Alex Ross has a moving tribute to Lorraine Hunt Lieberson in this week’s New Yorker. “She was the most remarkable singer I ever heard,” he writes, and it’s hard to argue with that. Speaking of Alex, he’ll be chatting with Mason Bates, Corey Dargel, Nico Muhly, and Joanna Newsom at BargeMusic at 10 pm on October 7 as part of the New Yorker Festival. Alas, the event seems to be sold-out. Alan Rich in L.A. Weekly on why he didn’t hang around for Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana at the Hollywood Bowl: The night had turned cold; the gin had run low;
Read moreGloria Cheng opened the season of serious music-listening in her position as opener of the Piano Spheres series of concerts. The program was oriented the program to two-musicians works, and there was a gracious lead-in to the guest appearance to be given by Thomas Ades in December, with performances of two of his early works. Cheng began the concert with Ades’s Opus 7, “Still Sorrowing” (1992-1993), written at age 21. This is a more restrained work than many of his, with the prepared piano dampening the middle range of the piano, creating a hollowness to support its feeling of loss. The middle
Read moreMichael Gordon’s new post-rock opera What To Wear opens tonight at the Redcat Theater in downtown LA. Richard Foreman wrote the libretto and directs the stage production. According to our sources (Michael, who “guarantees a good time will be had by all”), What to Wear is a raucous and bitingly funny work about fashion. There are 4 main characters (all called Madeline X) and 2 ducks, a small one and a big one. There are ten singers, ten actors and 7 musicians all under the musical direction of David Rosenboom. “What to Wear postulates a world in which military tanks and nightmare
Read moreJohn Zorn is officially a genuis. The 53-year-old composer, improviser, saxophonist, provocateur, and ardent promoter of experimental music through his Tzadik recording label, was one of 25 new MacArthur Fellows named today. Like his fellow honorees, Zorn will receive $500,000 in “no strings attached” support over the next five years. Unlike most other awards, MacArthur winners don’t apply but are picked by a secret committee of “experts.” One day you get phone call that says you don’t have to worry about next month’s rent. The award notes that Zorn is a “largely self-taught artist who, since the mid-1970s, has been at the center of
Read moreI like Mark Swed’s writing a lot and find I normally agree with his tastes but I can’t make sense out of his review of the Carl Orff/Jefferson Friedman concert at Hollywood Bowl that we hyped a little last week. I am particularly baffled by this line: As in “Carmina,” there is much to like musically in “Throne,” as long as you hold your nose. The political implications in both scores are troubling. Orff was, if not a Nazi sympathizer, at least a National Socialist opportunist. Okay, but I can’t for the life of me see a parallel in anything
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