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Spring For Music at Carnegie Hall Featuring The Houston Symphony

In what is now one of the premiere spring events for classical music in the United States, Spring For Music brings together an impressive grouping of orchestras from across the nation and Canada for a series of performances, showcasing some of the greatest music ever created, at the world-renowned Carnegie Hall.

Carnegie Hall in New York City

Our very own Houston Symphony is kicking off the sophomore edition of this series on May …more…

Gotham Chamber Opera Celebrates Tenth Anniversary with Mozart Revival

Fittingly, Gotham Chamber Opera in New York City has come full circle since its debut production of W.A. Mozart’s one-act opera Il sogno di Scipione during the 2001-02 season. Fast forward 10 years to April 11, 2012, when the opera company will stage a revival of the work at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College.

Celena Shafer in the 2001 producion of "Il sogno di Scipione;" photo …more…

American Mavericks at Carnegie Hall: The California Contingent

On Thursday evening, March 29, New York City’s Carnegie Hall continues the final week of its American Mavericks series—which focuses on 17 singular composers of the 20th and 21st centuries, from Charles Ives to Morton Feldman to Steve Reich—with a decidedly West Coast focus.

"American Mavericks" Curator and Conductor Michael Tilson Thomas; photo by Terrence McCarthy, culled from Carnegie Hall web site.

Series curator and conductor Michael Tilson Thomas will lead …more…

Centennial Favorites, New Creations Meet at the Avant Music Festival 2012

Composer Randy Gibson(foreground) performing "Apparitions of The Four Pillars, Avant Music Festival 2011; culled from Avant Media's photostream on Flickr.

Rather paradoxically, “new” and experimental classical music is as much about the past as it is about the present. By its very nature, creating art that is avant-garde now demands an intimate understanding of what was avant-garde then. The aptly named Avant Music Festival–now in its third year in New …more…

Love Before Intimacy: Lola Montes Schnabel’s First U.S. Solo Show

"Exchange of Youth for Knowledge," 2001, 84 x 120 inches; photo courtesy of The Hole.

Visiting art gallery shows can be a particularly refreshing experience, contrasting in tone from the often retrospective views of museum exhibitions. There is a welcome immediacy in a gallery, the kind that grounds the viewer in the here and now.

Such is the case at Lola Montes Schnabel’s exhibition Love Before Intimacy at The Hole in …more…

Explore “The Common Object” at MICA

The Common Object is an exhibition of over 60 still life paintings created by 31 Zeuxis artists and their associates. It is now on display at the Maryland Institute College of Art. Zeuxis (named after a prominent painter in ancient Greece) is a group of painters work to continue to explore still life painting as many contemporary artists disregard it. The Common Object is on tour and the fourth and last stop is here in Baltimore. It originally opened at the Prince Street Gallery in New York City in October 2010. ...more...

Lembit Beecher Presents Documentary Oratorio And Then I Remember in NYC

Taimi Lepasaar, top, and Ants Lepasaar, flier for "And Then I Remember;" culled from Lembit Beecher's website.

Outside of the medium of opera, composers are not often characterized as storytellers. Increasingly in recent years, however, with the use of multimedia to tell abidingly personal stories in a concert setting, the description of composer-as-storyteller has become more apt.

At 8 p.m. today, January 20 and Saturday, January 21 at …more…

2012 NY Guitar Festival: Buster Keaton and the Sounds of Silence

The New Year is upon us. For New York City concertgoers, this means the arrival of the New York Guitar Festival, and with it the seemingly anachronistic Silent Films/Live Guitars series. ...more...

Sonic Revelry: New Year’s Eve in NYC

If you’re a classical music lover who will be in New York City on New Year’s Eve, perhaps Times Square isn’t on the top of your list of destinations for revelry. Here are three more than viable options for your last concert experience of 2011 ...more...

Hansel for the Holidays at the Metropolitan Opera

Angelika Kirschschlager as Hansel and Miah Persson as Gretel; photo by Marty Sohl, culled from the Metropolitan Opera website.

If there is one definitive, reigning holiday tradition at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, it’s Engelbert Humperdinck’s fairy tale opera Hansel and Gretel. Since its Metropolitan Opera premiere on November 25 in 1905 with the composer in attendance, the work has been frequently performed by the company …more…

Wordless Caroling: Phil Kline’s Unsilent Night, Nationwide

There are, of course, numerous classical music works that have become iconic holiday traditions in and of themselves–Handel’s Messiah, Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker,Benjamin Britten’s A Ceremony of Carolsamong them. ...more...

Anticipating Ecstatic: NYC Festival Announces Second Season

Just yesterday, it seems, New York was gearing up for October’s SONiC Festival, a celebration of 21st century music by composers under 40 years of age. Now, with November days dwindling and winter closing in, the city’s Ecstatic Music Festival has recently announced its second season of programming. ...more...

“Obey-thoven”: NYC’s WQXR Presents Live Beethoven Sonata Marathon

As part of its Beethoven Awareness Month, New York classical radio station WQXR presents a marathon of all 32 Ludwig van Beethoven piano sonatas six two-hour intervals in The Greene Space on Sunday, November 20, from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Among the myriad pianists performing the sonatas are Timothy Andres, Alessio Bax, Jonathan Biss, Jeremy Denk, and Jonathan Biss. Characterized by WQXR as an “Endurance Test,” a more fitting tribute to the enduring Beethoven would be difficult to find. ...more...

A Provocative Preview: Gotham Chamber Opera and Composer Nico Muhly Present Dark Sisters

An October 13 performance at the New York City venue Le Poisson Rouge, entitled  “Gotham Chamber Opera and Nico Muhly Conspire,”  often felt like an insurrection of sorts—if not against institutional opera per se—against an attitude of sterile gentility and divisive pretention.  One part eclectic recital, one part season preview, Gotham Chamber Opera presented an intimate set of disparate songs and provocative performances, all while promoting the upcoming world premiere …more…

DOC NYC: New York’s Documentary Film Festival

If you’re feeling a bit worn down by the slew of fictional films vying for your attention during this end of the year Oscar campaign mode, consider taking a break from it all by watching films grounded in a bit more reality.

While not as glamorous as The New York Film Festival or as star studded as The Tribeca Film Festival, DOC NYC is perhaps one of the premiere …more…