Author: Philip Gardner

Above: pianist Bruce Liu

~ Author: Mark Anthony Martinez II 

Saturday February 20th, 2026 – It had been a while since I saw a solo piano concert, and I was reminded how beautiful and replete an evening of piano music can be.

Bruce Liu is an acclaimed pianist and the winner of the 18th Chopin Piano Competition in 2021. I had never heard Liu play before, but I was excited to hear how he’d play. In a former life, I was a pianist, and I truly love the music and instrument, even if I never play it anymore.

As the concert lights started to dim and everyone was settling in, Liu briskly strode onto the stage and got himself comfortable at the piano.

Liu jumped right into the first piece, which was “Fanfares” by Ligeti. This is a showpiece with fluttering notes that span the whole keyboard, and Liu had such a mellifluously light touch throughout. It was almost as if he were floating over the keys. It’s an interesting choice to start off the program with a contemporary piece, but it set the tone well for the first half of the program, which consisted of three pieces with lots of movement across the whole keyboard in near-constant motion, so thematically it all made sense.

Once the Ligeti was over, Liu started the French Suite No. 5 by Bach. Liu’s playing of the Bach was simply exquisite, delicate, and elegant. Liu’s playing was so assured and beautiful that I was able to just drift off into the sound.

The Allemande and Sarabande were two of the best-played movements by Liu. Even though the piano is a percussion instrument, the music was able to sing through. The Gigue was another fantastically played movement. What I particularly loved was Liu’s ability to really let the inner voices ring out in the movement. It’s easy to let the lower and upper notes cover a middle voice moment, but Liu’s control and musicianship let each appropriate voice sing out.

After he finished the Bach, the crowd erupted into applause, and Liu stood up to take a bow.

I was extremely excited to see what Liu would do with the next piece, the Waldstein Sonata by Beethoven. This is one of my favorite pieces that Beethoven wrote, and I’ve heard many seminal recordings of it.

I was particularly interested in how Liu would play it because he is such a Chopin specialist and has such a light touch. Beethoven, though still solidly in the Classical era, has flavors of romanticism, but also the classic Sturm und Drang. I was curious to see how Liu would navigate both.

Before Liu started the Waldstein, he took a moment to compose himself, then played the iconic opening. Liu started the piece faster than I was used to, and I sat listening to see how things would develop.

Liu really knocked the Waldstein out of the park. What was really so interesting was that Liu played the Beethoven in such a way that it sounded more romantic than I normally had heard it. The fluttering of notes and the well-placed rubato made it at times sound closer to Chopin than Mozart, and I loved it!

For a warhorse like the Waldstein, it’s easy to fall into the patterns of pianists over the ages, but the way that Liu played the piece made it feel like a fully new piece of music to me. Somehow this tried and trodden sonata had a breath of new life that shimmered as Liu swept up and down the keyboard. The voicing was again perfect and just so wonderfully played overall.

After Liu finished, he stood up for a well-deserved applause and then strode off for intermission.

The second half of the program was more of a motley crew of pieces. It started with some Chopin classics, then there were single movements from larger works by Ravel, Mompou, Albeniz, and ended with a grand Liszt piece.

Liu’s handling of the Chopin was great and very much what I expected a Chopin specialist to play like. What was really interesting, though, was that I felt more of a unique touch on the preceding pieces, the Beethoven in particular, than I did with the Chopin. It might be that since Chopin is at the core of Liu’s style, it is the style that affects the other pieces, but Chopin’s music remains unchanged.

The crowd loved the Nocturne in C-sharp Minor and the Nocturne in D-flat Major. The largest applause of the night up until this point followed the two Chopin pieces.

I loved Liu’s treatment of Ravel’s Alborada del gracioso. Ravel is truly a pianistic composer, and Liu took full advantage of the music that utilized so much of the keyboard. This piece has an infamously difficult triple glissando, and Liu managed that without a shred of difficulty. The piece was fiery and passionate and somehow more aggressively played than the Beethoven.

Another highlight for me was Albeniz’ El Puerto from Iberio, Book I. If there was a theme for the second half of the program, the music seemed to be inspired by Spain or have some Spanish influence throughout. This piece was classic Albeniz and was such a jolly piece with a very humorous mood throughout.

Before Liu tackled the last piece on the program, Liszt’s Rhapsoddie espangole, he took a quick break. True to Lisztian form, this piece was a monumental flurry of notes that left the listener in shock and awe at the virtuosity of the performer.

Once Liu finished, he received a very well-deserved standing ovation before jumping into encores of Beethoven and Chopin to more rapturous applause.

