In today’s Orange County Register online, I review yesterday’s performance of “Madama Butterfly” by Los Angeles Opera.
Click here to read my review, or pick up a copy of tomorrow’s newspaper.
Thanksgiving
A Register columnist gives thanks for our paper’s current prospects. Oddly perhaps, yours truly serves as an emblem for what went wrong, though it certainly did feel as if I was living in one of the upper circles of Hell.
Click here to read the column.
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Onwards and upwards.
Photo: Manzanar, Ansel Adams, Library of Congress.
Punk Beethoven
In today’s Orange County Register online, I review John Eliot Gardiner, the ORR and Monterverdi Choir in performances of Beethoven’s “Missa Solemnis” and Ninth Symphony.
Click here to read my review, or pick up a copy of tomorrow’s newspaper.
Stinker
Lisa Hirsch points out this review in the Sacramento Press and rightly calls it a “travesty.”
You have to read it to believe it.
The correction at the end will give you some idea of how completely out of his element the writer was:
“Editor’s Note: The second and fifteenth paragraphs of this article have been amended. Please note that the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra is not affiliated with Western Health Advantage. Western Health Advantage only sponsored this particular event. ”
But there are plenty of blunders to go around. I feel sorry for the writer — whether he sought to review the concert or was assigned; he had no business being there.
Gardiner-variety Beethoven
I chatted this week with conductor John Eliot Gardiner about his upcoming Beethoven concerts (“Missa Solemnis,” the Ninth) here in O.C.
Click here to read the interview, or pick up a copy of tomorrow’s Orange County Register.
Salonen and the Philharmonia: Five Bs
In today’s Orange County Register online, I review last night’s performance by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen.
Click here to read my review, or pick up a copy of tomorrow’s newspaper.
photo: Benjamin Ealovega
Beethoven guarantee
Want to hear the second (or third) best performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony you’ve ever heard for free?
Here’s how.
1. Buy a ticket to the Philharmonic Society’s presentation of John Eliot Gardiner, the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, Monteverdi Choir and soloists performing the work on Nov. 20 in Segerstrom Concert Hall.
2. Afterwards, take your ticket to the Philharmonic Society box office and say, “Well, Gardiner was good, but he’s no Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt” or some such, and the Philharmonic Society will fork over your dough.
That’s right. The Philharmonic Society is offering a money back guarantee to the concert.
“If this is not the best performance of Beethoven’s Ninth you’ve ever heard, you can have your money back,” the Society’s president, Dean Corey, says in a news release. “You have my word on it.”
OK, so, it’s a marketing ploy, but rather a clever one, I think, and one that the Society isn’t likely to lose their shirts on.
Ute Lemper sings with Pacific Symphony
In today’s Orange County Register online, I review Ute Lemper and the Pacific Symphony in a performance of music by Kurt Weill and George Gershwin, and songs made famous by Edith Piaf. It was a disaster, though I tried to be kind.
Click here to read my review, or pick up a copy of tomorrow’s newspaper.
Warsaw wonders
In today’s Orange County Register online, I review last night’s concert given by Antoni Wit and the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra (yes, they played some Lutoslawski). The latest winner of Warsaw’s Chopin Competition also performed.
Click here to read my review, or pick up a copy of tomorrow’s newspaper.
Orange County singer wins Met Opera’s Western regionals
O.C. baritone wins Met Opera’s regional contest, The Orange County Register, Nov. 7, 2012.
Click on the link above, or pick up a copy of Friday’s newspaper.
Photo: Courtesy of Chapman University
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