To the night
Minutes into “An die Nacht,” the first song Friday night, I realized how much I’d missed being enveloped in that seductive Straussian combination of a soprano (or two or three) rising higher and higher over a surging orchestra.
new york philharmonic
Virtual gala
Emanuel Ax, Anderson Cooper, Anthony Roth Costanzo, Katie Couric, Renée Fleming, David Foster, Josh Groban, John Lithgow, Kelli O’Hara, Stephen Sondheim, Emma Thompson and John Williams are among the special guests.
The perfect match
If only she’d been able to sing more than 10 minutes of Bjork’s music!
Speak loudly
Do we do what we have to do? Or do we have to do what we do?
You tread on my dreams
Wednesday night’s New York Philharmonic concert was a high-stakes performance for a number of reasons.
Aestival body
Broadway star Kelli O’Hara stepped out of her comfort zone.
In the River Rhine. In it.
It is always a pleasure to hear a great orchestra take on a major score that might sound half-muffled emerging from the pit of an opera house.
d’Arc victory
Tonight’s program at the New York Philharmonic, Arthur Honegger’s massive oratorio dramatique Jeanne d’Arc au Bûcher, has been an occasional visitor to the orchestra’s repertoire starting with the performance conducted by Charles Munch in January of 1948.
Rolling along
Show Boat continues to communicate, even in the less than perfect circumstances of this latest revival.
Levee duty
If you are of the belief that Show Boat can stand on its own as a classic score and thus doesn’t need the trappings of musical production, you’ll love the New York Philharmonic’s “semi-staged” production.
Blood types
“The finale of Sweeney Todd left the stage of Avery Fisher Hall littered with corpses, but the evening, for all its flaws, felt vibrantly alive.”
JJ au naturel
Our Own JJ has been spending a lot of time outdoors lately, which is such a novelty for him that he felt he really must write about it.
Dan Sharp-Ears
I had every reason to think I’d love the New York Phil’s production of The Cunning Little Vixen as much as I did their staging of Le Grand Macabre with the same creative team.
21st century fox
“A singing crossbreed—a fox with human intelligence—stars in Leos Janacek’s opera, The Cunning Little Vixen. If only the New York Philharmonic’s semistaged performance Wednesday night were as successful a hybrid.” [New York Post]
Win a Free Ticket to Opening Night at the Met!
Quinn Kelsey and Lise Davidsen star in the Met's new Macbeth. We're giving away one ticket, so screw your courage to the sticking place and enter now!
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).