~ Mark Anthony Martinez II

The Italian baritone Simone Piazzola (above) sings the great aria “Per me giunto è il dì supremo” from Verdi’s DON CARLO. The pianist is Francesco Rosa. The recording was made during the pandemic, hence, there is no audience present.

I discovered this voice just recently, and was very moved by his singing of this touching aria: Posa’s farewell to his friend, Don Carlo. Piazzola’s phrasing – and his amazing breath control – remind me of Hvorostovsky. Now I am following him on Facebook. Lisette has sung with him in Europe and she speaks highly of him. 

Watch and listen here.

Above: Joyce DiDonato, photo by Chris Gonz

~ Author: Mark Anthony Martinez II

Thursday February 19th, 2026 – Emily Dickinson wrote such beautiful and moving poetry that in many ways she has become one of the great poetic geniuses of the United States, and it’s no surprise that there are many musical works set to her writing.

In the program notes for the concert at Carnegie Hall with Joyce DiDonato, singing from Dickinson’s perspective, and Time for Three, acting as a further inner dialogue at times, it was noted that over 3,000 pieces have been written using Dickinson’s words.

The Carnegie debut of this cycle set itself apart with the grandeur of the set and the sheer scope of the music itself.

Carnegie is most often a concert hall, with the music alone being the focal point of the venue. Today’s concert was an exception. On the stage there was a large set which would be befitting enough for a one-act opera. The set had an elevated platform with a singular writing desk placed approximately in the middle of the platform. Above the platform was a forest of white fabric draping down in strips with pendulous lights mixed in.

There were words being projected onto the stage and around the hall as well, although I couldn’t catch what they were actually saying.

Before the concert started, I noticed that Joyce DiDonato was walking around the back of the stage, grazing the walls, clearly in the character she was playing. People didn’t seem to notice her as she made her home on stage, since I hadn’t heard anyone say anything about it around me.

The lights dimmed, and then the trio Time for Three rushed up onto the platform, performing the first song of the first piece.

Emily – No Prisoner Be is a new song cycle written by the composer Kevin Puts. A product of works originating during COVID, Puts knew from the start he was writing for Time for Three and then Joyce DiDonato.

It’s not too common to understand where the exact origin of a song cycle stemmed from, but the program notes mention this specific Dickinson poem kicked off the entire project.

“They shut me up in Prose –”
As when a little Girl
They put me in the Closet –
Because they liked me “still” –

Still! Could themself have peeped –
And seen my Brain – go round –
They might as wise have lodged a Bird
For Treason – in the Pound –

Himself has but to will
And easy as a Star
Look down upon Captivity –
And laugh – No more have I –”

And just like the original inspiration, the entire night was a journey of exploration, personal freedom, and triumph.

As Time for Three came on stage, the violinist playing as he walked, the stage was immediately set. Unlike a traditional song cycle where the singer stands giving a monologue or a soliloquy of sorts, DiDonato and Time for Three were intent on making the night a true show.

Each song within the larger work was a poem from Dickinson. The first piece was “They shut me up in Prose –,” which set the stage for the night’s music.

DiDonato truly was at home in this music. The style of singing was a mix of classical and contemporary, with good use of amplification so that she didn’t need to rely on operatic technique to be heard throughout the hall. DiDonato really did sound fantastic in this medium, and clearly Puts, the composer, endeavored to make the piece utilize the best parts of her voice.

Time for Three not only were the instrumentalists but also joined in quite frequently to provide backup vocals in the piece. I loved their playing but was actually quite a fan of their singing as well. The folksy nature of the piece and their dynamic style really made the night feel more like a contemporary folk concert than just a traditional classical performance.

Many of the pieces were beautiful, though at times the tonal quality of them felt so alike that it was hard to distinguish when one began and one ended. My highlight of the night was the music set to perhaps Dickinson’s most famous poem, “Because I could not stop for Death –.” This piece revealed a total tonal shift, and instead of the flowing, watery nature of the pieces beforehand, it was punctuated, loud, and full of drama.

The audience loved the short instrumental-only intermissions which were also inspired by Dickinson poems but did not use her words. The titles of each piece, as well as lyrics of the songs, were projected onto the bottom of the platform on stage. The first instrumental-only section was labeled “Bee Scherzo,” but subsequent ones cheekily wrote things like “Another Bee Scherzo,” which drew larger and larger laughs from the audience each time the title came up.

The night concluded with the namesake of the whole work, the song “No Prisoner Be.” After the musicians performed the work, Kevin Puts came up on stage to a warm ovation, and DiDonato started to lead the crowd in a chorale of the melody from the last song. The musicians all embraced, and the crowd left the theater humming the final melody.

