Reports are in. Sounds like the opening night of Lorin Maazel’s Die Valküre at The Met was pretty hot, complete with an on-stage tumble by mega-soprano, Stephanie Blythe. (C.C. regrets that she was unable to make it. You know we can’t do everything around here!) Critics Roundup: There isn’t much originality going on in the [...]
I don’t want to hear any excuses
You should be able to make it to at least one of these concerts. The New York Sun is reporting that organist Gail Archer will be playing the complete Messiaen organ book over the next five months. Totally hot. Totally fierce. I can’t imagine a better plan than to chillax on a Sunday afternoon in [...]
Goats Are The New Diva
So, according to The Sun, over four hundred performers and half a petting zoo will take the stage at The Met for tonight’s premiere of Prokofief’s gigantor opera, War and Peace, based on the gigantor novel by Tolstoy: The production includes 250 extras, 118 chorus members, and 41 dancers, plus four chickens, one horse — [...]
Nordlinger: Mac or Music Critic?
I know we totally just bagged on Nordlinger the other day–we might have questioned the integrity of his mental faculties, it’s true–but we’re gonna post about his review of the Fleming/Levine affair at Carnegie. Obviously, we’ve been a little frustrated with the watery non-criticism provided by the classical reviewers at The Times, so at least [...]
Iphigenie: The Morning After
So it’s a day after our coup de review. I could only find two other reviews of The Met’s Iphigenie en Tauride this A.M. (Feel free to point us toward any we overlooked.) First up, T-Bone Tommasini at The Times. His review is really heavy on the history. Then he lays on the synopsis. And [...]
Are You Sleepin’ Old Man Tucker?!
So, apparently an opera gala event–in this case, the Richard Tucker Music Foundation‘s annual gala–is fair game for review. These things are even more expensive to go to than a regular diamond encrusted night at the opera. Anne Midgette gives the affair a posh review in The Times, although she clotheslines 2007 Award Winner Brandon [...]
To Do: Child Exploitation
Y’all probably know how C.C. feels about using les enfants as objects for artmaking. So you can probably guess how we feel about little Marla Olmstead and her abstract painting enterprise…I mean, her parents’ abstract painting enterprise. Bruce Bennet at The Sun gives just weight to his review of Amir Bar-Lev’s new documentary that opens [...]
MPAA: Longer, Rougher Hetero Sex On Par With Gay Quickie
It’s funny that movie producers think NC-17 is like the kiss of death, as reported in S. James Snyder’s piece in The Sun, which focuses on the release of Ang Lee’s new suspense/skin-flick, “Lust, Caution.” I’ve always been like, Crank it up, fuckers! when it comes to sex on/in film. Of course, when you look [...]
Choose Your Illusion
Identity is now so synonymous with brand, it is no wonder why people in Mississippi are naming their babies after major television networks. It’s telling that during the height of identity politics, art institutions began to realize that they needed a consistent outward appearance by which they could be easily recognized. Kate Taylor reports for [...]
The Graphic Details
Kate Taylor reports for The Sun on a new exhibition of graphic music scores at The Kitchen. It’s kind of hilarious that the beginning of the article is basically like, the creators of the exhibition decided not to include John Cage. Then she goes on for two pages about John Cage. And rightly so. He [...]
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