The third free opera concert at the waterfront given by Palm Beach Opera was an artistic success. But who were the artists? Getting off to a good start with the national anthem and Bernstein’s Candide overture, conductor Greg Ritchey then introduced the wonderful Metropolitan Opera baritone Michael Chioldi and the next singer, Robert Watson, but forgot to name the other … [Read more...]
Rarely heard chamber masterpieces end Chameleon’s 13th season
In her concert programming and her recording, the Dutch-born cellist Iris van Eck has championed the music of repertory outsiders such as Max Reger and female composers in particular, such as her countrywoman Henriette Bosmans. On Sunday afternoon at Fort Lauderdale’s Leiser Opera Center, van Eck and her Chameleon Musicians chamber group closed their 13th season of concerts … [Read more...]
Rare Mozart sparkles with Bergonzi, Todd
The richness of Mozart’s oeuvre can’t be fully appreciated unless you’re able to hear good performances of every part of it, from his church sonatas to his first attempts at opera. That applies, too, to his chamber music. While performances of the later string quartets and quintets are frequent, and the Clarinet Quintet always gets an airing when a good enough clarinetist is … [Read more...]
Strong Brahms, radiant Chopin at PB Symphony
Under the 16 glittering chandeliers of Mar-a-Lago, the most tastefully decorated concert hall in America, Palm Beach Symphony played to the great, the good and the glamorous: scattered among the 600 guests were stand out beautiful young women in designer evening gowns — a coterie from Donald Trump’s Miss America pageant, perhaps? Thanking Trump for his hospitality, Symphony … [Read more...]
PB Symphony beautifully evokes intimacy of Viennese chamber society
Monday night’s Palm Beach Symphony Orchestra program was a tribute to the chamber music concert series founded by Arnold Schoenberg in Vienna in 1919, in which the enfant terrible modernist of his day established a way to try out new music in private, and hear large orchestral works in chamber arrangements. Thus it was Monday night, as a small band of just 11 players played … [Read more...]
Jasper String Quartet has great night, brilliant future
The Jasper String Quartet is the young face of American chamber music, now and in the future. To my mind they are on their way to replacing the eminent, now disbanded, Emerson String Quartet. Formed at Oberlin College, they won the very prestigious Cleveland Quartet Award and the Astral Artists 2010 National Auditions, and sought out the daunting Tokyo String Quartet to learn … [Read more...]