a virtual journal and blog of the classical music scene in Boston
Robert Levin, editor; Bettina A. Norton, executive editor; Lee Eiseman, publisher
News & Features
October 20, 2011
Berlioz’s Béatrice et Bénédict at Cutler Majestic
by BMINT STAFF
In a production by Opera Boston, Berlioz’s last opera, Béatrice et Bénédict, based on Shakespeare’s comedy Much Ado About Nothing, will have a three-performance run at the Cutler Majestic beginning on October 21st. Set by the noted Metropolitan Opera stage director, David Kneuss, in the frothy 1950s, the production features noted singers, mezzo-soprano Julie Boulianne [...]
October 18, 2011
Pianist Bronfman Cancels at BSO
by BMINT STAFF
Pianist Yefim Bronfman needs to rest and recuperate from an injury to one of his fingers and will not be able to perform Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 2 in the Boston Symphony Orchestra concerts of October 20, 21, and 22. Pianist Nicholas Angelich will substitute in these performances, making his BSO debut.
October 13, 2011
From NEC to Tchaikovsky Victory: Narek Hakhnazaryan
by BMINT STAFF
On October 16, Boston Chamber Music Society will be opening its 29th season with a special guest, Narek Hakhnazaryan, who will be making his first Boston appearance since winning the Gold Medal in cello in this year’s Tchaikovsky Competition and making many celebratory concerto appearances with major orchestras. At Sanders Theatre beginning at 7:30 the BCMS [...]
October 12, 2011
Kashkashian’s Music For Social Justice
by Susan Miron
Kim Kashkashian’s mission to engage musicians in social action continues with a concert at NEC’s Brown Hall on October 17th. You might think that being a world-class viola player with a multifaceted career as a soloist, chamber music player, and teacher would leave one little time to adopt another energy-consuming endeavor. Well, yes, unless the [...]
October 11, 2011
Recording Versus Marketing at BSO and Elsewhere
by David Griesinger
Asked to comment on John Newton’s recent Intelligencer article on recording and archiving at the BSO and to the comments therein here, BMInt writer David Griesinger responded in extraordinary detail (for a comment). We publish his response as an article. A reply to the comments after John Newton’s article would have to be book length [...]
October 6, 2011
Beyond the BU Fringe Festival
by Bettina A. Norton
Performances, lectures, and discussion in this year’s Fringe Festival, the fifteenth from Boston University, running from from October 9 through 28, will focus on art’s response to the different aspects of violence in our society, a timely theme, given the world’s current multitude of religious conflicts and the individual psychological stresses of a society replete [...]
October 3, 2011
Change is On The Air
by Lee Eiseman
On September 29, BMInt Publisher Lee Eiseman interviewed Ben Roe, director of classical services for WGBH about the new Classical New England, and on the major changes to be made public today. Eiseman: Ben, there’s going to be some big news on Monday. I gather we’re going to be hearing a lot less about WCRB, which will [...]
October 2, 2011
Ins and Outs of BSO Recording
by John Newton
In celebration of the 60th anniversary of the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s first broadcast on October 6, 1951, the BSO will return to return to the WCRB airwaves this coming Thursday night for a special broadcast. In addition to interviews and recorded features, the program will present Sean Newhouse conducting Britten’s Four Sea Interludes, from Peter [...]
September 30, 2011
Boston’s “Conservatorio” — The First
by Teresa F. Mazzulli
Inspiration for The Boston Musical Intelligencer, as readers of “About…” know, was the 19th-century publication of John Sullivan Dwight, the most learned and influential periodical on classical music in the history of the U.S.—Dwight’s Journal of Music, issued from 1852 to 1881. Nothing quite like it has been in print since then. Read on. “Before [...]
September 20, 2011
Mahler Unleashed by NEC
by BMINT STAFF
Back in the mid-20th century, Mahler’s symphonies were considered an acquired taste and were rarely heard. Not so now, but New England Conservatory, in highlighting its upcoming festival devoted to this Austrian composer, decided provocatively to title it “Mahler Unleashed.” The 19-concert festival, which runs through December, starts on September 26 at 5:30 with Mahler [...]
Alisa Weilerstein Named MacArthur Fellow
by BMINT STAFF
Cellist Alisa Weilerstein, a member of New England Conservatory’s ensemble-in-residence the Weilerstein Trio, was named as recipient of one of 22 MacArthur Fellowships for 2011. This “Genius” Grant brings her $500,000 in support over five years. Her work is very well known to Boston concert-goers and BMInt readers. A listing of all of her Intelligencer reviews and mentions can be found here. [Click title for complete article]
September 15, 2011
Modern Medieval Morality Play Thru’ Opera
by BMINT STAFF
Whoever says that opera is a quaint, irrelevant, relic from the 19th century has never seen a production by Guerilla Opera — an upstart group of iconoclasts intent on blasting opera into a realm of immediacy and newness. Is it vulgar? Well, it’s not exactly refined. Here’s what BMInt said of Guerilla’s Heart of a [...]
