The San Diego Symphony streamed their second concert on Friday, November 20. This concert was performed in Symphony Hall. It is available in its entirety on YouTube. This is exactly the type of concert the …

Thanksgiving is nigh, so how about two pieces by George Frederic Handel that give thanks? The first is “But Thanks be to God” from Handel’s Oratorio Messiah. The second is Dank sei dir Herr (Thanks …

The end of October saw a flurry of live classical music and opera suddenly descend upon San Diego. October 24 was the conclusion of the Drive-In Mainly Mozart Festival and the opening of the Drive-In …

It would appear as though our political system is at the start of Wagner’s Ring Cycle. You may recall that The Ring starts with the dwarf, Alberich, stealing the Rhinegold in order to create a …

The drive-in Mainly Mozart Festival concerts have concluded. The Mainly Mozart Festival presented four classical music concerts between October 17 and 24. San Diego Opera is in the middle of four drive-in performances of Puccini’s …

The Mainly Mozart Festival has gotten underway and now it’s almost over. The festival concludes on Saturday, October 24 at the Del Mar Fairgrounds. On opening night, Saturday, October 17, the event was sold out …

I’ve never heard Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony. Can you believe that? After all these years, it has avoided me. I’ve heard Mozart’s Haffner Symphony at least three times. I’ve heard his Symphony No 29 twice. I’ve …

Mainly Mozart is putting on a full-scale orchestra festival from October 17 - 24 and you can attend it live, no streaming required. The concerts are in a drive-up format at the Del Mar Fairgrounds. …

The post-modern politics of power are now trying to tack their sloppy thought processes onto Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5. An article at vox.com claims: “Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony starts with an anguished opening theme — dun …

There is some live music in San Diego these days. On Friday, September 11, I and my kids were able to attend Mainly Mozart’s drive-up Resilience concert at the Del Mar Fairgrounds. According to Mainly …

Shame on Amazon UK and their new Alexa commercial that asks Alexa to stop playing Mozart and start playing “something more fun.” The entire commercial makes Mozart’s Queen of the Night in The Magic Flute …

Last week I unfairly accused the brass and winds of forcing Covid-19-laden breath through their instruments. I venerated the strings section for their safer approach to music. None of that is accurate. I was having …

One of the issues orchestras is facing is brass and wind instruments. Brass instruments have “water keys” to drain the accumulated moisture from the instrument. Another, and more accurate, term for water key is “spit …

Giovanni Sgambati conducted the Italian premiere of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3 in 1867. He conducted the Italian premiere of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 in 1870. Let that sink in for a moment. Beethoven composed his …

It’s August, a month in which I usually begin to look forward to the Masterworks Season at the San Diego Symphony. However, in my opinion, there will be no fall concerts this year. One of …

When considering “blind auditions” for orchestras I began to wish opera companies were forced to cast their operas based on blind auditions. A blind audition means the auditors do not know anything about the musician …

The author of a thought piece in the New York Times wants to get rid of blind auditions for top tier orchestras in order to create more diversity in orchestras. A blind audition means the …

Well, we are back to square one with the reopening of the county, and that is bad news for San Diego classical music. The good news is that the restriction on concerts is forcing our …

Having spent the last eight days in the Santa Cruz Mountains and having walked many a forest path, I began to consider the greatest music inspired by nature. What follows is by no means a …

I’m spending some time in the Santa Cruz mountains and a redwood forest. A redwood forest is often compared to a cathedral and for good reason. I must admit there is something of a sacred …

There are a multitude of stories currently presenting the idea that Beethoven was black. The claim is that he had a Moorish background through his mother’s side. His mother’s family came from Flanders which was …

Since Father’s Day is coming up, let’s look at some operatic fathers and decide if they deserve a Father’s Day card or not. First up is Rigoletto from Verdi’s Rigoletto. We see Rigoletto as a …

I’ve been sitting in on some voice lessons at the studio of a good friend. In the course of the conversation between lessons, the topic of sports performance came up, and then we realized the …

What could an early 20th Century British composer and a 19th century American poet possibly have to say about the context of police brutality in early 21st Century America? First of all, I am growing …

I wish I could find the wherewithal to be a fan of classical music in the age of streaming. For a while I watched out of obligation. Obligation turned to watching out of guilt and …

