One of Rochester’s essential summer sounds is the University of Rochester’s Hopeman Memorial Carillon, which has pealed out from the top of Rush Rhees Library for the last 42 years. (The 50 hand-cast bronze bells came from the Netherlands, and replaced the original bells from 1930.) When it’s not striking the hours, it is playing […]
David Raymond
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CLASSICAL | Finger Lakes Choral Festival
Mozart only finished a few sections of his Mass in C Minor before abandoning it in 1783; nobody is sure why. But musicians agree that what’s left still deserves the work’s nickname, “Grand.” Even unfinished, the mass is still one of the grandest sacred choral works in the repertory: a synthesis of baroque contrapuntal artistry […]
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CLASSICAL | Finger Lakes Chamber Music Festival
An upstate summer music tradition for 13 years and counting, the Finger Lakes Chamber Music Festival, begins its 2015 season this Saturday, June 13, 7:30 p.m. at Hunt Country Vineyards (4021 Italy Hill Road, Branchport) with a recital of baroque chamber music by Bach, Telemann, Corelli, and Handel featuring harpsichordist Yi-heng Yang. The season roster […]
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Classical Review: RPO performs “Carmina Burana”
Choral groups have few blue-chip certainties in the 20th-century repertoire, but Carl Orff’s “Carmina Burana” is definitely one of them. With music that has been pilfered for movies, commercials, video games, rock albums, and sitcom episodes, Orff’s “scenic cantata” always draws a crowd — and the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and the Oratorio Society surely counted […]
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CLASSICAL | “Hochstein at High Falls”
Summer concert series are beginning to bloom all over the area. “Hochstein at High Falls” begins its seventh summer seaons this Thursday, June 4, at 12:10 p.m. with the African drumming and dance group Mounafanyi, and proceeds through all kinds of musical styles from world music and Latin jazz to rock, including such longtime local […]
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CLASSICAL | “An English Springtime” with the RPO
What better way to follow up a Rochester Lilac Festival than with a Rochester Philharmonic English Springtime? The RPO offers that opportunity this Sunday afternoon, in the orchestra’s last Hochstein Performance Hall concert of the season. Guest conductor Daniel Meyer, who led the RPO in March’s “Music and the Dance” concert, will return to lead […]
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Fall from grace
Craig Wright’s “Grace” had a modest Broadway run a few years ago, and Out of Pocket’s presentation at MuCCC suggests why it was modest. Despite interesting ideas and moments, it doesn’t convince as a whole. However, at MuCCC, “Grace” gets a production that at least shows the play to good advantage, and shows off some […]
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CLASSICAL | RPO performs Sibelius and Dvorak
The classical music world loves its anniversaries. Last year’s big one was Richard Strauss’ 150th. In 2015,the honor goes to another late-Romantic master: Jean Sibelius (1865-1957). The great Finnish composer’s music isn’t heard all that often on Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra programs. That situation changes this week, with two Sibelius works on the bill. Concertmaster Juliana […]
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THEATER | “Deathtrap”
Sidney Bruhl is a successful writer of Broadway thrillers who has hit a dry spell; when one of his writing students comes up with a script that could be a hit, he and his wife hatch a plan that soon turns into an exercise in cat-and-mouse suspense. That’s the basis of “Deathtrap” by Ira Levin, […]
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THEATER | “Orestes 2.0”
The ever-adventurous Bread and Water Theatre’s exploration of Aeschylus’ “Oresteia” trilogy, which began with “Agamemnon” and “The Libation Bearers,” comes to a close with a contemporary take on the ancient Greek story: “Orestes 2.0” by Charles Mee, this time based on Euripides’ “Orestes.” In a modern setting, veterans of the Trojan War return home, only […]
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THEATER | MuCCC College Theater Festival
College students who want to develop their talents for directing, acting, and writing have a strong ally in MuCCC, which is presenting its annual College Theater Festival this Saturday, May 9. (It’s thoughtfully scheduled after most finals.) Local college students and teachers provide the short one-act plays, and the theater professionals at MuCCC (not to […]
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CLASSICAL | “porgy And Bess”
George Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess” is often called the Great American Opera, and I can’t argue with that. First produced on Broadway in 1934, “Porgy and Bess” eventually found a home in opera houses throughout the world (though it has made periodic returns to Broadway, most recently in 2012). The score (with lyrics by DuBose […]
