[contextly_auto_sidebar id="XtxFdbJyLsCS5dQHdicsk1xjrReqe1hk"] LAST night, pianist Brad Mehldau and tenor saxophonist Joshua Redman played separate sets at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. These are perhaps the two leading jazz musicians of my generation, so there was no way I was going to miss it. While I would have loved to see these two, who've worked together in the past, play a … [Read more...]
LA Phil Goes to Scandinavia
[contextly_auto_sidebar id="8kEqCdbcCqQwhdKRJpToOBscTE4zIEM7"] ON Saturday night, I caught an all-Scandinavian Los Angeles Philharmonic concert that included a West Coast premiere of an Anders Hillborg piece and violinist Hilary Hahn playing a Nielsen concerto. The whole concert was strong -- I was amazed at the sounds Hahn was able to coax out of her violin -- but Hillborg's King Tide was so … [Read more...]
Elaine Stritch and Her Inspirations
EVERY two weeks, I speak to a performer coming to town and ask them about their influences, figures who drove them into a life in the arts or helped shape what they do. But my latest subject -- Broadway's tough dame Elaine Stritch -- was having none of it.Here is my latest Influences column, which I nearly had to rename.She was also surprised to note that despite the success of her Elaine Stritch … [Read more...]
Wily Finn Magnus Lindberg
NEXT to Esa-Pekka Salonen, the most visible Finnish classical musician over the last few decades has been his old partner in crime Magnus Lindberg, who is completing a three-year term as composer-in-residence with the New York Philharmonic.Lindberg is a playful kind of modernist who has recently, as he told me, started to blend his avant-garde tendencies (interest in electronica, industrial music, … [Read more...]
The Roots of Leila Josefowicz
I EXPECT I'm not the only one looking forward to the concert at Disney Hall tonight, which continues over the weekend: the new Philip Glass symphony, in its West Coast premiere, with John Adams' Violin Concerto, both conducted by Adams himself. And the violin part in the Adams piece -- some days, my favorite piece by the bearded Bay Area composer -- will be played by the lovely and talented Leila … [Read more...]
The Return of Steve Reich
ON Tuesday I saw a fascinating concert by Steve Reich and Bang on a Can at Disney Hall. Once considered a minimalist with few ties to the mainstream, Mark Swed wrote in his review, Reich is now one of the most important and influential composers alive.I sat down with Reich a few years ago and found him very accessible and easy going. My article starts by referring to the landmark "Music for 18 … [Read more...]
The Roots of Preservation Hall
THE latest installment for my Influences column is Ben Jaffe, son of the founders of Preservation Hall Jazz Band and the New Orleans institution's current leader. (My story is here.)Jaffe, who marched in carnival parades as a 9-year-old and later attended Oberlin College, described classic Crescent City figures -- Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong -- as well as some lesser known musicians and a … [Read more...]
Cameron Carpenter, Classical Wild Man
THE young organist Cameron Carpenter is a thinker, a talker, a rebel and a nearly androgynous figure in white jeans -- I think of him as a cross between '50s Glenn Gould and '70s David Bowie. He makes other classical iconoclasts I know -- Jeremy, for instance -- seem middle of the road.I spoke to Carpenter for the Los Angeles Times Influences column, which I am taking over for a while. When I told … [Read more...]
Classical LA
ANGELENOS don’t need to be told that they live in one of the nation’s best cities for classical music, but it may still be news to much of the rest of the world. On that count, I wrote a piece for the fall issue of Listen, the classical music magazine, that looks at the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Hollywood Bowl, local chamber music series, and oddball programs like Classical Underground.The whole … [Read more...]
The Many Moods of Keith Jarrett
As a longtime fan of idiosyncratic jazz pianist Keith Jarrett, I would have been disappointed if I'd seen him perform without reaming out at least one audience member. And I was not disappointed.Last night Jarrett made one of his rare appearances at LA's Disney Hall, and this show was devoted to solo improvisation -- pure Keith, unalloyed. He began the performance with a strange, gentle kind of … [Read more...]