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Sunday, July 12, 2026

Blomstedt at 99

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Herbert Blomstedt Photo by J.M. Pietsch / Courtesy of San Francisco Symphony Herbert Blomstedt, Conductor Laureate of the San Francisco Symp...
Saturday, July 11, 2026

Itinerary

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Place de la Bastille, Paris July, 2026 So I am out of town, on a European trip I'm thinking of as the follies of summer 2026, because of...
Friday, July 03, 2026

A Note from Alex Ross

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Cover of Alex Ross's first book, The Rest is Noise Black block type, all caps, with details in red-orange The Rest is Noise: Listening t...
Wednesday, July 01, 2026

Emerging Black Composers: Do Better

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Christopher Thompson Winner of the Sixth Annual Emerging Black Composers Project Photo Courtesy S.F. Symphony Christopher Thompson is the wi...
Monday, June 22, 2026

Opera Parallèle's Doubt

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Rhoslyn Jones (Sister Aloysius) and Matthew Worth (Father Flynn), in Doubt at Opera Parallèle  Photo: Stefan Cohen   Opera Parallèle staged...
Friday, June 12, 2026

Thea Musgrave at Left Coast Chamber Ensemble

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Thea Musgrave Photo courtesy of San Francisco Opera Left Coast Chamber Ensemble just announced their 2026-27 season the other day, and whad...

Friday Photo

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Salvation Army Building W. 14th St., NY, NY April, 2026  
Thursday, June 11, 2026

The Greeks Knew about Catharsis: Elektra at the San Francisco Opera

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Kyle Ketelsen (Orest) and Elena Pankratova (Elektra) Photo: Cory Weaver, courtesy of San Francisco Opera Richard Strauss's Elektra  is b...
Monday, June 08, 2026

Elim Chan Arrives

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Elim Chan and Sasha Cooke Photo: Stefan Cohen, courtesy of San Francisco Symphony June, 2026 Back in January, 2026, when Elim Chan's Jun...

Museum Mondays

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Annunciation drawing, by Raphael  Preparatory for Annunciation Raphael: Sublime Poetry Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC April, 2026 (Click to...
Saturday, June 06, 2026

Limmie Pulliam

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Tenor Limmie Pulliam, who had just turned 50, died on May 19  (gift link to NY Times obituary). I heard him just once , singing Otello at Li...
2 comments:
Friday, June 05, 2026

Friday Photo

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Brooklyn, NY Main Library April, 2026 An Art Deco beauty from the outside; I wish I'd had time to go inside.  
Tuesday, June 02, 2026

Whitney George's The Curious Case of Doctor Jekyll & Mr. Hyde

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Composer Whitney George has what she calls a Gothic chamber thriller, The Curious Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde , playing in New York Cit...

Exciting Times at Davies

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Davies Symphony Hall, S.F. Photo by Lisa Hirsch Exciting, yes, in good and not so good ways. Perhaps most importantly, I interviewed San Fra...
Monday, June 01, 2026

A Tale of Two Opera Houses

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War Memorial Opera House View from the Stage Photo courtesy of the War Memorial If you read this blog, you know that my home opera house is ...

Museum Mondays

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Puff Quilt with Tobacco Sacks Annie Crawford Routed West , BAMPFA  Berkeley, CA November, 2025 Click to enlarge  
Friday, May 29, 2026

Daniel Harding, Please Fly Me to Paris.

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Daniel Harding Photo: Polly Brown, Courtesy of Los Angeles Philharmonic No kidding: my summer vacation starts with an Air France flight from...

Friday Photo

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Cauliflower Civic Center Farmers Market, San Francisco March, 2026  
Thursday, May 28, 2026

Luna Composition Lab

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New York Times screencap Ellen Reid and Missy Mazzoli in Reid's Brooklyn loft/studio I've had a busy few weeks, and the biggest stor...

Los Angeles Philharmonic Die Walküre

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Walt Disney Concert Hall Photo by Lisa Hirsch I don't usually do review round-ups for performances I haven't seen, but in this case,...

Wo bleibt Elektra?

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Dover Score of Richard Strauss's Elektra (Black background, white type, different beige and black graphical motifs running across the sc...
2 comments:
Wednesday, May 27, 2026

Opera Parallèle 2026-27 Season

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Opera Parallèle has a fascinating season planned for 2026-27. Here's the repertory and descriptions of the three operas they'll perf...
Tuesday, May 26, 2026

Belated Museum Mondays

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Afrofuturism Display Photos of works by Octavia Butler, Nalo Hopkinson, N.K. Jemison, Ytasha L. Womack, and others; a typewriter. San Franci...
Friday, May 22, 2026

Friday Photo

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Tristan und Isolde Curtain Call Photo Metropolitan Opera, NYC April, 2026  
Thursday, May 21, 2026

Elim Chan, Music Director Designate of the San Francisco Symphony

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Elim Chan Cody Pickens, courtesy of San Francisco Symphony . Big news from Davies Symphony Hall this morning: Elim Chan, 39, will be the nex...