~ Mark Anthony Martinez II

The voice of 23 year-old Austrian mezzo-soprano Anja Mittermüller enchanted me when a brief clip of her singing popped up on YouTube the other day.

In 2024, Ms. Mittermüller – then 20 years old – was the youngest singer ever to win the Wigmore Hall/Bollinger International Song Competition.

Her rendering of Schubert’s Litanei auf das Fest aller Seelen, accompanied by James Baillieu, may be found here.

~ Author: Oberon

Above, the composer Georg Friedrich Haas

Sunday February 22nd, 2026 – This afternoon’s concert by Parlando had intrigued me since it was first announced. The orchestra’s founder and conductor, Ian Niederhoffer, had provided this “preview”:

“What does it mean to make music in complete darkness? Join Parlando for an immersive performance of Georg Friedrich Haas’s in vain, a gripping, hour-long work that bends time, light and memory. Written in response to the far-right’s resurgence in Austria and described by The Guardian as “the first masterpiece of the 21st century,” in vain confronts the fragility of democracy through waves of harmony, shimmering stillness, and sudden rupture. As politics around the world grow darker, Haas offers both a warning and a vision: a plea to keep listening, even when the lights go out. In this performance, lighting is written into the score, alternating between brightness and darkness.”

As the afternoon of the performance drew nigh, uncertainties about the weather caused my guest and I to wonder if the MTA would be reliable; and whether we should simply stay home. But the storm had not yet hit, and so a mere misty rain with a smattering of snowflakes decided us to venture out to Merkin Hall, where a full house of intrepid New Yorkers gathered for a mind-blowing performance of a terrifying and gorgeous 21st century masterwork that kept us enthralled from start to finish.

Maestro Niederhoffer gave a brilliant, truly informative introductory speech, telling us of what had impelled Georg Friedrich Haas to write his hour-long symphonic poem; the gist of his talk can be read in the program quote at the top of this article. He also told us what to expect in terms of the complex lighting scheme of the presentation, and of the darkness that would envelop us at times. The program charmingly included a reference to the level of “listening difficulty”; my companion and I had no difficulties whatsoever.

The work commences with tingling, cosmic sounds. A pulsing beat from the orchestra’s bassist, Dara Bloom, heralds a loud passage which develops into drooping motifs. Marimba, harp, and xylophone keep lightness in the mix, but sustained wind tones flow into the ominous darkness, with the vibrating gong a harbinger of fate. Echoing sounds and fading light leave harpist Kristi Shade illuminated: an outstanding visual effect. 

Shivering violins and lingering wind notes evolve into long chords with dense harmonies. Bursts of brightness are offset with growling, sighing, whining sounds. The music develops a soul-searching depth, with descending brass arpeggios. Cymbals crash; massive sonic attacks and chilling strings fill the air. Hell-fire is evoked; we hear oozing chords, stutterings from the marimba, and fractured brass sounds. The lighting causes the polished surface of Ms. Bloom’s double-bass to turn blood red. The doom-ladened gong is struck.

Swirling, plunging motifs suddenly run out of gas. The music crawls along, with sighs from the cellos. A brief passage of tonality – a mystical quietude – gives way to rising fanfares. Throbbing rhythms, a rattling bell, and brass chords are played as darkness descends for the second time. The insistent bell underscores the music’s tension; deep resonances are explored. Then harp glissandos signal a sonic sunburst of hope. A repeated piano note as the music sails into the stratosphere, with gong attacks seeming to carry a warning. Tumult ensues. Weighted chords descend, only to rise again; the rhythm speeds up. The ebb and flow of the music, which perhaps goes on a bit too long here, ends in silence. After a profound pause, the applause commenced, soon turning into a standing ovation. 

A mixture of despair and elation as we emerged into the developing storm. Awakening the morning after, I could feel the intense silence of an island now buried in snow. For a few minutes, all was peaceful. But then the morning’s headlines drew me back into reality all too soon. 

Boundless admiration for the composer’s thrilling, daring work…and for Maestro Niederhoffer and his marvelous band of music-makers for bringing it to us with such stunning clarity.

~ Oberon 

I love discovering singers I’d never previously heard…or even heard of.

The German mezzo-soprano Ute Walther (above) made her operatic debut as Octavian at Staatstheater Schwerin in 1968. From 1980, she was a leading artist with the Dresden State Opera.

Her roles included Dorabella, Cherubino, Strauss’s Composer, Wagner’s Fricka, Waltraute, Brangäne, Magdalene, Mary, and Ortrud; Hansel, Carmen, Prince Orlofsky, and Verdi’s Amneris, Meg Page, and Princess Eboli.

