One week. Six North American orchestras. Such was the Spring for Music festival at Carnegie Hall last week, which featured the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra on Friday evening. The festival, for which orchestras compete by proposed...

A terrific opportunity exists Thursday through Saturday, May 17-19, to see a world premiere by distinguished choreographer Gerald Casel and several outstanding Milwaukee dancers. The veteran of the Stephen Petronio Company and founder...

A voice whispers, “I been away so long, I wonder if the drum still has the power to connect us back to the beginning of being.” Those words by Milwaukee poet Sheena Carey open Words from the Sole, a groundbreaking new dance from Ko-Thi Dance...

Next up for the Bel Canto Chorus is Dvorak's classic Stabat Mater, directed by maestro Richard Hynson. First performed in Prague in 1880 (and also known as the “Czech Messiah”), the solemn score was composed to honor Dvorak's daughter...

A great deal happens both on and beneath the surface of Michael Pink's generous ballet Peter Pan, created for the Milwaukee Ballet in 2010 and revised earlier this year for the Colorado Ballet and again for Milwaukee. With deepened interpretations...

Last weekend was the second preview of the May 11 appearance of Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. I think it's safe to say that few involved knew what to expect in composer Qigang Chen's 45-minute work, Iris dévoilée...

For several years, the Danceworks Performance Company has presented several revue-style concerts of new dances choreographed by a varying roster of company members. The choreographers also dance in one another's works...

Hans Richter, who conducted the premiere of Johannes Brahms' Symphony No. 3 (1883), suggested to the great composer that he consider the subtitle of “Eroica” for the work. Never eager to draw comparisons with his predecessor, Beethoven, Brahms...

Because of working abroad, last Saturday was the first opportunity this season I've had to hear the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra (MSO) conducted by Edo de Waart. Every music director sculpts an orchestra over time. Through player changes...

Two little-known works by British composers comprised the last concert of the Frankly Music season, heard last week at Wisconsin Lutheran College. I wish other leaders in the community in various disciplines could speak as well as Frank Almond...

The compelling beauty of La Mer, Debussy's most famous and widely performed score, dates from 1903, a time of great personal happiness following a divorce from his wife and new life with his mistress. The music abounds in the shaded...

The Prometheus Trio completes its 12th season at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music with works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Arno Babajanian and Robert Schumann. Prometheus will perform Mozart's Piano Trio in F major (from Sonata for...

Is Buffalo Nation (Bison bison), premiered at Present Music last weekend, an opera? An oratorio? A song cycle? Live accompaniment to film? Or an unstaged, multimedia morality play with incidental music?

Milwaukee's masters of early music, Ensemble Musical Offering, have found a link between the Baroque era and our city's popular Alterra Coffee Roasters in the form of J.S. Bach's “Coffee Cantata.” The Prospect Alterra (2211 N. Prospect Ave...

The music of Russian composer Alexander Glazunov (1865-1936) is not much encountered these days. His deceptively difficult violin concerto, heard last weekend at Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, has a few prominent recordings...

The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra's next concert, “Symphonic Masters,” will kick off with Symphony No. 26 in D minor, written in 1768 by the incredibly prolific Franz Joseph Haydn. For this symphony, known as the “Lamentatione” for its sonic...

Milwaukee Ballet's Spring Series of contemporary dance was meant to appeal to a range of tastes. I found the new works—The Last Glass by Matthew Neenan of Philadelphia's BalletX from 2010, and Extremely Close by Alejandro Cerrudo...

The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra will be on the road to the Basilica of St. Josaphat under the baton of Francesco Lecce-Chong. The concert will feature the MSO Chorus for an extravaganza of sacred music, starting with Arvo Pärt's chamber...

The Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra is working double time, starting with the “Salon Series 2.” Like a rave party in the '90s, mystery is maintained on the exact location of the MSO performance—except for its identification as “a beautiful East...

Terrible things befall innocent people in melodrama. By the end, evil is usually punished and the good guys rewarded or at least consoled. American composer Carlisle Floyd's 1955 opera Susannah tells the melodramatic story of a young woman falsely...

Carlisle Floyd's compelling American opera Susannah, to be performed by the Florentine Opera March 16 & 18 at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts, may come as a welcome surprise to those unfamiliar with the work. Composed in 1955...

I have written often in the last decade of the steady improvement in the quality of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra. Listening anew on Saturday evening I heard an ensemble moving into a new realm of refined excellence...

When Jean Sibelius was in his mid-teens, he was studying hard to become a famous concert violinist. Indeed, he did become a fine musician, but fate had other plans and Sibelius soon found himself drawn toward composition instead of performance...

For a city of its size, Milwaukee has a decent amount of professional-level chamber music. One of our better series is Chamber Music Milwaukee (CMM). While it is primarily conceived to showcase music faculty at the University of Wisconsin...

Maestro Richard Hynson and the 100 voices of the Bel Canto Chorus will perform Hynson's Evensong at the St. Joseph Center Chapel. Hynson wrote the piece in 1999 to commemorate his first decade with Bel Canto and to honor patrons David and Roseann...