What’s Coming Up in Arts and Culture for 2023. Voice of OC, Jan. 13, 2023.
Roger Angell, 1920-2022
I had the considerable pleasure to interview the great baseball writer Roger Angell in 2006. Below, I reprint a Q and A I made in 2008 from the original interview. New York Times obituary here.
How to write like an Angell
April 29, 2008 | Orange County Register, The: Blogs (Santa Ana, CA)
Author/Byline: Timothy Mangan; music critic | Section: The Arts Blog
1278 Words | Readability: Lexile: 1030, grade level(s): 6 7 8
I spoke with longtime New Yorker baseball writer Roger Angell back in 2006 upon the publication of his eloquent memoir, “Let Me Finish.” It struck me that his baseball writing was nothing but criticism in another form, and I’ve learned a lot from reading him (for instance, it’s important to be a fan of the artform you’re writing about, and allow the reader to know it). Here’s just part of the interview I had with him, put in the form of a Q and A. Writers take note: you might learn something.
TM: What’s going on with your baseball writing?
RA: Well, I’m not doing much but I’ll be doing some more. It’s hard for any writers to get close to the players now, because there’s so much media around them and they’re so media attuned that its hard to get stuff out of them that really feels fresh. But I share that problem, it’s not just because I’m old. But also I am old and they look at me and they call me sir, which is a big disadvantage.
TM: But you’re still going to games?
Review: Pacific Symphony performs ‘Otello’
Review: Pacific Symphony Mounts a Surefire Production of Verdi’s ‘Otello’ in Segerstrom Concert Hall. Voice of OC, April 8, 2022
Review: Rattle and London Symphony at Segerstrom Concert Hall
Review: London Symphony Orchestra performs blockbuster program at Segerstrom with mixed results. Voice of OC, March 24, 2022.
Review: Ohlsson and Gerstein at Soka
Review: Pianists Team for an Evening of Music for Two Pianos at Soka. Voice of OC, March 8, 2022.
May 6, 1991
WEEKEND REVIEWS : Music : Kawakubo, Glendale Symphony
BY TIMOTHY MANGAN
MAY 6, 1991 12 AM PT
It takes time for a conductor to develop a rapport with an orchestra. If the Glendale Symphony’s concert Saturday night at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion is fair evidence, then Lalo Schifrin, now two years into his music directorship, needs more of it.
In an old-fashioned program more typical of 1890s London than 1990s Los Angeles, Schifrin led his orchestra in undistinguished, often messy run-throughs.
So it remained for 11-year-old violinist Tamaki Kawakubo to steal the spotlight. In her performance of Edouard Lalo’s “Symphonie Espagnole,” she exhibited enthusiasm and an almost nonchalant technique. Kawakubo is no automaton. Though her musical expression is still imitative, the gusto of her delivery imparts a style that is refreshingly unprecocious.
Schifrin closed with a ‘Wagner Spectacular” that included a contrapuntally quagmired “Die Meistersinger” Prelude, a disheveled “Tannhauser” Overture and a fast, ill-balanced Ride of the Valkyries, played twice. He opened with what is thankfully a rarity these days, the “Bacchanale” from Saint-Saens’ “Samson et Delila.”
Ozu and Schumann
This pairing of a sequence from a silent film directed by Yasujiro Ozu with the music of Robert Schumann is magical.
Review: New chamber group debuts at the Barclay
New Chamber Group Debuts at the Barclay. Voice of OC, June 28, 2021.
Schumann on ‘Frasier’
The following once transpired on network television.
Things are going real bad for Dr. Frasier Crane. His high-school reunion is coming up and he’s unemployed, unmarried and without a date. To alleviate the first circumstance, he goes to a job interview but blows it big time.
Enter Frasier’s dad and brother Niles into Frasier’s apartment.
He is nowhere to be seen. Daphne, the English house servant, approaches.
Daphne: Am I glad you’re home.
Dad: What’s wrong?
Daphne: It’s Dr. Crane. Ever since he came back from his job interview he’s seemed awfully depressed. In fact, he’s as bad as I’ve ever seen him.
Niles (concerned): Oh, I guess it didn’t go well?
Daphne: Oh, I gather not. He mumbled something about it being worse than the Dresden premiere of Schumann’s Second Symphony.
Niles (now frantic): And you left him alone?!
Review: Pacific Symphony launches series of pandemic concerts online
Review: Pacific Symphony Launches Series of Pandemic Concerts Online. Voice of OC, Feb. 27, 2021
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