A list of the things that have changed in the South Florida music scene since the Reagan administration’s first presidential term constitutes a scroll, with practically all being for the worse. Yet something that hasn’t changed during that time frame is WLRN (www.wlrn.org) deejay Michael Stock’s Folk & Acoustic Music radio program, which streams and airs Sundays from 3-5 … [Read more...]
Appreciation: Remembering Palm Beach County folk scene star Marie Nofsinger
Singer, guitarist and songwriter Marie Nofsinger came onto my radar more than 25 years ago, as I was walking along Lake Avenue while she was performing live on the sidewalk stage in front of the Coffee Gallery in downtown Lake Worth. This was back when Palm Beach County had a thriving original music scene — even if I purposely only heard some of its many such performers in … [Read more...]
Boston’s H&H Society brings standout ‘Messiah’ to Kravis
By Márcio Bezerra The Kravis Center’s Classical Concert Series launched its latest season with a performance that has set the standard so high that it will be difficult to surpass it. Featuring the Handel and Haydn Society Orchestra and Chorus, the program’s sole work was the profoundly beautiful (and often butchered) George Frideric Handel’s Messiah. Written in … [Read more...]
Boynton performer featured in Harry Chapin documentary
Art imitates life, as the accurate saying goes, and vice versa. A new documentary by Jason Chapin, S.A. Baron and Rick Korn, Harry Chapin — Cat’s in the Cradle: The Song That Changed Our Lives (Greenwich Entertainment), is now a case in point in both directions on major streaming services. And not just regarding the late American singer/songwriter and humanitarian who … [Read more...]
Poulenc organ concerto stands out at Symphonia’s season opener
A compelling reading of an important 20th-century organ concerto was a highlight Sunday afternoon (Nov. 23) of the opening concert of the 2025-26 season by The Symphonia, an event that made the most of its strings-only makeup with interesting repertoire choices. The concert, held at St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church right behind Mizner Park in Boca Raton, was led by the chamber … [Read more...]
‘Silent Night’ opens FGO season in stellar fashion
By Robert Croan Florida Grand Opera has a real winner in its revival of Kevin Puts’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Silent Night, which opened at Miami’s Adrienne Arsht Center on Nov. 15, and will be repeated in Fort Lauderdale’s Broward Center on Dec. 4 and 6. Commissioned and premiered by Minnesota Opera in 2011, Puts’s opera is based on a real World War I event that inspired … [Read more...]
Bailey shines in Saint-Saëns at SoFla Symphony opener
By Robert Croan A bravura rendition by cellist Zuill Bailey of Camille Saint-Saëns’ Cello Concerto No. 1 in A Minor (Op. 33) was the highlight of South Florida Symphony’s season opener at The Parker on Nov. 5. It was an all-19th-century program, which also featured Johannes Brahms’s Symphony No. 1 in C minor (Op. 68) — solidly traditional in a season that has to be … [Read more...]
Three B’s concert with triple twist engagingly delivered by Frazier, SOTA
By Robert Croan For his second concert as artistic and music director of the Symphony of the Americas (seen Nov. 10 in Broward Center’s Amaturo Theater) Luke Frazier offered a program of the Three B's of classical music: Bach, Beethoven and Brahms at the Keyboard. That sounded trite at first, and the epithet may have been intended to attract a wider audience, but the … [Read more...]
The power of three: King’s X carves out its own uncompromising path
There’s a veteran rock act that emerged from Houston, one with style and staying power that’s literally both little and old. Just don’t confuse it with “that little ol’ band from Texas.” Because while ZZ Top was a force through the 1970s after coming out of the southeastern Lone Star State hub, that trio fell prey to 1980s video trappings and has become a caricature tribute … [Read more...]
Music of celebration gets loving treatment at hands of Master Chorale, Karlin
By Robert Croan Jubilant music for the coronations of kings and other autocrats was the unifying element in Master Chorale of South Florida’s Handel and Mozart program [seen Oct. 24 in Bailey Hall on Broward College’s Davie campus]. Artistic director Brett Karlin conducted Handel’s four Coronation Anthems, written for the coronation of England’s King George II in 1727. … [Read more...]