Classical Music
Derivative is the greatest insult in the book when it comes to modern composers. No one wants to be declared as “derivative” of anything. I am, of course, speaking of the artistic derivative not the …
On the way to camping in Idaho I stopped on The Extraterrestrial Highway. My children were with me and wondered what was going on when I pulled the car over in the middle of nowhere. …
Well, well, well. Comic-Con has sold out the San Diego Symphony’s July 22 concert. The title of the concert is Raiders, Rebels, and Supermen: The Music of John Williams. Now Mr. Williams is popular no …
It feels as though every summer I get into Wagner. It could be because news of the Bayreuth Festival is always there to remind me. It could be because I rarely get a chance to …
The conclusion of the Mainly Mozart Festival included a piece of music by Alfred Schnittke. I wrote that Schnittke was trying too hard to be innovative with the marching of the players around the stage …
The Mainly Mozart Festival Orchestra season has come to a close. There is still plenty of Mainly Mozart to be had during the remaining 50 weeks until the next one but the orchestra is on …
The San Diego Symphony’s Bayside Summer Nights has its Fourth of July weekend coming up on June 30, July 1, and 2. However, on The Fourth of July the symphony welcomes country star Wynonna Judd. …
Every now and again it is important to eat some crow and I had an appetite for it after the Mainly Mozart concert on Thursday, June 22. Previously I had said I could go the …
We now have a peak experience to add to the list for Mainly Mozart, but it came from Prokofiev and Beethoven. The Mainly Mozart Festival is taking a chronological journey through Mozart’s life over the …
Two concerts into the Mainly Mozart Festival and all is well. The second concert on Thursday, June 15, was a mixed bag for moi. This was the third time I’ve been to a Mainly Mozart …
What is an intermezzo? There are several famous musical intermezzi such as those found in Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci but there is also an entire opera entitled Intermezzo by Richard Strauss. What gives? In the …
Taoism, with its principles of effortless action, naturalness, humility, simplicity, spontaneity, compassion, and frugality, was a perfect fit for the evening. Which evening? The opening evening of The 2017 Mainly Mozart Festival on Saturday, June …
Perhaps I’m overstating my case but I feel as though the recent success of the Wonder Woman movie has been prophesied here in this humble column. For not a few years I’ve been adding my …
Scatology is currently a most distasteful subject but that was not always the case. There are examples of scatalogical humor dating back to Aristophanes’s The Birds in the ancient Greek theatre. This type of humor …
Saturday, May 27 was the second of three final concerts at the San Diego Symphony. These concerts conclude the Jacobs Masterworks Series and Maestro Jahja Ling’s tenure as music director of the orchestra. The concert …
Round about this time of year I begin to feel like a musical Paul Revere. Instead of riding from town to town shouting, “The redcoats are coming! The redcoats are coming!” I begin posting from …