"How fortunate that Ms Gabetta happens upon the scene just at a time when there is a shortage of top rank cellists... What a joy it is to hear a young immensely talented player on the way up!"
Is America the New Frontier for Bruckner?
"I wonder how appreciative San Francisco audiences really have been of Blomstedt’s powerful advocacy of Bruckner’s music over the years [because] Americans don’t get Bruckner’s music."
Los Angeles Philharmonic; More Dud than Dude
"The performance of Mahler’s Ninth Symphony I attended was one of the worst in memory."
Why More Women Are Winning at Musical Chairs
"It may take a while for the public to get used to having female conductors -- the symphony audience is a very conservative one. But they will."
David Gockley Clearly Saved the Best For Last
"This is one of those operas that get better and better as it goes along. "
Why Orchestras Have Had to Bring Gender-Bling Policies to the Fore
"The cost of gender discrimination rises as the pool of talented male conductors dries up."
Prima Donnas Strut Their Stuff at the Lucerne Festival
"Only now are the doors opening for female conductors and again not because of any sense of fair play or political activism but for the simple reason that there are just not enough credible male candidates to go around."
Swan Song in San Francisco
"It is a tribute to David Gockley’s good taste and courage that he chose to end his 10 years as general director of the San Francisco Opera with a production of Giuseppe Verdi’s Don Carlo. Verdi’s vast and inspired masterpiece imposes great demands on an opera company’s resources... Mr. Gockley gave it an honorable shot."
Yannick Takes a Ticket on the Titanic
"Let’s Set The Record straight: The relevant question when contemplating the recently announced appointment of Yannick Nezet-Seguin (henceforth called Yannick) as the new music director of the Metropolitan Opera is not whether the Met made the right choice but what was Yannick thinking --or smoking--when he agreed to take on the Met post."
Chamber Music Duo a Triple Threat
"Music@Menlo, a 3-week summer festival of chamber music in Silicon Valley, has been [David Finckel and Wu Han's] most successful venture outside of Lincoln Center. Until [they] came along, Menlo Park was a sleepy well-healed cultural wasteland during the summer months."
Chamber Music's Power Couple Summer in Silicon Valley
"The new appointment of Wu Han and David Finckel as joint artistic directors of the prestigious Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center makes this husband-and-wife team America's power couple of chamber music."
Opera Is Suffering From A Supply-Side Crisis
"The Met blames its bad box office on a drop-off in international tourism. But the crisis goes much deeper than implied by this superficial explanation."
In Perfect Harmony: Michael Tilson Thomas, San Francisco and Its Orchestra
"[San Francisco Symphony's] music director, Michael Tilson Thomas, says San Franciscans are proud of their city's cultural institutions. Even in a tough economy, their ambitions for their city make them willing to back what they perceive as a winner."
The Lucerne Festival Is on the Threshold of Change
"It is a critical time for the revered Lucerne classical music festival in Switzerland."