Classical Music Theater Reviews: Best Shows & Critic Recommendations Page 20

BWW Classical Music Review: PARK AVENUE CHAMBER SYMPHONY ELGAR & MENDELSSOHN at All Saints Church, New York City
by Peter Danish - May 31, 2016

The Park Avenue Chamber Symphony under the guidance of musical director and conductor, David Bernard, presented yet another in a series of superb concerts this past weekend at the All Saints Church in NYC. The program included Mozart's Flute Concerto No. 1 in G major (K. 313), The Elgar Cello Concer...

BWW Review: The Clarinet Factory Performs at Prague Spring Festival
by Charles Shubow - May 26, 2016

It was quite a performance at the National Technical Museum....

BWW Review: GLAMOUR TANGO a Female Twist to the Sultry Dance
by Marsha Volgyi - May 18, 2016

On May 11, 2016, The Cutting Room on East 32nd Street housed Polly Ferman's Glamour Tango. In befitting cabaret style, wining and dining were part of this evening's performance. A four-piece band would allow our ears to hear live music, which is something quite rare if not at the opera or the ballet...

BWW Review: Midcoast Symphony Presents Stirring VERDI REQUIEM
by Carla Maria Verdino-Süllwold - May 16, 2016

Music Director Rohan Smith has certainly taken this fine community orchestra to a new level of excellence. This past weekend, joining forces with the Oratorio Chorale, directed by Emily Isaacson, the Vox Nova Chamber Orchestra, directed by Shannon M. Chase, and four guest soloists, the huge ensemble...

BWW Opera Review: Vertical Player Repertory Disinters Pacini's MALVINA DI SCOZIA
by Richard Sasanow - May 16, 2016

As part of the New York Opera Fest, Brooklyn's scrappy Vertical Player Repertory ventured into Manhattan's Christ and St. Stephen's Church near Lincoln Center, bringing with it a true rarity: Giovanni Pacini's bel canto-ish MALVINA DI SCOZIA, which dates from 1851. And while it was good to hear a wo...

BWW Opera Review: Few Sparks from Opera Orchestra in Donizetti's Formulaic PARISINA D'ESTE
by Richard Sasanow - May 09, 2016

Those of us with long enough memories can recall some exciting nights at Opera Orchestra of New York's concerts at Carnegie Hall, with Eve Queler at the helm. It's reputed that Donizetti's PARISINA D'ESTE made quite a stir with Montserrat Caballe in the spotlight in 1974--but anyone expecting histor...

BWW Opera Review: Oh, To Be Abducted from This SERAGLIO at the Met
by Richard Sasanow - May 04, 2016

I wonder whether James Levine imagined that Mozart's DIE ENFUHRUNG AUS DEM SERAIL (THE ABDUCTION FROM THE SERAGLIO) would be his swan song as Music Director of the Metropolitan Opera. I think he might have chosen better....

BWW Review: A Stunning PORGY AND BESS With the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and Morgan State University Choir
by Charles Shubow - May 03, 2016

What a thrill it was to hear George Gershwin's opera with the BSO under Maestra Marin Alsop....

BWW Review: Australian Brandenburg Orchestra's MOZART REQUIEM: 100 VOICES Brings Baroque Music To A New Generation
by Jade Kops - May 01, 2016

The rich old world sound of the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra and Brandenburg Choir is given a new youthful dimension with the Brandenburg Young Voices Choir for MOZART REQUIEM: 100 VOICES concert....

BWW Opera Review: MASTERVOICES Strikes a Masterful Chord with Dido and Aeneas
by Christina Pandolfi - May 02, 2016

A heavenly aura flooded through the regal New York City Center this past Thursday night at the MasterVoices premiere of Henry Purcell & Nahum Tate's baroque opera, Dido and Aeneas. With a full orchestra, the MasterVoices choir, and the Doug Varone and Dancers company, this unique production created ...

BWW Opera Review: Met's New ELEKTRA Has the Cast and Conductor--But Where's the Catharsis?
by Richard Sasanow - April 26, 2016

The Met's new production of Richard Strauss's ELEKTRA is something to behold, with Vincent Huguet recreating the original by the late Patrice Chereau from France's Aix-en-Provence Festival. Starring the glorious Nina Stemme in the title role--and backed by the stellar performances of Waltraud Meier ...

BWW Opera Review: SF vs. NY, Tilson Thomas vs. Gilbert, Mezzo vs. Baritone, But Audiences Take the LIED
by Richard Sasanow - April 25, 2016

Earth Day has come and gone in 2016, but symphonic orchestra audiences in New York have lots to remember from this year's celebration, with performances of Mahler's DAS LIED VON DER ERDE (SONG OF THE EARTH). In less than a week, we had two different versions of the piece, with differing pluses and m...

BWW Review: LES FETES VENITIENNES
by Wesley Doucette - April 22, 2016

A review of Robert Carsen's direction of 'Les Fetes Venitiennes,' as performed by Les Arts Florissants and L'Opera Comique at BAM....

