Clips & Articles: Music
I review the Seattle and Portland operas, and smaller opera companies, for Portland-based Oregon ArtsWatch and Artslandia, and for Classical Voice North America, the official web site of the Music Critics Association of North America, of which I am a member. I write about classical, chamber and jazz music for Oregon ArtsWatch, Classical Voice North America, and previously, for Oregon Music News, concertonet.com and Northwest Reverb. For more stories and music reviews, check the archives at www.columbian.com between 1995-2006. My 2005 National Endowment for the Arts and Columbia Journalism grant helped immensely in music coverage.
Lifesize Bright: Dan Balmer’s latest album ‘When the Night’
The Oregon jazz guitarist discusses his background, his love for Pat Metheny and for education, and his new album on Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble Records.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch December 2023
Virtuoso jazz musician Dan Balmer will open the 2024 PDXJazz Festival concert starring Grammy-nominated guitarist Julian Lage on Feb. 28 at Portland’s Revolution Hall. A generation or so younger than Balmer, the innovative Lage has a reputation for “impeccable technique, free association, and the spirit of infinite possibility,” according to his press materials. Read More
Forever and ever, amen: Handel’s ‘Messiah’ with Portland Baroque Orchestra, Cappella Romana, Enrico Lagasca, Camille Ortiz, Hannah Penn, John Reese, and guest conductor John Butt
The evergreen seasonal oratorio received a stellar complete performance from choir, soloists, and period instruments at First Baptist Church.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch December 2023
Growing up, the “Messiah” was a sure sign of Christmas. My mother put the well-worn LP of Handel’s three-hour sacred oratorio on the turntable and cranked up the stereo as loud as she could. Even the neighbors could hear it. I loved it. It was thrilling.
But.
Read More
‘Performance is 100 percent integrated with movement’: Violist Paul Laraia and the Catalyst Quartet at The Old Church
The Grammy-nominated quartet’s “¡Viva la Música!” program November 30 (part of their CMNW residency) made the most of the group’s Latin roots, featuring music by Paquito D’Rivera and Astor Piazzolla alongside Ravel, Gershwin, and Shaw.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch December 2023
It’s been said before: The viola is under-appreciated. The violin, the cello, even the harp and the double bass these days, attract more attention among the string family.
The instrument deserves more praise, especially when played as dazzlingly as it was by Paul Laraia of the phenomenally creative and well-honed Catalyst Quartet Nov. 30 at Portland’s The Old Church. The sound of the viola’s velvety alto in talented hands makes your heart beat harder and faster. Read More
Magic and logic, working together: PSU Opera’s charming production of Evan Meier and E.M. Lewis’ ‘Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Fallen Giant’
Cast and crew from Portland State’s School of Music & Theater gave the staged premiere of Meier and Lewis’ opera with style.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch December 2023
Portland State University Opera’s Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Fallen Giant was a charmer. The four performances Nov. 25 through Dec. 3 (the opera I saw) were sold out in the 84-seat Lincoln Hall Studio Theater. And for good reasons. The production hit the right chords: original, playful, an ideal length at 100 minutes in two acts, and family-friendly. Read More
Are we a jazz town? The 1905 closes.
Financial difficulties for the 1905, which has just gone out of business, raise larger questions about the history and future of jazz in Portland.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch November 2023
In mid-October, music fans received an email announcing that the snug beloved 1905 jazz club in North Portland’s Mississippi neighborhood was on the brink of financial disaster. The final show would be that night. Read More
Portland Opera’s colorful, comedic, costume-rich ‘Figaro’
PO kept its sixth production of the 238-year-old Mozart opera fresh with superb singing, tight conducting, agile staging, and new, historically-informed costumes.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch November 2023
If you’re new to opera, The Marriage of Figaro is usually a guaranteed good ticket. If you’ve seen several Figaros, as I have, its playful charm and tuneful music, when well conducted, rarely lets down even a jaded critic partial to contemporary pieces. Among the 10 most produced operas, the 1786 Mozart hit remains one that companies can’t resist staging over and over. Read More
A 21st-century reboot: Seattle Opera’s gender-bent ‘Alcina’
SO staged the Handel opera with six singers (including one countertenor), modern set design, and haute couture costuming.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch October 2023
SEATTLE – George Frideric Handel’s operas don’t amass a lot of stage time in the United States. Seattle Opera has presented only four in its 60-year existence.
The fourth, which continues through Oct. 28 at SO’s McCaw Hall, is Alcina–and what a playfully sexy choice it was, cleverly stage-directed by British-born Tim Albery, known for his taut, poetic presentations. The production should convince the opera world to give Handel a 21st-century reboot. Read More
‘The endless expanse of the African savannah’: Harriet Tubman comes to Jack London Revue
The electric jazz trio will perform at the Portland night club in October.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch October 2023
Most of us know Harriet Tubman as a one-time-slave-turned-abolitionist who risked her life for her freedom and that of at least 70 other Black people two centuries ago.
But there’s another Harriet Tubman–for 25 years, there’s been a three-person band carrying on her name and legacy. Read More
Remembering Yaki Bergman, 1945-2023
“He led with his heart, and what a huge, open heart it was!”: The leader of Portland Chamber Orchestra and the Siletz Bay Music Festival leaves a giant gap among musicians and friends.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch October 2023
The music community and its extended family lost a faithful friend, a visionary leader, an innovative programmer, and a beloved conductor when Yaacov “Yaki” Bergman died Sept. 20 in Portland. Read More
Real life on the fringes: OrpheusPDX’s ‘Dark Sisters’
Local production of Nico Muhly’s opera brings complex emotions and conflicting points of view to Lincoln Hall.
Originally Published in Oregon ArtsWatch August 2016
The title alone, Dark Sisters, is enough to clue us in that the 90-minute chamber opera will touch on chilling moments, secrets, conspiracies, coverups, lies, sexual abuse, uncertainty. And mystery. These ideas and textures surface in a disturbing and beautifully anguished way in the opera about six women confined to a Texas “ranch” and controlled by one man in the FLDS (Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints) Church. Read More