May 1, 2023 • 5:08 pm 0
Congratulations to composer James Díaz, Musical America’s New Artist of the Month for May 2023. My profile:
When he was 14, James Díaz started taking keyboard lessons thanks to the toss of a coin. His parents wanted to have one of their two sons receive training so as to be able to play in the local church. Díaz, born in 1990, would commute every day from his working-class district on the outskirts of Bogotá. …
Filed under: artist profile, composers, Musical America
April 1, 2023 • 11:03 am Comments Off on Sameer Patel: Musical America’s New Artist of the Month
I had the pleasure of writing this profile of Sameer Patel, Musical America’s New Artist of the Month for April 2023:
As he describes the career choices that have led to his current position, Sameer Patel refers to a verse from the Bhagavad Gita: “‘It’s better to strive in one’s own dharma than to succeed in the dharma of another’ — in other words, to follow your own virtue or path or journey.”
Filed under: conductors, Musical America
March 1, 2023 • 8:38 am Comments Off on A Thousand Splendid Suns Dawns at Seattle Opera
The moving operatic transformation of Khaled Hosseini’s 2007 novel A Thousand Splendid Suns by composer Sheila Silver and librettist Stephen Kitvakos had its world premiere over the weekend at Seattle Opera in a powerful production directed by Roya Sadat. I reviewed the opening night performance for Musical America:
Soon after reading A Thousand Splendid Suns, Sheila Silver sensed that the story’s combination of tragedy and endurance has an archetypal, larger-than-life quality — exactly what opera excels at expressing. It’s a terrible irony that the work’s lengthy genesis has actually made this story of the oppression of women even timelier than when Silver first considered the idea over a decade ago….[see below]
Filed under: Musical America, new opera, review, Seattle Opera
December 1, 2022 • 11:32 am Comments Off on Musical America’s New Artist of the Month: Nina Shekhar
I wrote about the fantastically talented composer Nina Shekhar for this month’s Musical America column:
Questions involving identity have fascinated Nina Shekhar since she can remember. Coming of age as a first-generation Indian American has meant learning to navigate different cultural expectations not only in her personal life but also in her priorities as an artist. “A lot of my work is identity driven,” the composer explained in a recent conversation via Zoom. “Music was always a way of understanding my relationship to myself and to my environment.”
Filed under: composers, Musical America
November 1, 2022 • 8:53 am 1
Congratulations to cellist Zlatomir Fung, Musica; America’s New Artist focus for November. I had the pleasure of hearing his New York Philharmonic debut last summer at the Bravo! Vail Festival. Here’s my profile:
Competing with nature’s own surround-sound orchestra, open-air performances aren’t the optimal context in which a soloist can shine. But Zlatomir Fung kept me riveted at this past summer’s Bravo! Vail Festival, eager not to miss a single nuance from the moment…
Filed under: artist profile, cellists, Musical America
March 1, 2022 • 8:04 am Comments Off on Musical America’s New Artist of the Month: Lee Mills
For this month’s column, I had the privilege of writing about this very talented young conductor:
When he was still in college, Lee Mills had a dream job of becoming a roller coaster designer. But the unexpected career path he ended up following has given the young conductor another way of providing some very memorable thrills—especially during the current season of turbulent twists and turns….
Filed under: conductors, music news, Musical America, Seattle Symphony
February 11, 2022 • 11:20 am Comments Off on George Crumb: An Appreciation
Reflecting on George Crumb for Musical America:
The American composer George Crumb, whose innovative, theatrically charged soundscapes explored a new kind of musical poetry, has died after a long and far-reaching career. He was 92.
Filed under: American music, George Crumb, music news, Musical America
December 11, 2021 • 10:46 am 1
Congratulations to Seattle Opera’s Christina Scheppelmann for being ranked among Musical America’s Top 30 Professionals of the Year:
“In January 2020, when Seattle Opera announced its next season, it was the first to be programmed by the company’s new general director, Christina Scheppelmann. She had arrived eight months earlier as one of only a few women to lead a major opera company, but after the pandemic lockdown set in, the season might have been lost entirely if not for her determination. ‘I don’t like to stick my head in the sand,’ said Scheppelmann, previously artistic director of Barcelona’s Fundació del Gran Teatre del Liceu. ‘Doing nothing and waiting out the pandemic was not an option. I wanted to deliver the season we promised, and I saw an opportunity to get it done within public health restrictions we needed to follow.'”
Filed under: music news, Musical America, Seattle Opera
November 22, 2021 • 9:09 am 1
I reviewed Seattle Symphony’s latest program: a world premiere of a new double harp concerto by Hannah Lash and Amy Beach’s “Gaelic” Symphony:
SEATTLE — An unexpectedly last-minute round of musical chairs reshuffled the lineup for one of the most unusual and original programs of the Seattle Symphony season. As a double harp concerto, Hannah Lash’s The Peril of Dreams, an SSO commission, in itself represents a rarity in the orchestral literature. That it was paired with the seldom-programmed “Gaelic” Symphony by Amy Beach made the occasion all the more remarkable….
continue [paywall]
Filed under: Musical America, new music, review, Seattle Symphony
November 1, 2021 • 8:49 am Comments Off on Jesús Rodolfo: Musical America’s New Artist of the Month
I wrote about the remarkable young violist Jésus Rodolfo for Musical America’s New Artist of the Month column:
At heart, Jesús Rodolfo is a storyteller who uses four strings and a bow to give voice to his restless imagination. The young Spanish violist constantly returns to the model of narrative—even when discussing music as formally abstract as Paul Hindemith’s sonatas for the instrument, which rank among his favorites. Two of his albums to date are devoted to the composer’s sonatas (those with piano accompaniment and the solo viola sonatas).
Filed under: Musical America
Arts & Culture Stories from NPR
MEMETERIA by Thomas May 