brilliant performances by Caruso and Destinn, the opera went into hiding for a hundred years. The Lyric production shows why it will be good to have it live and kicking again.
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Nixon In China Kindah Live in HD
Almost Like Being at the Met
By: - Feb 13th, 2011The cameras of the Live at the Met broadcast of the John Adams opera Nixon in China provided stunning details of singers who proved to be skilled actors. While there is nothing that compares to being there this came rather close to the experience. We attended with just half a house at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown.
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A Triumphant Lohengrin at the Lyric
Johan Botha Soars as the Swan Knight
By: - Feb 12th, 2011The Lyric Opera of Chicago has mounted a production of Wagner's great lyric musical drama with six voices of equal stature led by the stentorian Johan Botha. Wagner's music is gorgeous, and when it is realized as it is in this Lyric production, it is an event not to be missed. It continues through March 8.
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Creators Discuss Nixon in China at the Metropolitan Opera
What to Expect in HD Telecast
By: - Feb 11th, 2011Any ideas that Nixon in China is inaccessible were dismissed by five collaborators on this great American opera which premiered two decades ago in Houston. The Metropolitan Opera has mounted a Convent Garden production. It will be broadcast live in HD on February 12.
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Hot Tuna Warms Cold Berkshire Night
Gutsy Blues at the Colonial in Pittsfield
By: - Feb 10th, 2011Hot Tuna Blues sizzled at the Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield. It launched a busy Valentine celebration in the Berkshires. Barrington Stage is presenting a weekend long V Day Cabaret. Shakespeare & Company is opening a winter run of Mystery of Irma Vep. Williamstown Theatre Festival announces its season on Friday and hosts a reading of a Neal Simon play on Monday at the Clark. The Met Live in HD will screen Nixon in China on Saturday at the Mahaiwe, Beacon and Clark. Here's looking at you sweetheart.
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Nixon in China at the Metropolitan Opera
Live in HD February 12
By: - Feb 07th, 2011Nixon in China by John Adams and directed by Peter Sellars has traveled the world for twenty years and finally arrives at the Metropolitan Opera. It is wonderfully entertaining and at local theaters on February 12. In the Berkshires the opera will be screened Live in HD at the Mahaiwe in Great Barrington, Beacon in Pittsfield and in Williamstown at the Clark Art Institute.
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Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor
Emerson's Cutler Majestic Theatre
By: - Feb 05th, 2011The singing, the sine qua non of bel canto opera, was terrific – full-blooded and deeply committed. The international cast of soloists sang their hearts out for an unfortunately small audience. There were more than a few moments of thrilling vocalism.
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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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