performed by the Goldner String Quartet, or below by the Alban Berg Quartet (cover image by David von Diemar) One of Stravinsky’s few efforts in the string quartet form, the Three Pieces dates from 1914, right after Petrushka and The Rite of Spring. … Continue reading Stravinsky: Three Pieces for String Quartet
performed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Pierre Boulez (cover image by Patrick Hendry) Mark him well—he is a man on the eve of celebrity. Serge Diaghilev of Igor Stravinsky This piece may well be the most famous of Stravinsky’s, … Continue reading Stravinsky: The Firebird
performed by the Lucerne Festival Orchestra under Riccardo Chailly, or below with the Columbia Orchestra under the composer’s baton (cover image by Jingda Chen) And now for something completely different. It’s almost shocking to me, despite being the sole writer and … Continue reading Stravinsky: Feu d’artifice
featuring Yuja Wang, piano It seems like the last year or two we haven’t had as many of the big-name, super famous ensembles come through Taipei. The Lucerne Festival Orchestra decided (last minute?) not to come to Taipei, and the … Continue reading New York Philharmonic in Taipei
performed by Anne Sophie Von Otter, Ian Bostridge, Deborah York, Bryn Terfel, et al., the London Symphony Orchestra, and Monteverdi Choir under Sir John Eliot Gardiner, or below in this recording led by Kent Nagano For idle hearts and hands and … Continue reading Stravinsky: The Rake’s Progress
Welcome back, everyone, to another round of concert reviews, with stuff I always forget to mention, people who don’t know how to behave themselves in public, stunning, stellar music, a later bedtime than I usually have, and the overwhelming feeling … Continue reading NSO: Blazing Masterpieces
This is the second concert lately to feature works from Russian composers (singular in this case), and there’s lots more Russian music in the next few weeks. First, I have to say that the cast (as it was sort of a cast) … Continue reading The Soldier’s Tale
We’re quite spoilt here in Taipei. I won’t go on again about having seen the world-famous ensembles from Berlin, Vienna, Chicago, and Munich come visit, along with the likes of the Concertgebouw and Philharmonia, and on and on, but we … Continue reading Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Taipei
performed by the Columbia Symphony under the composer’s baton To think that this is the first Stravinsky piece we’ve touched in our more-than-two-years here… better late than never. For those of you who think of Stravinsky as a wild, imaginative … Continue reading Igor Stravinsky: Symphony in Eb major, op. 1
So… kind of finally, we get around to this guy. The cover image for this article is a far less common (to me…?) image of the composer, not the one below that everyone’s used to seeing: Anyway, he’s outstandingly famous now … Continue reading Influential People: Igor Stravinsky
This is another one of those concerts I have (very proudly, I might add) managed to gather people together to attend. Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin enjoyed quite a fantastic turnout on its opening night, and I was very glad at that performance to have been … Continue reading Concert review: NSO’s Fireworks from Russia
台北愛樂管弦樂團 This concert was the day after the previous concert review, the one with Mo. Antoni Wit, and if you look at the two programs, it could also tenuously be called “Paganini Variations Part 2.” I don’t seem to have recalled hearing the Taipei Philharmonic before. For clarification’s sake, the previous day’s ensemble is the Taiwan Philharmonic, but only in English. Their Chinese name (國家交響樂團) translates to English as the National Symphony Orchestra. You can see how that may be confusing, but in any case, they’re different. I expressed in that article my continued and growing adoration for the NSO, … Continue reading Concert Review: Taipei Philharmonic 30th Anniversary Concert
Fugue for Thought 