Monthly Archives: February 2001

Cleopatra Takes a Bath

In 48 B.C. or thereabouts, some kind of hanky-panky may or may not have occurred between Julius Caesar, conqueror of Egypt, and Cleopatra, claimant to that country‘s throne. Caesar was 52 at the time; Cleopatra was 20. Several centuries later, … Continue reading

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“GIULIO CESARE” AT THE L.A. OPERA

Handel has earned his place –  a century late, perhaps, but decisively. The most convincing of the old arguments, that a world enlightened by more benign attitudes toward surgery had therefore cut itself off from the requisite singers for this … Continue reading

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Brain Waves

When Marino Formenti gave his first piano recital at LACMA’s Bing Theater last April, there were something like 50 people scattered through the 600-seat hall — the usual turnout, in other words, for a new-music program at the Museum. Two … Continue reading

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Loving Ludwig

On a rainy night last week I fell in love with Beethoven’s Violin Concerto. Really, I mean, in love. I heard the first drumbeats as if they came from my own throbbing temples; the opening music for winds was smooth, … Continue reading

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Adams the Accessible

Threaded like a litany though the recent writing about John Adams — of which there has been considerable, local and national — is the proclamation of him as the most “accessible” of contemporary composers. Surely the term has the ring … Continue reading

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