BWW Review: THE PIANIST OF WILLESDEN LANE Melds Music, Storytelling, and Inspiration, at Portland Center Stage
by Krista Garver - April 13, 2016

Chalk up another winner for Portland Center Stage this season -- THE PIANIST OF WILLESDEN LANE is one you don't want to miss! Mona Golabek's one-woman show about her own mother's escape from Nazi-controlled Austria on the Kindertransport is part-concert, part-storytelling, and all magic....

BWW Reviews: Folds Spreads the Spotlight Around in Concert with CSO
by Paul Batterson - April 11, 2016

As a principal percussionist for the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, Philip Shipley is used to watching concerts from behind the oboes and the woodwinds. At the CSO's concert with Ben Folds on April 9, Shipley got distinctly different point of view....

BWW Review: Lawrence Brownlee Dominates CHARLIE PARKER'S YARDBIRD at New York's Apollo
by Richard Sasanow - April 07, 2016

As Charlie “Bird” Parker, the great jazz saxophonist, who is the central character in CHARLIE PARKER'S YARDBIRD--the opera that had its New York premiere last week at the famed Apollo Theatre in Harlem--Lawrence Brownlee wonderfully embraced the classical and bebop sides of the score....

BWW Review: Broadway Divas and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra Bring Girl Power to the Strathmore
by Vanessa Michaud - April 04, 2016

Talented vocalists Christina Bianco, N'Kenge, Kristen Plumley, and Mandy Gonzalez, in conjunction with Jack Everly and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, headlined the concert of classic songs from the Great White Way to honor some of the most beloved Broadway divas and musicals of our time at the Mu...

BWW Review: Radvanovsky Completes Donizetti Hat Trick with Potent DEVEREUX at the Met
by Richard Sasanow - April 01, 2016

“The Tudor Trilogy” --putting together Donizetti's ANNA BOLENA, MARIA STUARDA and ROBERTO DEVEREUX--was fabricated to light Beverly Sills' fire as “America's Queen of Opera” at the old New York City Opera. This season, soprano Sondra Radvanovsky was charged with bringing the trio of operas to the Me...

BWW Review: Audience LOVE-fest for Grigolo in Met's Cartoon-y ELISIR D'AMORE
by Richard Sasanow - March 29, 2016

Vittorio Grigolo's fans were out in force last week when he took on the star-tenor role of Nemorino in Donizetti's L'ELISIR D'AMORE (THE ELIXIR OF LOVE) at the Met and it seemed like they'd taken a potion of their own....

BWW Review: If It's Monday, It Must Be Puccini - Opolais is a Ravishing MADAMA BUTTERFLY at the Met
by Richard Sasanow - March 25, 2016

MADAMA BUTTERFLY was never my favorite Puccini until the current production conceived by Anthony Minghella. Before, Butterfly always seemed too submissive, Pinkerton too brutish and their child, well, too cute. Now—particularly with the current cast, headed by the magnificent Kristine Opolais as the...

BWW Review: The Audience Cheers Tenor Camarena in Delightful DON PASQUALE at the Met
by Richard Sasanow - March 23, 2016

Point/counterpoint: As if to set off its trio of Elizabethan tragedies by Donizetti, the Met is presenting two of the master's comedies. First up: DON PASQUALE, and it was a pip. (The other is L'ELISIR D'AMORE.) Too bad the Met underestimated its appeal, because it had a truncated run of only five p...

BWW Review: Sydney Symphony Orchestra's LAST NIGHT OF THE PROMS Brings British Tradition To The Sydney Opera House
by Jade Kops - March 18, 2016

THE LAST NIGHT OF THE PROMS delights Anglophiles with a recreation of the relaxed closing concert of the British summer season....

BWW Review: An Opera Grows in Brooklyn, Part II - Regina Opera Looks at LUCIA
by Richard Sasanow - March 16, 2016

On the surface, LoftOpera and Regina Opera couldn't be more different--the former turning away hipsters in East Williamsburg (call it Bushwick), the latter providing a matinees-only environment for a family audience. But these two Brooklyn institutions do have one important thing in common: They res...

BWW Review: An Opera Grows in Brooklyn, Part I - LoftOpera Takes on TOSCA
by Richard Sasanow - March 15, 2016

On the surface, LoftOpera and Regina Opera couldn't be more different--the former turning away hipsters in East Williamsburg (call it Bushwick), the latter providing a matinees-only environment for a family audience. But these two Brooklyn institutions do have one important thing in common: They res...

BWW Review: Sydney Symphony Orchestra's FROM THE CANYONS TO THE STARS Pairs Contemporary Orchestral Work With Landscape Images
by Jade Kops - March 10, 2016

Artistic Director and Conductor has paired Olivier Messiaen's contemporary orchestral work, Des Canons aux etoiles (FROM THE CANYONS TO THE STARS) with Deborah O'Grady's images to present a unique experience....