The Chamber Orchestra's 50th anniversary

Fifty years and still going strong

The Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia celebrated its first half century with a quartet of celebratory pieces — including a familiar item that isn’t normally considered celebratory and should be.

Tom Purdom

May 12, 2015 · Articles · 3 minute read

Sarah Chang with the Philadelphia Orchestra

The woman in red

Violinist Sarah Chang dazzled in Dvořák as the Philadelphia Orchestra, under Măcelaru, brought youthful vigor to Beethoven and Eastern European favorites.

Linda Holt

May 12, 2015 · Articles · 4 minute read

The Academy of Vocal Arts presents Gounod's 'Faust'

A devil of a deal

A new generation comes to grips with the moral attitudes and the religious faith of an earlier time.

Steve Cohen

May 08, 2015 · Articles · 2 minute read

Amerita, Network for New Music, and ARTCy

Dante and light, insomnia and Whitman

A veteran new music organization and a fumbling newcomer presented a quartet of premieres.

Tom Purdom

May 05, 2015 · Articles · 5 minute read

Opera Philadelphia's 'Don Carlo' (second review)

A risk that paid off

Opera Philadelphia took a giant leap with its production of Verdi’s sprawling masterpiece.

Steve Cohen

May 05, 2015 · Articles · 4 minute read

Philadelphia Orchestra plays Bernstein's 'Mass' (second review)

Music-theater or agitprop?

Is Leonard Bernstein’s Mass gospel music, classical, Broadway, or rock ‘n’ roll? Yes. All of those and more.

Steve Cohen

May 02, 2015 · Articles · 3 minute read

Philadelphia Orchestra plays Bernstein's 'Mass' (first review)

Singin’ the liturgical blues

Leonard Bernstein’s Mass was, with 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, the flop of his career. Its belated Philadelphia premiere, despite an elaborate production, showed why.

Robert Zaller

May 02, 2015 · Articles · 5 minute read

Tempesta di Mare, Café et Catastrophe

A novel brew and a classic tale

Tempesta di Mare celebrated coffee and recounted a Greek tragedy in a recreation of an 18th-century French musical salon.

Tom Purdom

Apr 28, 2015 · Articles · 4 minute read

The trouble with Verdi’s ‘Don Carlo’

Sympathy for a tyrant

Verdi's Don Carlo is an opera that’s better heard than seen. Because the unevenness of its dramatic line tends to undercut the beauty of the music, Don Carlo is worth attending only for the chance to hear vibrant voices — which, happily in this case, were mostly magnificent.

Dan Rottenberg

Apr 28, 2015 · Articles · 7 minute read

The Philadelphia Orchestra plays John Williams

Time warps

Stéphane Denève’s program with the Philadelphia Orchestra was a mixed bag, stylistically and musically, with the lightweight John Williams thrown in with a Magnus Lindberg premiere and a Prokofiev masterpiece.

Robert Zaller

Apr 25, 2015 · Articles · 5 minute read