With tributes to famous bands and artists seemingly taking over the South Florida music scene, it’s refreshing to note that Lake Worth-launched group Julius Sanna & the Positively Africa Experience (www.positivelyafrica.com) has paid tribute to an entire continent’s culture — through uplifting original compositions rather than mimicry — since 2007. And its founders are … [Read more...]
Fifty-three years later, blues-rock stalwarts Foghat still on their slow ride
Even though he plays while seated, 78-year-old drummer Roger Earl is literally the last man standing in Foghat. And if he has his way, his 53-year-old British act will be the last band standing. Foghat comes to the Sunshine State not to retire, you see, but to work. Which includes performing at Wells Hall at the Parker Playhouse in Fort Lauderdale on June 15 in support of … [Read more...]
Loxahatchee’s Mount Sinai proves a welcome progressive surprise
Going to see South Florida acts in a festival setting can lack the element of surprise. Those events are usually themed, and even expected top area blues, jazz, or alt-rock artists will usually give listeners only exactly what they came to expect. So it came as a jolt — even among the folk-to-punk stylistic swath presented at the latest all-purpose 561 Music Fest — when … [Read more...]
Lake Worth Beach’s Bamboo Room returns, and gets back to its musical roots
As anyone 25 years or older knows, a lot changes during that span of time. Such has been the case upstairs at 25 S. J St., in the 101-year-old Paradise Building in Lake Worth Beach, where Rudy’s at Bamboo opened Feb. 14. It marked the sixth grand opening at the club since it originally launched as the Bamboo Room in 1999. MaryBeth Sisoian, whose Rudy’s Pub has been a … [Read more...]
Brilliant Fauré, Brahms performances at SFSO chamber opener
By Robert Croan The first-desk players of South Florida Symphony Orchestra are not an official ensemble, like, say, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center or the Beaux Arts Trio. They get together each summer for a series of three modest monthly concerts — each performed in two South Florida venues — which provide some of the best classical music to be heard in this … [Read more...]
Outlaw persona mixes with middling set for Elle King at SunFest
Ten years into her major-label recording career, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Elle King is probably best-known for two things, one good and one not so good. And both came up, whether literally or figuratively, during her performance at SunFest on May 4. The good one was “Ex’s & Oh’s,” the Grammy-nominated Top 10 single and provocative video from her 2015 debut album … [Read more...]
Zukerman-Forsyth duo bring stellar Brahms Double to SOTA finale
By Robert Croan Johannes Brahms’s “Double” Concerto for Violin and Cello (in A minor, Op. 102), is a gnarly, dense work, not at all an easy romp for performers or listeners. Under the deft fingers of violinist Pinchas Zukerman and his cellist wife, Amanda Forsyth, however — as it was in the season’s final concert by Symphony of the Americas (heard May 5 in Broward … [Read more...]
Standout Mimì lifts otherwise adequate ‘Bohème’ at FGO
By Robert Croan Florida Grand Opera’s 2024 version of Puccini’s La Bohème (seen May 2 at the Broward Center) was the 13th production since 1947, which makes it the most frequently performed opera in the company’s history. According to recent surveys, La Bohème is in the top three most frequently performed operas nationwide, as well, and the work lends itself to varied … [Read more...]
Appreciation: Remembering Carle Vickers, horn man for T’s Express
Horn players are often to jazz and fusion what guitarists are to popular music — attention-grabbing players who wait for their chance to speak through soloing rather than listening to their ensemble’s overall sound. Yet there are significant differences. Guitarists play chordal instruments, so there are far fewer lulls in their playing because they also have rhythmic … [Read more...]
Jordan’s tribute to Hendrix needs to dig a little bit deeper
Tribute act mania seems to know no bounds, as even established international baby boomer artists take stylistic detours to salute heroes from their youth. Many make sense. Bassist Will Lee, of countless recording sessions and David Letterman’s covers-heavy TV band, started the Beatles tribute Fab Faux. Guitarist Mike Keneally, of Frank Zappa’s band, joined both Zappa … [Read more...]