Benjamin Zander

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Over (and under) the top

Musical chairs at the BSO, the Pacifica at Longy, the Boston Philharmonic's three B's, and the Cecilia's Bach B-minor Mass
With only one rehearsal, 31-year-old BSO Assistant Conductor Julian Kuerti confronted a challenging two-and-a-half-hour program of not-quite-standard 19th- and 20th-century repertoire.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | November 24, 2008

Russian, Spanish, American . . .

Music in all accents comes to the concert halls
What everyone is looking forward to this fall is the return to the podium of Boston Symphony Orchestra music director James Levine.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | September 11, 2008

On (and off) track

Boston Lyric Opera’s Seraglio , BU’s Barbiere di Siviglia , Andy Vores’s No Exit , the BPO’s Bartók and Brahms
It’s an expensive, elegant set, a lovingly detailed theatrical reproduction of railway cars on the Orient Express, the famous train connecting Paris and Istanbul.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | April 29, 2008

Singers’ delight

Spring Arts Preview: Opera and vocal works lead the season
The season may be starting to wind down, but there remain some events music lovers have been waiting for all year.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | March 10, 2008

Russians on the run

Benjamin Zander and the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra at Sanders Theatre, February 24, 2008
Zander balanced the pathos and the passion here the way you have to balance the rose and the distaff/thorn in The Sleeping Beauty , and that was no small thing.
By JEFFREY GANTZ | February 26, 2008

Too much too soon?

Classical goodies for 2008
Two of the most exciting concerts announced for this winter are on the same date, February 24.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | January 31, 2008

Love and loss

Classical: 2007 in review
Boston’s biggest classical-music story this year was also its saddest.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 18, 2007

Unanswered questions

Ben Zander and the BPO, Sanders Theatre, November 18, 2007
Not many living conductors (Abbado? Harnoncourt? Barenboim?) would do better.
By JEFFREY GANTZ | November 19, 2007

Super abundance

Gustavo Dudamel and the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela; James Levine’s Berg and Mahler; Measha Brueggergosman at Jordan Hall
“Something absolutely extraordinary is happening in Venezuela,” announced Tony Woodcock.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | November 13, 2007

World music

The BSO goes traveling, and Berlin comes to Boston
There’s more to Boston’s classical music scene than the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | September 12, 2007

Oh Susanna

Ailyn Pérez shines in BLO’s Figaro; so does Gabriela Montero with the Boston Philharmonic
Music director Stephen Lord conducts a Figaro that clocks in close to three and a half hours but so engaging, few people will be checking their watches.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | May 01, 2007

Heroics

Ricardo Chailly and the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Teatro Lirico, and the BSO’s latest guests
It’s been eight years since Ricardo Chailly made his last Boston appearance.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | March 13, 2007

Rise and fall

Opera Boston does Mahagonny; the BSO and the Boston Philharmonic do Sibelius
With its production of the Kurt Weill/Bertolt Brecht Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny, Opera Boston consolidates its position as this city’s most exciting opera company.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | March 13, 2007

Erwartung . . .

Classical goodies for 2007
BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA music director James Levine will be back in February to continue his survey of Beethoven and Schoenberg with Metropolitan Opera diva Deborah Voigt in Beethoven’s “Ah! perfido” and Schoenberg’s Erwartung (“Awaiting”), along with Beethoven’s Coriolan Overture and Eighth Symphony (Symphony Hall, February 1-3).
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 28, 2006

The best of times, the worst of times

A year in classical
This year Boston classical music lost some of its most beloved figures — some, like mezzo-soprano Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, at the very height of their extraordinary powers, others, like opera director Sarah Caldwell and her conductor/collaborator, Osbourne McConathy, after long and gratifying runs.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 20, 2006

Changing lives

The New England Conservatory’s Youth Philharmonic Orchestra visits Venezuela and Brazil
People who love the arts are fond of saying that art changes our lives. Slideshow: The New England Conservatory’s Youth Philharmonic Orchestra visits Venezuela and Brazil
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 15, 2006

Winter harvest

Emmanuel’s memorial to Lorraine Hunt Lieberson; Angelika Kirchschlager at Jordan Hall; Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos and El Niño at the BSO
"I don’t want to be here,” soprano Susan Larson lamented in her moving eulogy to her old friend and colleague Lorraine Hunt Lieberson.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 12, 2006

Beyond the fringe

The BSO’s Beethoven, Schoenberg, Bartók, and Brahms; Intermezzo’s Britten; Zander’s Mahler
It was a good week for chamber opera: Bluebeard’s Castle from the BSO, Curlew River from Intermezzo.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | November 20, 2006

High Numbers

Elliott Carter at 85, Pavarotti at Boston Garden, plus Russell Sherman and the Boston Philharmonic
This article originally appeared in the March 19, 1993 issue of the Boston Phoenix.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | November 16, 2006

From Knoxville to Swan Lake and back

A chock-full season of classical music
As our most prestigious classical-music institution, the Boston Symphony Orchestra ought to be every year’s headliner, and once again, under the adventuresome direction of James Levine, it is.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | September 13, 2006

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