MUSIC REVIEWS
St. Lawrence String Quartet Thrills ArtPower!
For its vivacious stage presence and vibrant tonal palette, the St. Lawrence String Quartet is a popular and regular guest at UC San Diego’s ArtPower! chamber music series. Their Friday (Nov. 7) concert at the Conrad Prebys Concert Hall brought cheers and shouts of bravo . . .
Read MoreSongs Instrumental and Vocal
Mention the composer Ottorino Respighi, and most music aficionados will reel off a list of massive orchestral works, especially those throbbing tone poems depicting the city of Rome. But the early 20th-century composer has another more intimate and subtle side: Respighi the chamber music maestro. This was the visage that smiled on Art of Élan’s season-opening program . . .
Read MoreDiLisi the Crafty Soloist in Rare Timpani Concerto
One of San Diego Symphony Music Director Jahja Ling’s laudable traits is affording the virtuoso players within his orchestra opportunities to appear in solo concertos. This Friday Principal Timpanist Ryan DiLisi amazed and pleased the Copley Symphony Hall audience with his solo turn in William Kraft’s Timpani Concerto No.1 . . .
Read MoreSan Diego’s Next Wave: Collaboration
Sunday (October 19) at La Mesa’s St. Martin of Tours Church, the recently formed choral group Folklore shared a program with Joseph Martin Waters’ avant-garde ensemble Swarmius, evidence of a new collaborative spirit among San Diego music ensembles and organizations. . .
Read MorePianist Kholodenko Scores with Powerful Prokofiev Second Concerto
Sometimes the designation “competition winner” is a scarlet letter, a mark denoting that soulless technical wizardry capable of impressing judges, but Vadym Kholodenko, first prize winner of the 2013 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, demonstrated probing emotional depth and daring individuality in his stunning account of Prokofiev’s Second Piano Concerto Sunday . . .
Read MoreSan Diego Symphony’s Scottish Fling Opens Season
San Diego Symphony Music Director Jahja Ling celebrated his tenth anniversary with the orchestra by completing a musical circle: he duplicated his inaugural concert from 2004, a program of Scottish-themed works by Mendelssohn, Bruch and the contemporary Peter Maxwell Davies . . .
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