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Concert Review: CONCERT OF THE CENTURY (Carnegie Hall / New York City)
FIFTY YEARS LATER, STILL MAKING HISTORY A glittering lineup of musical giants turned Carnegie Hall’s anniversary celebration into an overwhelming tribute to artistic endurance Move over MET Gala: Carnegie Hall has just celebrated its Concert of the Century with another once-in-a-lifetime summoning of all-stars. Organized 50 years ago by Isaac Stern, the original event brought…
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Concert Review: THE SOLDIER’S TALE (Boston Symphony Chamber Players, Symphony Hall)
FIDDLER, DEVIL, AND A DEAL GONE WRONG Beautifully realized, with narration and music in sync—The Soldier’s Tale is devilishly surprising, if a bit abrupt at the finish Igor Stravinsky composed L’Histoire du Soldat (The Soldier’s Tale) in the waning days of World War I, when resources were scarce. Working with a Swiss writer named C….
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Music Preview: SANTA MONICA INTERNATIONAL JAZZ FESTIVAL (Various Venues, Santa Monica)
COASTAL COOL, GLOBAL GROOVE A new festival turns Santa Monica into L.A.’s jazz epicenter L.A. jazz lovers are already buzzing about the inaugural Santa Monica International Jazz Festival, a nine-day, citywide event running May 1–9 that aims to turn the beachside enclave into a bona fide jazz destination. Anchored by major headliners, centennial tributes, and…
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Opera Review: DIE KLUGE (THE WISE WOMAN) (Independent Opera Company, Los Angeles)
A GEM FINDS ITS VOICE A charming, rarely staged Orff opera gets a smart, scrappy revival Did you know that composer Carl Orff wrote more than Carmina Burana? It’s true. While most audiences know “O Fortuna” and its bombastic spectacle, Orff also composed lighter fare such as Die Kluge, a fairy-tale opera that Independent Opera…
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Music Review: SOPHIA WOLZ – “FUSION” (Single from Debut Album ABOUT LIFE)
A QUIET FUSION THAT BURNS SLOW A breakthrough in restraint, mood, and control “Fusion” begins with a piano line so bare it feels like a held breath. The song immediately sets a mood of quiet deliberation. Nothing here hurries. Nothing here fills the space just to fill it. Sophia Wolz lets silence do the structuring,…
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Opera Review: FALSTAFF (LA Opera, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion)
THE LAST FOOL A master’s final shrug lands with surprising weight Verdi was seventy-nine when Falstaff premiered at La Scala in 1893. He had not written a comic opera since Un giorno di regno in 1840, a failure so complete it drove him to swear off the form for fifty-three years. And here, in what…
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Concert Review: LISE DAVIDSEN & FREDDIE DE TOMMASO (BroadStage, Santa Monica)
TWO VOICES, ONE VOLTAGE An evening of operatic power finds its charge in connection, not just scale BroadStage does not often present evenings of this ambition. A sold-out house, a freelance orchestra under Iván López Reynoso, and two singers at or near the summit of their respective careers: Lise Davidsen, the Norwegian soprano who has…
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Opera Review: GILGAMESH: THE OPERA (Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts)
EPIC SOURCE, EPIC SCORE, EPIC PRODUCTION An ambitious new opera that struggles to connect its spectacle to a coherent narrative Want to know the quickest way to make me hesitate seeing a new musical? Append “: The Musical” to the title. So, here we have Gilgamesh: The Opera (which seems oblivious to at least seven…
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Music Review: LANG LANG PLAYS BEETHOVEN (Pacific Symphony)
FATE AND THE NEW WORLD Beethoven’s Egmont Overture was still settling into the air above Segerstrom Concert Hall when it became clear that Monday evening March 23 was going to demand more than the usual pleasant surrender to familiar music competently played. Carl St.Clair opened the Pacific Symphony’s program with the Egmont, followed by Dvorak’s…
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QUINCY’S WORLD: THE NEW FOUNDING FATHER OF AMERICAN MUSIC (MUSE/IQUE at The Wallis)
A THRILLER OF A CONCERT MUSE/IQUE’s vibrant tribute traces the extraordinary career of one of America’s greatest musical innovators Quincy Jones changed the face of music as a bold, brave, multi-hyphenate music mogul whose storied legacy is unlike anyone else’s—as a record producer, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, composer, arranger, and cultural force. Over a career spanning more…
