Tonight marks the latest installment in Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra’s annual “Westside Connections” series of three concerts pairing music with (insert annual topic here) . . . no seriously, the topic changes every year, complete with special guests discussing how the the topic and music mesh. This year, Margaret Batjer (LACO concertmaster and series curator) has … Continue reading
Admit it: the first time you heard that Los Angeles Opera had decided to pair the Baroque charms of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas with the expressionistic horrors of Bartok’s Bluebeard’s Castle, you didn’t exactly say to yourself, “Oh yeah, that makes total sense.” No, at best, you probably thought, “Hmmmm — that’d be interesting.” If … Continue reading
(Publisher’s note: We’re very happy to welcome back Fiona Bryan, writer and violinist, to All is Yar for this concert review). In the short year and a half that I have lived in Southern California, I have come to expect the unexpected when it comes to programming presented by various cultural organizations around Los Angeles. The progressive landscape of … Continue reading
Los Angeles Opera announced their 2014/2015 season today. After browsing the press release (seen in its entirety below), here are my top of mind thoughts and observations: A little surprised that the number of main stage productions is still at six (well, seven productions if you count the double bill as two separate operas). That … Continue reading
Inspired by Tim Mangan’s identically titled blog series, I offer up two brief scenes from Being John Malkovich which use the same excerpt from the second movement of Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta by Béla Bartók. The first is the opening scene of the movie featuring some startlingly life-like puppetry (John Cusack plays the puppeteer). The second … Continue reading
Recently, whenever there has been an opening for a music directorship at an orchestra, Pablo Heras-Casado usually gets included in the list of candidates to be considered. The 30-something Spanish maestro has many admirers and proponents, and he gets his fair share of positive press. The New York Philharmonic just announced that he’ll be making … Continue reading
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