Ms. Walther also appeared with the Deutsche Oper Berlin, Dresden State Opera, at the Cologne Opera House, the Vienna State Opera, the Bolshoi, the Edinburgh Festival, Teatro Real in Madrid, and the Teatro Nacional de São Carlos in Lisbon.

She was also a noted concert singer, admired especially for her Bach interpretations.

Ms. Walther’s 1989 rendering of Mahler’s Kindertotenlieder may be heard here. The orchestra of RAI Turin is conducted by Wolfgang Rennert.

Born Joseph, Baron Van Damme, in Brussels in 1940, bass-baritone José van Dam went on to become one of the greatest vocal artists of our time. On February 17th, 2026, he passed away at the age of 85.  

M. van Dam studied at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels, and made his operatic debut at Liège as Rossini’s Don Basilio. In 1967, Loren Maazel invited the singer to join the Deutsche Oper Berlin. In the ensuing seasons, van Dam appeared at La Scala, Covent Garden, The Met, the Monnaie, the Teatro Colon, the Vienna State Opera, the Paris Opera, and the festivals at Salzburg, Aix-en-Provence, and Orange. He had a huge success in the premiere performance of Olivier Messiaen’s Saint François d’Assise, conducted by Seijo Ozawa. He worked frequently with such great conductors as Solti, Karajan, Plasson, Cambreling, Nagano, and Levine. 

At the Metropolitan Opera, where he debuted in 1975 as Escamillo, he sang 75 performances over a 30-year span. His roles were Colline, Golaud, Wagner’s Dutchman, Mozart’s Figaro, Wozzeck, and the Hoffmann four villains.  I attended his performances in the Debussy (opposite Jeannette Pilou) and the Berg (opposite Anja Silja), and they were among the most thrilling evenings in my 60+ years of opera-going.

A beloved recitalist, M. van Dam gave concerts and made recordings with the Polish pianist Maciej Pikulski. I had the great good fortune to attend two of their recitals in New York City. 

M. van Dam leaves behind a number of wonderful complete opera recordings, notably his Barak, Hans Sachs, and Mozart Figaro conducted by Sir Georg Solti, and his Golaud in Claudio Abbado’s marvelous rendering of Debussy’s score.

The bass-baritone appeared in the film The Music Master and also as Leporello in Joseph Losey’s classic Don Giovanni.

The City of Berlin honoured M. van Dam with the title of “Kammersänger”; in France he was bestowed the honor of “Commandeur des Arts et Lettres”; and, more recently, José van Dam was ennobled by King Albert II of Belgium.

From M. van Dam’s treasure chest of recordings, I’ve chosen his deeply moving performance of Mahler’s “Ich bin der welt abhanden gekommen”.  Listen here.

Above: composer George Lewis

~ Author: Oberon

Tuesday February 17^th,  2026 – I’ve been under the weather for the past few days, but I’d been looking forward to tonight’s concert by Carnegie Hall’s Ensemble Connect since the program was announced many moons ago. By late afternoon I was feeling pretty poorly, but I decided to head down to Weill Hall, thinking the fresh air might do me good after a couple of days of not venturing out. 

The concert opened with George Lewis’s Broke, a Carnegie Hall commission having its New York premiere this evening. The composer spoke briefly, insinuating that the music might not be to all tastes, but adding that “It’s short!”

Above: playing Mr. Lewis’s Broke; photo by Fadi Kheir

The players took the stage: Cameron Cullen (flute), Nicole Martin (clarinet and bass clarinet), Grace O’Connell (trumpet), David Seder (trombone), and Joseph Vaz (piano). The music started, and I was soon scribbling notes as fast as I could…for there was much to take in. Here are the words I scrawled: cacophonous, weird, fun, growling, stuttering, sighing, fast, furious, piercing, rippling bass clarinet, alarming, deafening, kozmic, sighing, muted brass motifs, massive slashing sounds from the piano’s strings, mind-blowing, messy…marvelous!

I thoroughly enjoyed every second of this piece, smiling and laughing to myself. The audience reception was more staid than I expected, but I applauded vigorously. The composer came onstage for a bow, and I decided that I would meet him and thank him after the concert ended.

Valerie Coleman’s Portraits of Langston (composed in 2007) brought Ms. Martin and Mssrs Cullen and Vaz back to the stage. The piece, in six movements – each having a title – was most appealing; the music shone with the composer’s trademark lyricism and her mastery of rhythms and moods. The entwining voices of the winds, and the pianist’s impressive dynamic range, engaged us from start to finish; dancing tempos and the alternating of pensive and light-hearted passages gave the players ample opportunities to shine. I thought the spoken-word introductions to each movement were superfluous, and held up the musical flow; but overall, the work was intriguing. 

