The Arts Blog

Notorious RBG in Song

August 27, 2018

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has always loved classical music.  Especially opera.  More than once, people have captured her on their camera phones at Santa Fe Opera (you can find this on Facebook and You Tube).  Now there’s a CD that sets her words, and those of friends and family to music.  Soprano Patrice …

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Lara Downes celebrates Lenny’s 100th

August 21, 2018

In this anniversary year – the 100th anniversary of Leonard Bernstein’s birth – many record labels are releasing new performances of his music, as well as his own discography.  Many of them are of his music:  West Side Story, Mass, and other major pieces.  Pianist Lara Downes took a more intimate approach in her disc.  …

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Bell’s Scottish Fantasy

August 2, 2018

Back in 2011, American violinist Joshua Bell became the first music director of London’s Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, since its founding by Neville Marriner.  Bell and the orchestra already had a longstanding relationship:  Around the time of the violinist’s 19th birthday, he recorded Max Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1 with the Academy.  Now it feels …

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How Postmodern Are You?

July 24, 2018

I recently returned from a semester abroad in London, where I intensely studied art and culture. While I was there I was required to take a few different arts courses. This included a music history course entitled, “Topics in Music History,” which sounded absolutely thrilling. As a music major, I had already taken two semesters …

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Hopes and Dreams (The Lullaby Project)

June 29, 2018

In April, the Oregon Symphony presented a remarkable and powerful concert as part of its “Sounds of Home” series, where young mothers experiencing housing insecurity, had the opportunity to write lullabies for their children.  These were performed by OSO musicians.  Their concert was inspired by Carnegie Hall’s “Lullaby Project”, which recently released a CD under …

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The Story of Minimalism – Part Two: From Minimal to Maximal

May 22, 2018

(Special Note: If you are new to this blog, click here to first read Part One of this series.) New Horizons: Postminimalism   In our last post, we left off with a broader conception of minimalism as a music which creates a listening experience that is meditative, non-teleological, and process-oriented. It is through this broader lens …

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Ravel’s “Choreographic Symphony”

May 17, 2018

Kazem Abdullah is an American conductor (he hails from Indiana, studied at Tanglewood and Peabody), and was General-Musikdirektor of the Symphony Orchestra in Aachen, Germany from 2012 to 2017.  Maestro Abdullah has also been to Oregon:  About ten years ago he subbed for one of Carlos Kalmar’s concerts. Based on the new recording (a live …

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The Story of Minimalism – Part One: A New Way of Listening

May 15, 2018

“What you hear depends on how you focus your ear. We’re not talking about inventing a new language, but rather inventing new perceptions of existing languages.” – Philip Glass   If you’ve tuned into All Classical Portland recently, you may have come across some music your ears weren’t expecting to hear from a classical radio …

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Harry Rabinowitz

May 3, 2018

On Tuesday, May 8, All Classical Portland will be naming its Music Library in honor of Harry Rabinowitz (1916-2016), a British conductor and composer known for his television and film music. Rabinowitz is best known for having conducted the scores for over 60 films, and he regularly appeared on TV and radio throughout the 1950s …

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Tomas Cotik explores Mozart

April 30, 2018

Violinist Tomas Cotik, Assistant Violin Professor at Portland State University, is also an internationally-renowned concert and recording artist.  He has done extensive study of fellow Argentine Astor Piazzolla, in several acclaimed recordings (Naxos); a complete series of Schubert’s violin works (Centaur); and now the violin sonatas of Mozart. Mr. Cotik has been a guest in …

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