Classical Music Theater Reviews: Best Shows & Critic Recommendations Page 21

BWW Review: Captivating REQUIEM from Brahms, New York Philharmonic and New York Choral Artists
by Richard Sasanow - March 09, 2016

Brahms wasn't having a midlife crisis when he composed his masterwork, EIN DEUTSCHES REQUIEM (A GERMAN REQUIEM), his meditation on death. In fact, he was only 33 when he started writing it in 1866 and had written sections of the opening as early as 1861. His reasons for taking on the piece are uncle...

BWW Review: Louisville's SPRING COLLABORATION - Artists Are Breaking Out
by Keith Waits - March 08, 2016

The Louisville Orchestra and Louisville Ballet Spring Collaboration may be one of those nights we will talk about in the future. We will say -- Remember the night that the private conversation the artists shared went public?...

BWW Review: TRIAL BY JURY At Baltimore's Historic Westminster Hall - A Victorian Treat
by Charles Shubow - March 07, 2016

Gilbert & Sullivan's operetta performed by Baltimore lawyers and judges along with performers from the Young Victorian Theatre Company is just plain well-done!...

BWW Review: Furlanetto Shows Mastery in San Diego Concert
by Erica Miner - March 07, 2016

One of San Diego Opera's most cherished stage luminaries...

BWW Review: Diva Netrebko Casts Spell at Metropolitan Opera Recital
by Richard Sasanow - March 03, 2016

Anna Netrebko came out on stage in a shimmering white and silver gown with matching headband, looking like an Art Deco goddess in a poster by Alfonso Mucha. It's a look that suited her--not only because the Russian soprano has Bellini's NORMA on her Met schedule in the not-too-distant future, but be...

BWW Review: Darren Criss, Betsy Wolfe, and the National Symphony Bring a Little Broadway to Kennedy Center
by Jennifer Perry - February 28, 2016

One thing I can always count on when I go to a National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) Pops concert featuring music of the Great White Way - and perhaps beyond - is that the accomplished musicians and their exceptional conductor Steven Reineke will give it all the energy, vigor and verve it deserves. Thi...

BWW Review: SUTTON FOSTER Sparkles in Performance with the Baltimore Symphony
by Charles Shubow - February 23, 2016

Principal Baltimore Symphony Pops Conductor Jack Everly presents top notch entertainment....

BWW Review: High Art in Small Places, Part II - Von Stade's Bountiful Trip to EGYPT at American Songbook
by Richard Sasanow - February 23, 2016

Lincoln Center's American Songbook series doesn't usually cross the road to opera-land, but I'm glad it did, when it presented the Ricky Ian Gordon-Leonard Foglia chamber opera A COFFIN IN EGYPT with mezzo extraordinaire Frederica von Stade last week. Performed in Jazz at Lincoln Center's tiny Appel...

BWW Review: Broadway Valentine Exceeded All Expectations
by Anton Anderssen - February 22, 2016

The Michigan Philharmonic Orchestra exceeded all expectations on February 13 when it presented BROADWAY VALENTINE, a salute to some of the best love songs on Broadway.  Carefully chosen by Maesto Nan Washburn,  the program included selections from My Fair Lady, Les Miserables, Evita, Superstar, Grea...

BWW Review: Kristen Chenoweth with the Louisville Orchestra
by Keith Waits - February 22, 2016

There are a lot of superlatives that have been thrown around about the World Renowned Kristin Chenoweth: Stunning, personable, fun, entertaining. All are true and she demonstrated all of those traits when she came to Louisville for a second time and performed with our Louisville Orchestra under the ...

BWW Review: Kaufmann's Out, Alagna's In with Opolais in Met's New Film-Noir MANON LESCAUT
by Richard Sasanow - February 19, 2016

Take one part “Casablanca,” a taste of Bernstein's CANDIDE, some Alfred Hitchcock and you get Sir Richard Eyre's film noir concept for the Met's new MANON LESCAUT, now set in France in the 1940s, complete with Nazis. Tack on that behind-the-scenes drama of “Roberto Alagna to the rescue”--when tenor...

BWW Review: NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC MAHLER 6TH SYMPHONY at David Geffen Hall
by Peter Danish - February 18, 2016

Bychkov leads the NY Philharmonic a magnificent and majestic Mahler 6th....

BWW Review: Spectacular Sleepwalking in Bellini's SONNAMBULA at Juilliard Opera
by Richard Sasanow - February 17, 2016

It's a shame that Bellini wasn't Donizetti--because the story of LA SONNAMBULA seems to be begging for the full comic treatment and could have been a great companion to L'ELISIR D'AMORE. (I'm not sure how Maria Callas would have felt about changes in one of her great roles.) As it stands, performing...

