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PostClassical Ensemble’s “Cultural Fusion: The Gamelan Experience,” presented on January 23, 2019, at the Washington National Cathedral, was just named THE BEST CLASSICAL MUSIC EVENT of 2019 by Washington Classical Review. To hear extended excerpts from this one-of-a-kind event -- featuring Javanese and Balinese gamelans, and surveying more than a century of gamelan-inspired … [Read more...] about “Best of the Year” — The Gamelan Experience: From Debussy to Lou Harrison

The formidable Norwegian soprano Lisa Davidsen, making her Metropolitan Opera debut in Tchaikovsky’s Queen of Spades, is right now New York’s most talked about opera singer. I caught the final performance in the run, on December 21 – and discovered myself mainly thinking about the Bolshoi Opera’s historic four-week New York season of 1975. The Bolshoi was a throwback to the … [Read more...] about “Pique Dame” at the Met — and at the Bolshoi

“America’s forbidden composer” is Arthur Farwell (1872-1952), leader of the “Indianists” movement in music. As I’ve discussed in a recent blog: politically, Farwell seems hopelessly incorrect today. But impressions of Farwell, insofar as they endure, are typically misimpressions. His significance is not merely historical. He composed some of the most original and compelling … [Read more...] about America’s Forbidden Composer: Take Two — Listening to Arthur Farwell

The latest installment of Conrad L. Osborne’s indispensable opera blog takes stock of Porgy and Bess and the Met’s acclaimed new production. It also graciously plugs my own recent series of Porgy blogs in this space, my American Scholar review of the Met Porgy, and my book (“On My Way” – the Untold Story of Rouben Mamoulian, George Gershwin, and “Porgy and Bess”) about this … [Read more...] about Porgy — Take Four

                                               -- I -- “Arthur Farwell is probably the most neglected composer in our history. . . . At the … [Read more...] about America’s Forbidden Composer