Why did Ted Sperling and MasterVoices choose to perform an old warhorse like Carmen which has been produced almost continuously over decades just up the street at Lincoln Center?

Despite a star-studded cast, last night’s Anyone Can Whistle at Carnegie Hall ultimately failed to take flight.

“Spring has sprung,” announces MasterVoices’ director Ted Sperling with a smile at the beginning of Part III. And indeed, even the doomsayers among us (and I count myself one) can’t help but feel signs of cautious optimism, as the world we knew slowly but noticeably begins to re-emerge.

Conceived by Adam Guettel as a song cycle that explores human relationships to the gods across the span of history into today, Myths and Hymns has been seen and heard in concert and staged settings, and some of the individual songs are often performed in cabaret.