BWW Review: NEW YORK CITY BALLET Triumphs With 'La Sylphide' and 'Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2'
by Sondra Forsyth - February 16, 2016

Peter Martins' reconstruction of the 1836 tragicomedy, 'La Sylphide', and Balanchine's 1972 update of 'Tschaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2' proved to be a particularly felicitous pairing for a February 12th to 18th run at the Koch Theater during New York City Ballet's Winter Season. 'La Sylphide', wit...

BWW Review: The Sydney Symphony Orchestra Joins With Diana Krall For The Sydney Leg Of Her WALLFLOWER WORLD TOUR
by Jade Kops - January 28, 2016

Diana Krall's deep smoky jazz fills Sydney Opera House's Concert Hall as she teams up with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra on the first Australian stop of her WALLFLOWER WORLD TOUR....

BWW Review: THE OTHER MOZART restores a genius at Aux Dog Nob Hill
by Devon Hoffman - January 27, 2016

A prodigy in her own right but suppressed because she was a woman and forgotten in the shadow of her brother Wolfgang, Maria Anna Mozart tells her true story in a galvanizing, intimate one-woman show, 'The Other Mozart,' touring from New York and playing at the Aux Dog Theater Nob Hill until January...

BWW Review: All Puccini, All the Time at the Met with LA BOHEME and TURANDOT
by Richard Sasanow - January 25, 2016

Sometimes, the Metropolitan Opera seems like an endless Puccini festival. It's particularly apparent this season, when top dogs LA BOHEME, TOSCA and MADAMA BUTTERFLY are joined by TURANDOT and MANON LESCAUT, which are not second drawer, though certainly less popular than the first three. (Let's see ...

BWW Review: CSO Brings Great Joy to Geffen Hall
by Kazimierz Nowak - January 18, 2016

When I'm sitting down to listen to a piece I can name my top 5 favorite recordings of in order with detailed reasons of why they're ranked as such, it's hard to not have certain expectations. It's even difficult to hear something executed brilliantly and accept it as brilliance if you 'want' to hear...

BWW Review: ON SONDHEIM: An Opinionated Guide
by Christina Pandolfi - January 05, 2016

As a self-proclaimed Broadway and theatre aficionado, I certainly thought I had a solid working knowledge of Stephen Sondheim. His music and lyrics have spanned a generation and impacted the world with innate complexity and thoughtfulness. In particular, Gypsy has had a tremendous personal impact on...

BWW Review: New York Pops and Carnegie Hall Present A CHARLIE BROWN CHRISTMAS
by Holly Kerr - December 30, 2015

On Sunday, December 20, at 3:00 PM in the Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage, Carnegie Hall's Weill Music Institute presented A Charlie Brown Christmas. This was a special holiday family concert that was a collaboration between five New York City arts organizations: The New York Pops, The Carnegie Hall...

BWW Review: Jodi Benson and Charlie Brown at SF Symphony
by Harmony Wheeler - December 21, 2015

San Francisco continues a – hopefully – new tradition this week with “A Charlie Brown Christmas – Live!” This delightful program had its West Coast premiere last season, with first-half vocals from Lisa Vroman and the Symphony Chorus. This week, the concert features “Little Mermaid” voice Jodi Benso...

BWW Review: Brian Stokes Mitchell at SF Symphony
by Harmony Wheeler - December 18, 2015

Performer Brian Stokes Mitchell speaks of his desire to uplift his audience by adding character to his music. Davies Symphony Hall discovered his exact meaning Wednesday when "Stokes" - "affectionately" called so by conductor Randall Craig Fleischer - immediately lit up the stage with a hearty smile...

BWW Review: GRADUATE SINGERS – NATIVITY Points The Way Towards Christmas
by Barry Lenny - December 15, 2015

Sixty singers under the direction of Karl Geiger, made a suitably strong and joyful noise in Nativity....

BWW Review: Vivaldi's CATONE is a 'Hot Mess' - and a Great One from Opera Lafayette
by Richard Sasanow - December 09, 2015

On paper, Vivaldi's 1737 opera seria CATONE IN UTICA--involving a confrontation between Cato and Caesar--seems a big mess: The music from the first act is missing and musicologists can't agree what the third act should look and sound like, leaving Act II to make or break a performance of the opera. ...

BWW Review: BUGS BUNNY AT THE SYMPHONY II
by Harmony Wheeler - December 04, 2015

Bugs Bunny at the Symphony closes its 25th Anniversary, 2015 tour at San Francisco's Davies Hall this weekend. Outside, Civic Center has its holiday decorations up and a community brass group occasionally plays down the street, while inside the San Francisco Symphony continues its tradition of beaut...