Summer classical music in San Diego has followed a glorious pattern for as long as most of us can remember. The Mainly Mozart Festival welcomes the summer in June. The San Diego Symphony Summer Bayside …

“To send light into the darkness of men's hearts - such is the duty of the artist.” – Robert Schumann “Art is whatever you can get away with.” – John Cage With no concerts to …

During the shelter-in-place era, I’ve been covering a lot of ground, relative to my normal consumption, in the realm of high culture. I’ve read books which I’ve been putting off for years such as Death …

There are some real concerns out there regarding the future of many classical music organizations. I don’t want to come off as unsympathetic, but the destruction of these organizations by the COVID-19 situation won’t mean …

There’s one thing we all have in common at this time. We are all required to spend a lot of time at home. All this seclusion got me to thinking about music which I associate …

A few weeks ago I outlined some binge listening plans. I’ve completed two of them. The first was all 32 of Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas. The second was a survey of Baroque music. The Beethoven took …

“As we all know very well, music has a unique power to heal the human soul. In music, there are no boundaries of language or limits of understanding." Rafael Payare, music director, San Diego Symphony. …

As Shelter in Place is extended to at least the end of April, I mourn the loss of some potentially fantastic concerts in San Diego. To replace those experiences, I’m considering a few listening projects …

When, in an opera, the staging, acting, and costumes, are all misguided to bad, what’s left? The singing? What if the singing is just okay? What’s left is The Metropolitan Opera’s production of Wagner’s Das …

There’s Covid-19 and then there’s the Black Death. The height of the Black Death was between the years of 1347-1351. Estimates for the number of deaths in, during the Black Death, range to 200 million. …

On Saturday, March 7, it was English Night at Symphony Hall, and I like that sort of thing. I like it even better when it’s played as nearly to perfection as I can tell, particularly …

Ah, the impermanence of all things. After last week’s peak musical experience at the San Diego Symphony, we were bound to come down off the mountaintop. The concert on Friday, February 28, was good but …

The San Diego Symphony is on a roll! The previous two concerts, which I have attended, have been nothing short of spectacular. The most recent endeavor was Beethoven’s Violin Concerto and Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 11: …

The San Francisco Examiner reports on Feb 18, 2020: A striking aspect of the programming is Salonen’s Collaborative Partners project, announced last year, featuring contributions by: pianist, film producer and composer Nicholas Britell; soprano, curator …

Mirella Freni, one of the greatest singers of all time, has died at the age of 84. Freni was a singer I returned to time and time again. By the time I was getting into …

Hansel and Gretel is a story based on hunger. The opera version of this tale of the tummy is being produced by San Diego Opera at the San Diego Civic Theater on February 8 - …

I entered Symphony Hall on Saturday, January 25, as the crustiest of all curmudgeons. I left as a young adventurer just returned from an invigorating sojourn through the Austrian countryside full of hope and optimism. …

I take no pleasure in what follows. The San Diego Symphony has now given two perplexing performances of a Beethoven symphony in as many weeks. The fourth symphony was played on the weekend of January …

The San Diego Symphony has been holding a January festival for the past several years. This year, the topic is Beethoven at 250. The festival started with performances of Beethoven’s Leonora Overture No. 3, Piano …

We are now in the 250th anniversary year of Beethoven’s birth and there will be content created like never before. The internet is already dripping with articles about the grim master of the human condition. …

As we enter the 2020s, I thought it would be interesting to look back to 1920 and get a feel for what was going on in classical music at the start of that notorious decade. …

As a member of the San Diego Opera Chorus, I don’t often have a chance to review an opera but I’ve got one now. I went to see Der Rosenkavalier, by Richard Strauss, at The …

Never, ever, trust a critic. Always take any review with a grain of salt. Case in point. I thought I didn’t like Dvorak’s Symphony No. 8. I found it lacking the drama of his Seventh …

Since we are at the end of a decade, I’m feeling an obligation to name the top concerts I’ve experienced in the past 10 years. That’s a lot of pressure so I’ve decided to ease …

I’ve been posting daily music history tidbits on my social media and discovered that Michele Puccini was born on Wednesday, November 27 in 1813. Michele was the father of the much more famous Giacomo Puccini. …