Unfortunately, I’d been feeling increasingly ill as the music played on; at the interval, I decided to head home, foregoing the music of Samuel Barber, Scott Joplin and – most especially – of Charles Ives, which was what had lured me to the concert in the first place. 

~ Oberon

Above: The Malpaso Dance Company performing Martha Graham’s Dark Meadow Suite; photo by Steven Pisano

Author: Oberon

Sunday February 15th, 2026 matinee – The Malpaso Dance Company closing their eleventh engagement at The Joyce today with a triple bill program that featured the company’s premiere performances of works by Martha Graham, Keerati Jinakunwiphat, and Daileidys Carrazana. Live music was a key element in the production’s success this afternoon. 

The Graham Company’s artistic director, Janet Eilber, has crafted a suite from the choreographer’s 1946 longer work, Dark Meadow, to a score by Carlos Chavez. Bringing this Dark Meadow Suite into their repertoire gave the Malpaso the distinction of being the first Cuban dance company to stage a work by Martha Graham. This ritualistic work, with its underlying exploration of a woman’s sexual awakening, was set on the Malpaso dancers by Graham régisseur Elizabeth Auclair.

The Chavez score was performed live – and gorgeously – by the Alma String Quartet, giving the piece a palpable immediacy. This ensemble, founded in 2016 by its marvelous cellist, Amaya Justiz, played from their hearts: a really engrossing blend of musical textures.

The piece opens with the female dancers in a passage of classic Graham steps and gestures; the men then back into the space, and a solo by danseur  Esven González is superbly rendered. All afternoon, Mr. González will continue to captivate the eye. The suite dances on, with processions and partnered rituals. In a unique scene, the men, seated on the floor. support the standing women by grasping their ankles as they lean forward as if searching for something other-worldly. The female principal, I believe it was Greta Yero today, has a poignant solo; we then leave this realm as the light fades away. 

Though it takes years of dedicated study and physical discipline to master the Graham technique and style, the Malpaso dancers rose nobly to the challenge. The playing of the Alma quartet made an indelible impression; and kudos also (all afternoon) to the lighting designs by Manuel da Silva. 

Following a pause, a quartet of remarkable musicians gathered in the Joyce’s improvised pit to astonish us with their simply fabulous playing: trumpeter Adam O’Farrill and his colleagues from Stranger Days – saxman Xavier Del Castillo, bass-player Walter Stinson, and percussionist Zack O’Farrill – blew the roof off the place with their dynamic rhythms and vibrant sound. I could have listened to them for hours, but there was also dancing to be enjoyed in Year Of The Lion, choreographed by Kyle Abraham alumna Keerati Jinakunwiphat. 

The six dancers, clad in satiny unisex dresses designed by Karen Young, were Dailiedys Carranza, Greta Yero, Jennifer Suarez, Laura Rodriguez, Esven Gonzalez, and Esteban Aguilar. Fleeting solo and duet passages are woven into full ensembles in choreography that is eye-catching and vividly responsive to the musical score. The dancers were divine, the music kozmic.   

Following the interval, the program continued with La Estación (The Season), a new work by Malpaso co-founder Daileidys Carrazana. The score, drawing on themes of the changing seasons, was a collage of works by Astor Piazolla, Tchaikovsky, and Vivaldi – the last-named in arrangements by Max Richter. The Alma Quartet served up this delicious musical feast with their perfect playing; they were joined at the keyboard by Gabriel Chakarji.  Much of the music has a Spanish flair. 

All eleven of the Company’s dancers were onstage for this grand-scale piece, which opens in silence with a man and woman standing – facing each other – in a pool of light. The music commences; it will veer thru many mood swings as the dance unfolds. The beautiful hues that the musicians conjure up are not well-matched by the drab unisex costumes of steely grey, which give anonymity to the individual dancers.

Passages of interesting choreography are offset by moments of emptiness. A lineup of the dancers executing gestural motifs gets lively; the excellent lighting holds our attention. The music turns dirge-like for a male duet. At last, the original couple are alone onstage again. They seem to have reconciled, and they head upstage, as if moving on to their future together. But instead, a long pas de deux ensues. 

The program might have been better crafted had the Graham piece been given last. To open with a masterpiece by one of the greatest choreographers of all time sets a very high bar.

~ Oberon

Barbara Hendricks sings the Letter Scene from Tchaikovsky’s EUGENE ONEGIN; the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France is conducted by Paavo Järvi.

Listen here.