By Rebecca Schmid A timpanist just tall enough to rumble his mallets over the kettle drums stares out from beneath his specs as Lars Vogt slides onto the bench for the opening chords of Grieg’s Piano Concerto. “I like that sound!” says Music Director Donato Cabrera to the young percussionist as he walks out into [...]
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By Rebecca Schmid Conducting the Berlin Philharmonic is no small feat for a 37-year-old, and Yannick Nézet-Séguin—returning to the orchestra’s podium for the first time since his 2010 debut—had no intention to the make the event a small affair. The newly minted music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra, seen at the Philharmonie on June 16, [...]
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By Rebecca Schmid Peter Sellars’ semi-staging of St. Matthew Passion for the Rundfunkchor Berlin and the Berlin Philharmonic, officially called a “ritualization” on the cover of the production’s recently-released DVD, may be one of his most daring enterprises to date. Interestingly though, Bach’s Passion already has a history as a subject of both artistic reverence [...]
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