September 14, 2011
Sean Roberts Remembered
by BMINT STAFF
BMInt announces with deep regret the untimely death of Sean Roberts, executive director of The Boston Classical Orchestra for the last four years. At the Intelligencer we felt a special kinship with Sean. He was extremely helpful in organizing and promoting BMInt’s successful town meeting on “Whither Classical Music in Boston: A discussion of the recent changes at [...]
September 6, 2011
To Remember September 11, 2001
by BMINT STAFF
There are many ways to remember September 11, 2001. For the tenth anniversary recognition in Boston we know of three music based events throughout the day. At 2:00 pm at Jordan Hall, New England Conservatory and the City of Boston are presenting their (sold out) “Day of Remembrance,” a gala concert with orchestra and soloists [...]
Injury Forces James Levine To Cancel At Met Opera
by BMINT STAFF
Fabio Luisi has been named met principal Conductor and will lead the new production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni as well as initial performances of Wagner’s Siegfried. Mr. Levine is now recuperating following required surgery after his accidental fall while on vacation in Vermont.
September 1, 2011
Vilna Ghetto Recalled in Yiddish Songs
by Bettina A. Norton
As a child (in the World-War II era) on the North Slope of Beacon Hill, I used to jump the roofs abutting Vilna Shul, then a religious center for that Lithuanian town’s early twentieth-century immigrants to Boston. At precisely the time of my aerial highjinks, Yiddish poetry was being set to music for four revue [...]
BMInt’s Accomplishments Heartening
by Robert Levin
When Lee Eiseman, Bettina A. Norton, and I embarked on starting a classical music website in 2008, our enthusiasm was qualified by naiveté. We were convinced that greater Boston needed and deserved better coverage of its musical events, but we were uncertain whether we had the abilities to provide a persuasive alternative. How heartened we [...]
August 12, 2011
A.R.T. Takes New Spin on Porgy
by Howard Pollack
An adaptation of George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess starring Norm Lewis, Audra McDonald and Phillip Boykin is scheduled to open at the American Repertory Theatre on August 17 at The Loeb Drama Center in Cambridge, across the river from where the opera premiered in 1935. Director Diane Paulus has reconceived the libretto in collaboration with [...]
August 10, 2011
Accomplished Young Pianist’s Concert at Walnut Hill
by BMINT STAFF
For the twentieth consecutive year The Foundation for Chinese Performing Arts is sponsoring its annual music festival at Walnut Hill School for the Arts. In addition to attending lectures, concerts and masterclasses, the forty-three students selected by audition from Taiwan, China, Canada , and the United States for a three-week residency get much individual study [...]
July 28, 2011
Free Concerts at Composers Conference
by Zoe Kemmerling
Summer is that magical season when the fortunate among musicians sequester themselves at festivals and seminars to perform, debate, and carouse with like-minded artists all day, every day. Just down the highway at Wellesley College is one such haven, the Wellesley Composers Conference, which in addition to being a highly sought-after and prestigious destination for [...]
July 27, 2011
NEC Triple Grad Off for NY Philharmonic
by BMINT STAFF
New York Philharmonic Music Director Alan Gilbert has chosen recent NEC graduate Joshua Weilerstein to be assistant conductor for 2011-12 Season. His responsibilities in New York will begin soon after he completes his duties as assistant conductor of Aspen Music Festival and School. This is very much a local story, since the twenty-three-year-old Weilerstein has [...]
July 26, 2011
Super-mix of Ear-Expanding Music
by BMINT STAFF
The Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival at MASS MoCA (the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art) is now halfway through its edgy contemporary music series. The residency concludes with the six-hour Marathon Concert featuring performances by the student/faculty ensembles on Saturday, July 30. Meanwhile, there are daily performances in the museum galleries, free with [...]
July 24, 2011
Opera in English. In the summertime. At affordable prices.
by BMINT STAFF
This is the niche adopted by Boston Midsummer Opera, and it is proving a welcome approach to, as they state, “ward off the summer doldrums.” BMO is offering Rossini’s “The Italian Girl in Algiers” — L’Italiana in Algeri — on July 27, 29, and 31 at the Tsai Performance Center of Boston University. Conductor of [...]
July 13, 2011
Scrappy ’70s Falstaff Promised by BOC
by BMINT STAFF
Since 2006, a scrappy young opera company, Boston Opera Collaborative, has been presenting grand opera on shoestring budgets at unconventional locations. The results have frequently exceeded expectations, looking and sounding far better that they have any right to. A production of Verdi’s Falstaff scheduled at the Somerville Theatre on July 15-24 is next in line [...]
July 10, 2011
Pipe Organ Encounters — in Concerts and Policy
by Christian Lane
Between July 17 and 22 Boston will host Pipe Organ Encounters. Sponsored by the local American Guild of Organists (AGO) contingent, the get-together aims to familiarize thirteen- to eighteen-year-old students of piano and organ with the pipe organ and to socialize them into the organ milieu. Further it provides concerts of interest to the public [...]