By Dale King The final evening of this year’s Festival of the Arts Boca at the Mizner Park Amphitheater in Boca Raton on March 8 was damn cold, with a biting wind that made ambient temperatures in the 60s feel even frostier. Still, the not-too-comfortable folding chairs on the amphitheater lawn were nearly filled, thanks, in large part, to the appearance of Postmodern … [Read more...]
The blues haunts Zwilich’s fine new cello concerto
By Dennis D. Rooney Two world premieres opened the third program of the South Florida Symphony Orchestra’s 22nd season. Zuill Bailey was soloist in the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra by Ellen Taafe Zwilich, one of two premieres on the program, both dedicated to founding Music Director Sebrina María Alfonso. Zwilich (b. 1939), a native Floridian, is a distinguished … [Read more...]
Legendary fusion band Brand X to play first-ever Florida show
Formed in the mid-1970s in England, iconic jazz/fusion group Brand X became one of the sub-genre’s prominent acts of the decade after its members initially met to record solo albums for multi-instrumentalist/producer Brian Eno. Dormant afterward through the 1980s and again between 1999 and 2016, its current four-year-old lineup hasn’t yet recorded in a studio, but has … [Read more...]
ACO, soloist get mixed Beethoven results; Stravinsky, Higdon sparkle
By Dennis D. Rooney Dance music dominated the first half of the second Masterworks Series program of the Atlantic Classical Orchestra’s 30th season Wednesday at the Eissey Campus Theatre in Palm Beach Gardens. Dance Card by Jennifer Higdon (b. 1962) was the opener. Written in 2016, the five-movement work, for string orchestra, explores different aspects of dance rhythms. … [Read more...]
Splendid ‘Acis and Galatea’ closes Seraphic Fire’s Enlightenment Festival
By Robert Croan “Happy we!”/”Wretched lovers!”/”Galatea, dry they tears!” That’s the plot, in a nutshell, of Acis and Galatea, Handel’s pastorale opera, first performed in London in 1718, given a rare (and splendidly realized) revival by Seraphic Fire to conclude the group’s two-week Enlightenment Festival in South Florida. The shepherd Acis and the sea nymph … [Read more...]
Soloists enlighten Seraphic Fire’s secular Bach cantatas
By Robert Croan The Enlightenment, also known as the Age of Reason, gave rise to individual freedoms that we now take for granted, among them the revolutionary concepts of liberty, equality and brotherhood. The splendid South Florida vocal-instrumental ensemble Seraphic Fire, founded and directed by Patrick Dupré Quigley, is celebrating these ideals – no less timely … [Read more...]
Charming ‘Pirates’ runs aground on Broward Center acoustics
By Robert J. Croan The piquant and perceptive, witty and profound comic operas of Gilbert and Sullivan rely for their effect as much on William S. Gilbert’s brilliant words as on the sparkling scores of Arthur Sullivan. Broward Center’s 2,658-seat Au-Rene Theater worked against clarity in the New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players’ production of The Pirates of Penzance on … [Read more...]
Power and poetry from Lucinda Williams at Parker Playhouse
From the moment she stepped onto the stage at the Parker Playhouse in Fort Lauderdale on Feb. 6, Lucinda Williams exemplified what sets her apart from most other singer/songwriters. Having recently turned 67, Williams neither seems to be as self-obsessed, nor take herself as seriously, as fellow guitar-playing lead vocalists. Her combination of blues, Americana, country … [Read more...]
Violinist Rhee was clear winner of second EOIVC
By Dennis D. Rooney The four finalists in the second triennial Elmar Oliveira International Violin Competition the next EOIVC will be held in 2023) were heard on the last weekend in January in two concerts. They had been chosen from 19 quarter-finalists from 10 locations — Canada, China, Israel, Italy, Korea, Russia, Taiwan, United Kingdom, Hong Kong and the United … [Read more...]
Soprano Lopez scores triumph in FGO’s ‘Butterfly’
By Robert Croan The title role in Puccini’s Madama Butterfly is one of the pinnacles for every opera soprano. Sandra Lopez has performed this arduous role more than 50 times in nine productions, and in her Broward Center performance Jan. 30 (the fifth of six in Florida Grand Opera’s current run; the last one is tonight) she came through the hurdles unscathed and victorious. … [Read more...]