Monthly Archives: April 1998

Everything that’s right about romantic Italian opera, and everything that’s wrong, comes into focus in Verdi’s Il Trovatore. The plotline cries out for parody, and has been handsomely treated in that regard by the Brothers Marx in A Night at … Continue reading →

There was a tingle in the news. UCLA’s Royce Hall, shut for over four years of earthquake repairs and retrofitting, was to reopen its doors with a most newsworthy event: a major collaboration between those blithe, innovative spirits, director/designer/poet Robert … Continue reading →

Several weeks ago I wrote off the symphonies of Robert Schumann as some of music’s “most honorable failures.” Esa-Pekka Salonen had performed the “Rhenish” Symphony in an acceptable but hardly stirring manner – as he had the “Spring” Symphony a … Continue reading →

Every year around this time, the excellent local ensemble called the Armadillo String Quartet puts on a concert of music by its anointed composer-in-nonresidence, Peter Schickele. Peter comes out from New York for the concert; sometimes – as a pretty … Continue reading →

One thing is certain: Royce Hall, grand architectural landmark on the UCLA campus, 1,829-seat concert hall of matchless comfort, beauty and sonic amenities, reopens next Wednesday. After four years and three months of repair, reconstruction and retrofitting in the wake … Continue reading →

“Now that’s music,” whispered the man behind me to his companion, as Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Los Angeles Philharmonic launched into the merry A-major opening bars of Mendelssohn’s “Italian” Symphony. After a stiff dose of forward-marching works from his own … Continue reading →