Any concert featuring guitarist and former Saturday Night Live musical director G.E. Smith — with an all-star band of former Johnny Winter vocalist Jay Stollman, British blues guitar and vocal icon Matt Schofield, Boynton Beach-based Mark Telesca on bass, and Jeff Beck bandmate Jonathan Joseph on drums — is a benefit for attendees. Throw in an opening act like singer/guitarist … [Read more...]
St. Lawrence SQ’s Haydn, Beethoven persuasive at Four Arts
It’s not a bad idea to try to educate an audience about the music they’re going to listen to, and certainly in this year of the Leonard Bernstein centennial, that’s something many classical music groups are surely considering. An audience at the Four Arts on Sunday got a substantial helping of good-for-you information about Franz Joseph Haydn from the first violinist of the … [Read more...]
At 91, Tony Bennett shows he can still make magic
An adoring capacity crowd greeted the artist formerly known as Anthony Dominick Benedetto on Monday as the ageless, 91-year-old vocalist confidently strode onstage at the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts’ Dreyfoos Hall in West Palm Beach. And why not? As Tony Bennett, the singer has earned 20 Grammy Awards, the most recent for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album for Tony … [Read more...]
Sheng concerto proves admirable feature of Lynn Philharmonia concert
By Dennis D. Rooney South Florida is extremely fortunate to have the Lynn Conservatory of Music. The all-scholarship school attracts outstanding students internationally. Their studies are punctuated by participation in public concerts. The Lynn Philharmonia is the institution’s student orchestra. It offers six programs per season under the musical directorship of … [Read more...]
‘Tosca’ launches Palm Beach Opera season in excellent style
For the first opera of its 2017-18 season, Palm Beach Opera handed its audience a gift. In mounting a box-office surety in Giacomo Puccini’s Tosca, the company was doing its best to make sure it had a sizable audience for its first mainstage production of the year. And on the afternoon of Jan. 28, the Kravis Center house was gratifyingly huge. But in bringing this opera … [Read more...]
Boston string orchestra A Far Cry joins with pianist Dinnerstein for new Glass concerto
A concert Feb. 14 at the Society for the Four Arts in Palm Beach has multiple drawing points: A visit by one of the top young classical ensembles in the country, one of the nation’s finest pianists, and a new concerto by its most prominent modernist composer. Philip Glass’s Piano Concerto No. 3, which is composed for piano and string orchestra, got its world premiere in … [Read more...]
Beautifully played Dvořák caps fine Hermitage Trio outing
By Dennis D. Rooney The Hermitage Piano Trio takes its name from the great Russian museum of art and culture in St. Petersburg founded in 1764 by Empress Catherine the Great. The players are Ilya Kazantsev, piano; Misha Keylin, violin; and Sergey Antonov, cello. Their concert Jan. 23 in the Flagler’s current Music Series opened with a relative novelty, Dmitri … [Read more...]
FGO’s ‘Salome’ benefits from strong lead, secondary performances
Today’s menu of visual entertainment encompasses literally everything thanks to digital technology, but even a complicated work of grand opera from more than a century ago still has the power to shock. Richard Strauss’s 1905 opera Salome, based on an Oscar Wilde play that was the last word in decadence at the time, also remains a formidable challenge for any house that wants … [Read more...]
Violinist Huang impressive in Kravis recital
By Dennis D. Rooney 23-year old Sirena Huang won the grand prize at last year’s inaugural Elmar Oliveira International Violin Competition held at Lynn University in Boca Raton. On Jan. 22, she gave a local recital, part of the Kravis Center’s Young Artists Series. That complex’s Rinker Playhouse was an ideal venue. With Robert Koenig at the piano, Huang played a … [Read more...]
Lang’s ‘Little Match Girl Passion’ makes moving impact in Seraphic Fire performance
By Robert Croan In prefatory remarks to Seraphic Fire’s January concerts, director Patrick Dupré Quigley told audiences that the featured work, David Lang’s The Little Match Girl Passion, is such a strong piece that no other contemporary choral work could stand up to it on the same program. Instead, Quigley balanced the 40-minute oratorio with three Renaissance motets. … [Read more...]