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GUITAR PICKUPS: THE TINY PARTS THAT GIVE YOUR GUITAR ITS VOICE
The first thing that a person pays attention to when playing electric guitar is, more often than not, the shape of the body, the brand or the amplifier. However, with experienced players, the true magic is often something much smaller, such as guitar pickups. These little pieces rest in the silence of the strings, though…
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Concert Review: FROM MOZART TO MAHLER (Pacific Symphony)
INTIMACY AND ENORMITY: MOZART AND MAHLER IN COSTA MESA Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major, K. 488, is a peculiar piece to a classical program. It omits oboes entirely, replacing them with clarinets for a softer, more inward blend, and there are no trumpets or drums at all, no means of making a…
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Opera Review: AKHNATEN (LA Opera)
STILL THE PHARAOH-EST OF THEM ALL, AKHNATEN STUNS AT LA OPERA An intellectually rigorous, visually arresting production that embraces the opera’s challenges rather than disguising them John Holiday as Akhnaten There is a structural difficulty at the heart of Akhnaten that admiration alone cannot resolve—although admiration at last night’s opening at The Chandler is never…
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Concert Preview: MISSA SOLEMNIS (Gustavo Dudamel and The LA Phil at Disney Hall)
Beethoven’s towering Missa Solemnis arrives at Disney Hall for a rare, monumental performance. Dudamel leads a massive musical and choral force in one of Beethoven’s most demanding—and least-heard—masterworks. “From the heart—may it go further to the heart.” That’s what Ludwig van Beethoven inscribed on the score of his Missa Solemnis, a work he labored over for four years—the…
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Music Review: WILD UP: THE GREAT LEARNING (The Broad)
EXPERIMENTAL SOUND MEETS MUSEUM SPACE — WITH MIXED RESULTS A well-intentioned immersion in Cardew’s radical score undone by acoustics, logistics, and audience reality On Saturday February 7, Wild Up performed The Great Learning, Paragraphs 2 and 7 by radical English composer Cornelius Cardew inside The Broad, in conjunction with the exhibition Robert Therrien: This is…
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Concert Review: THE DOVER QUARTET (Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall)
TRADITIONS IN CONVERSATION From Mendelssohn to Chickasaw works, a program unified by thoughtful playing The Dover Quartet — Joel Link, Bryan Lee, violins; Julianne Lee, viola; and Camden Shaw, cello) — is small but mighty. Originally formed at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia in 2008, they are one of the greatest quartets you will ever…
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WHY CLASSICAL MUSIC NEEDS BETTER BUSINESS MINDS NOW MORE THAN EVER
If you spend time around classical music, you already know how much talent fills this world. There are gifted players, passionate singers, dedicated conductors, and audiences who love this art with their whole hearts. Still, if you look behind the curtain, you start to notice something else. Many of the challenges facing classical music today…
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Music Review: THE LOVESTRUCK BALLADEERS (Birdland Theater)
A POEM IN PRAISE OF THE LOVESTRUCK BALLADEERS There’s a super group that gets plenty of cheers:They’re called The Lovestruck Balladeers.They had a Birdland three-night gig.And the repertoire was pretty darn big.They play vintage music – originals, too.One cute highlight’s a song that’s called “Looking for You.”And this delight just happens to beThe title tune…
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Highly Recommended Concert: MARTIN CHALIFOUR & FRIENDS: THE ART OF CHAMBER MUSIC (The Music Guild at St. Alban’s, Westwood)
CHAMBER MUSIC IN AN IDEAL SETTING Glorious acoustics, a resonant space, and musicians who know how to listen to one another. There are few places in Los Angeles better suited to chamber music than St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, whose warm, luminous acoustics allow strings to bloom and piano lines to resonate without ever turning brittle….
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Concert Preview: THREADS OF GOLD—DOLLY PARTON GOES SYMPHONIC (National Tour)
THREADS OF GOLD—DOLLY PARTON GOES SYMPHONIC Her songs get the orchestral treatment in a cross-country concert experience Dolly Parton has never been one for half measures. When she says the threads of her life run through her songs, she means it. That idea is taken literally with Dolly Parton’s Threads: My Songs in Symphony, a…
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