Monthly Archives: August 2008

Forty years ago this week. at New York Magazine, Clay Felker  allowed me to get away with an entire music column in  rhyming doggerel. Bob Grossman supplied the artwork,  which I continue to use, in Bob’s color upgrade. He  asked … Continue reading →

BRUNDIBAR AGAIN. Five years ago the L.A. Opera’s Opera Camp project staged this endearing small  concentration-camp relic at a church in Santa Monica. Since then the work – by Hans Krasa, to a libretto by Adolf Hoffmeister, has had a … Continue reading →

IT WAS A FOREGONE CONCLUSION  that Mark. Swed and I would hear entirely different music at the Hollywood Bowl on Tuesday night, under the title of the Philip Glass Violin Concerto; we acknowledged as much in our pre-concert greeting. The … Continue reading →

CONDUCTORS A TO Z: It has been a while since I’ve been to the Cabrillo Festival, at least the 17 years of Marin Alsop’s time since this was my first first encounter with her work there. Santa Cruz apparently loves … Continue reading →

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS FROM TODAY’S MAIL  Q.   Hello Alan, I’m a freelance writer (and former editor) with Symphony magazine, doing a story about the recent rounds of layoffs and cutbacks of classical music critics and other arts critics at print … Continue reading →