For cultured South Florida listeners seeking to hear things they've never heard before, who think that the area is inundated with only classic rock nostalgia tours and tribute acts paying homage to them, this "buzz" is for you. The sixth installment of Bumblefest (www.Bumblefest.com), celebrating the 11th anniversary of Lake Clarke Shores-based promoter and publisher … [Read more...]
Convivial, enthusiastic Mozart, Schumann enliven SFSO chamber evening
By Robert Croan With live classical music scarce at this time of year, South Florida Symphony Orchestra’s chamber music series in Miami and Fort Lauderdale has been a welcome addition to the cultural scene, as well as continuing evidence of the organization’s self-described commitment to community engagement. The third and final program (heard July 22 at Fort … [Read more...]
West Palm’s own jam band, Guavatron, seeks larger territory
None of the members of young, West Palm Beach-based quartet Guavatron (www.guavatron.com) are old enough to remember when the original "jam bands" started out in the late 1960s, long before that term was ever coined. That's when the California-spawned Grateful Dead, Georgia act the Allman Brothers Band, and British bands like Cream and Pink Floyd colored outside of the … [Read more...]
Guitarist Carlton masterful at Funky Biscuit show
Larry Carlton is on the short list of iconic jazz/fusion guitarists who emerged between the late 1960s and mid-1970s, bringing more attention toward the subgenre that mixes jazz with rock and other popular music forms. And during his late show at the Funky Biscuit in Boca Raton on July 24, "Mr. 335" (a nickname based upon his frequent use of the hollow-bodied electric … [Read more...]
Guitar hero Carlton to revisit greatest hits, plus Steely Dan, Crusaders, in Boca gigs
Jazz/fusion emerged as a musical subgenre from the late 1960s through the mid-1970s by blending traditional acoustic jazz with instruments more associated with rock, namely electric guitar. And some names rose to the fore in the process that are now practically household, including guitarists John McLaughlin, Pat Metheny, Allan Holdsworth, Jeff Beck, and Larry Carlton. … [Read more...]
Young sibling violin-piano duo delights Lauderdale chamber music audience
By Robert Croan FORT LAUDERDALE - The South Florida Symphony Orchestra, having completed its regular season, is brightening up this year’s already long, hot summer, with a series of three chamber music concerts, each held in Fort Lauderdale’s Center for Spiritual Living and at Temple Israel of Greater Miami. The second of these, seen June 24 in Fort Lauderdale, featured … [Read more...]
Palm Beach Chamber Music Festival returns in one-week format
Over the 30 years that the Palm Beach Chamber Music Festival has been presenting summer concerts, its musicians have presented more than 500 pieces, the majority of which have been pieces from worthy but infrequently visited corners of the repertoire. It’s a remarkable legacy, and its mix of adventurousness and first-rate playing can be explored on the six recordings its … [Read more...]
Oz Noy offers improvisational variety at Funky Biscuit Show
Prior to June 3, Israel-born, Manhattan-based jazz/fusion guitarist Oz Noy's last appearance at the Funky Biscuit in Boca Raton was barely more than two-and-a-half years ago. Yet those two shows in November of 2019, with bassist Hadrien Feraud and drummer Dave Weckl, appear further back in time because they occurred in a seemingly distant era -- pre-COVID-19. Noy's … [Read more...]
Record review: Bright, vigorous Telemann from violinist Cotik
Tomás Cotik is a violinist, a professor at Portland State University, and perhaps most important, a scholar whose projects for the Centaur Records label have included complete surveys of the Mozart violin sonatas and Schubert violin-and piano works, as well as the Bach sonatas and partitas. Each of these recordings was accompanied by deeply learned program notes by Cotik, who … [Read more...]
FGO’s ‘Agrippina’ has fascinating staging, recitative-heavy editing
By Rosie Rogers Florida Grand Opera closed out its season this month with an ambitious production of Handel’s Agrippina. First performed in 1709, the 313-year-old Agrippina is a tongue-in-cheek tale of political ambition and sexual competition. This production made an admirable musical effort inside of an interesting, if somewhat confusing, framing device. This Agrippina … [Read more...]