By Greg StepanichIt’s true that the Miami-based concert choir Seraphic Fire is a national organization that draws many of its singing members, as well as the personnel for its Firebird Chamber Orchestra, from across the country.But it is also nevertheless true that on Saturday night in a church in Fort Lauderdale, a large audience saw a South Florida musical … [Read more...]
Music review: Seraphic Fire’s Rachmaninov ravishing, and a departure
By Greg StepanichThe music of faith may mean most to the worshippers for whose ears it ultimately is meant, but the sensual beauty of some composition in these traditions, especially when well-performed, has a way of suspending doubt.On Saturday night at All Saints Episcopal in Fort Lauderdale, the Miami-based concert choir Seraphic Fire continued its opening … [Read more...]
Music review: Musical piety, vocal purity make for absorbing concert of French Baroque
Louis XIV, king of France and Navarre (1638-1715).By Greg StepanichIn the days when Louis XIV was an actual presence and not merely the name of a favorite rococo interior design fashion, the faithful gathered in churches for communion with the Almighty but also for music, for the sound of a pure, unclouded voice ascending into the severe angles of … [Read more...]
Music review: From Firebird, a peerless night of Bach
Margrave Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg (1677-1734),dedicatee of Bach's Brandenburg Concertos.By Greg StepanichOn the one hand, it's no mystery why the Brandenburg Concertos of J.S. Bach should be so rarely played in local concerts.Engaging as they are, canonical and popular as they unquestionably are, they are also very difficult. And in some ways, that only deepens the … [Read more...]