Category Archives: Musical America

Suddenly Tan Dun is everywhere you look, everywhere you listen. In just the past few months audiences in Lisbon and Singapore have flocked to his large-scale orchestral works. His Water Passion After St. Matthew  reached its first American audiences last … Continue reading →

“it is a principle of music to repeat the theme. Repeat and repeat again, as the pace mounts. The theme is difficult but no more difficult than the fact to be resolved.” William Carlos Williams, “The Orchestra” in Steve Reich’s … Continue reading →

In the summer of 1979, in a madcap decision that I still don’t regret, I succumbed to the urge to go bicoastal. (The term, I think, had just been invented.) New York Magazine, whose music critic I had been from … Continue reading →

“Billy Budd” was the appropriate finale for the Los Angeles Opera’s 14th season, a reminder that of all repertories sampled by departing founder and general director Peter Hemmings during his tenure, the operas of Benjamin Britten have consistently earned highest … Continue reading →

If anyone ever advised Plácido Domingo that running an opera company might be an easy and well-oiled undertaking, last week’s events around his West Coast branch – also known as Los Angeles Opera – were surely enough to set him … Continue reading →

The Placido Domingo era at the Los Angeles Opera got off to a sensational start this week, and how! In press conference after press conference, the incoming artistic director/tenorissimo had promised that attention would be paid in areas where scant … Continue reading →

Operating on the brave but often-challenged principle that an audience still exists for, and cares about, the music of the recent past, the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s current “Focus on Igor Stravinsky” festival focusses broadly. Over four weeks ending March 12, … Continue reading →

Handel has earned his place –  a century late, perhaps, but decisively. The most convincing of the old arguments, that a world enlightened by more benign attitudes toward surgery had therefore cut itself off from the requisite singers for this … Continue reading →

COSTA MESA, Calif. — When last we visited California’s Orange County, that high-property-value enclave just to the south (and far to the right) of Los Angeles, the Orange County Philharmonic Society’s first “Eclectic Orange” Festival had run its course. Local … Continue reading →

When last we visited California’s Orange County, that high-property-value enclave just to the south – and far to the right – of Los Angeles, the OC Philharmonic Society’s first “Eclectic Orange” Festival had run its course. Local audiences may have … Continue reading →