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...]
SFSO quintet offers knockout readings of Dvořák, Schumann
By Robert Croan FORT LAUDERDALE — The South Florida Symphony is providing a real service to the local community with its summer chamber music series, showcasing this orchestra’s excellent first-desk players in three monthly concerts in Miami and Fort Lauderdale. The second of this year’s programs [seen June 16 in Fort Lauderdale’s Center for Spiritual Living] offered two … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: June 9-10
Film: I have rarely recommended a horror film, but Ari Aster’s directing debut, Hereditary, is so creepy good, with a stunning central performance by Toni Collette, that it exceeds the genre. She plays a woman disturbed by the recent death of her mother, whose genes have apparently infected the family and set in motion a series of tragedies. When her stoner son reluctantly … [Read more...]
St. Petersburg Piano Quartet ends Flagler season with assured Mozart, Brahms
By Dennis D. Rooney Mozart may not have written the very first piano quartet, being preceded in a way by J. C. Bach, Schobert and others, but he definitely was the first to write piano quartets in which all the voices are equal, and the indicated keyboard instrument is a pianoforte in the modern sense. In 1785, Mozart received a commission from the Viennese publisher … [Read more...]
Classical notes: The comeback orchestra; Casals Istomin in Palm Beach
In all the election turmoil over the past year, it might have escaped general notice that an orchestra that had almost been given up for lost only three years ago has recovered in award-winning form. It’s been three years to the month since the 16-month musicians’ lockout of the Minnesota Orchestra ended, an experience that left that arts-loving community reeling but that … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: Aug. 19-21
Music: The Argentine violinist Tomás Cotik, who has made a strong career for himself with well-received discs of music by Schubert and Piazzolla, will be departing South Florida at the end of this month to take a job teaching at Portland State University in Oregon. His exit from the local scene is a real loss, but before he goes, he’ll be giving two concerts of music from his … [Read more...]