Rick Schultz

Full of sound and fury: Bloch’s ‘Macbeth’ opera gets a rare airing

Published on May 29, 2013

Ernest Bloch, the renowned 20th century Swiss-born American composer, wrote just one opera, “Macbeth,” and it has rarely been produced in the United States since its 1910 Paris premiere.

Matt Haimovitz: Global yet grounded

Published on March 20, 2013

Speaking by phone from Montreal, Israeli-born cellist Matt Haimovitz revealed that he’s a great admirer of the American singer Nina Simone. Looking at his life and career, one can easily see why. Like Simone, Haimovitz is admired for his solid classical grounding, eclecticism, improvisatory brilliance and the fact that he defies easy classification.

‘Hebrew Melodies’ all in the Shaham family

Published on February 20, 2013

Gil Shaham does his most eloquent speaking with his violin, but as a recent interview by phone from his home in New York revealed, he’s not a bad singer either.

Cellist Weilerstein brings worldly depth to SoCal stages

Published on November 21, 2012

Cellist Alisa Weilerstein grew up in a thriving Jewish community in Cleveland, where before she became a bat mitzvah, she had already made her debut at age 13 with the Cleveland Orchestra.

Joshua Bloom: His voice is more than the sum of his parts

Published on September 11, 2012

The old theater saying that there are no small parts, only small actors, can also be said for opera. Just ask Australian bass Joshua Bloom, who was in town last month to begin rehearsals as Masetto for the Los Angeles Opera production of Mozart’s “Don Giovanni.” The opera’s seven performances run Sept. 22 through Oct. 14 at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

Benjamin Wallfisch has music in his genes

Published on September 10, 2012

Film composers who venture into the hallowed domain of the concert hall are sometimes greeted with raised eyebrows. Maybe that’s why film-music scholar Jon Burlingame called movie scores a “much-maligned stepchild of 20th-century composition.” Yet for English composer and conductor Benjamin Wallfisch, the differentiation has never been a problem.

Technique, sensitivity the keys to pianist Bronfman’s success

Published on July 25, 2012

When Yefim Bronfman performs Brahms' Second Piano Concerto with conductor Lionel Bringuier and the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl on July 31, he will be tackling what is known as a real "finger buster," a term used for a work that is awkwardly conceived for a pianist's hands or physically demanding. The Brahms concerto is both.

Global repertoire inspires international ensemble at iPalpiti Festival

Published on July 18, 2012

Among the pleasures of the summer music season is the annual iPalpiti Festival of International Laureates, now in its 15th year. iPalpiti (the name translates loosely as "the heartbeats") is a string orchestra of 28 young professionals from Israel, Tatarstan, Azerbaijan, Norway and 14 other countries. Thirteen concerts are being performed in the Los Angeles area through July 29, but the grand finale at Walt Disney Concert Hall (July 28) has, over the years, become a much-anticipated gala-style affair.

Slatkin's last stand at the Bowl?

Published on June 13, 2012

Maybe it was his heart attack during a concert in Rotterdam in 2009, or perhaps it’s just a matter of aging, but conductor Leonard Slatkin, a venerable fixture with the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl for many years, is now thinking about summer as vacation time.

The passion of David Lang

Published on May 31, 2011

It may seem a sign of overconfidence for someone to tell you he’s rewriting a major work by Beethoven, but for David Lang, who reconceived Bach’s “St. Matthew Passion” for his Pulitzer Prize- and Grammy Award-winning 2008 opera, “The Little Match Girl Passion,” it’s just business as usual.

The Mandolin Rock Star

Published on May 17, 2011

Avi Avital plays the mandolin sitting center stage in a hard-back chair. He curls into himself, his face turned downward, and nestles the small stringed instrument on his lap. His intense concentration draws a listener in, whether he’s performing a piece composed by mandolin virtuoso Yasuo Kuwahara or by Israeli composer Avner Dorman.

Philip Glass’ ‘Akhnaten’ at Long Beach Opera

Published on March 22, 2011

Who was Akhnaten? For composer Philip Glass, this mysterious Egyptian pharaoh, said to be Queen Nefertiti’s husband and the father of King Tutankhamen, was a rebel-hero. In the 14th century B.C.E., Akhnaten defied tradition by attempting to forge a monotheistic religion, and even tried to change Egyptian artistic culture by moving the capital city and building a new one, Amarna, now a ruin.

String theory’s huge and heavenly harp

Published on February 16, 2011

Ethan Bortnick: Child prodigy, entertainer, mega-fundraiser

Published on January 25, 2011

Ethan Bortnick was just 6 when he first appeared on “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno,” playing snippets of piano works by Bach, Mozart and Scott Joplin. He even performed his own composition, “The Tiger Ran Away at the Zoo.” By that age, he had already raised $12 million for Miami Children’s Hospital. Since then, he has performed for the Chabad Telethon and the Friends of the Israeli Defense Forces, among other charities.

Le Salon de Musiques debuts with emphasis on the classics

Published on November 16, 2010

The pianist François Chouchan has nothing against contemporary music, but for the first season of the monthly chamber music series Le Salon de Musiques, he and co-artistic director violinist Phillip Levy have filled all eight concerts with masterpieces of the Western classical canon.

Shul roots sprout into grand arias

Published on September 23, 2010

Growing up in the San Fernando Valley, soprano Shira Renee Thomas was drawn to the music played during services at Northridge’s Reform Temple Ahavat Shalom, where her father, Rabbi Jerry Brown, presided. She especially loved Kol Nidrei, and when she finally got to sing that touching piece in a recital for Center Stage Opera, she fulfilled part of a larger dream that includes one day singing at The Metropolitan Opera and London’s Covent Garden.

For many Jews, it’s a hate-love relationship with the anti-Semitic composer

Published on April 6, 2010

“Amoral, hedonistic, selfish, virulently racist, arrogant, filled with gospels of the superman ... and the superiority of the German race, he stands for all that is unpleasant in human character,” The New York Times music critic Harold Schonberg wrote about Richard Wagner in “The Lives of the Great Composers.”

Music Banned by Nazis Finds New Life With L.A. Chamber Orchestra

Published on March 16, 2010

If you ask 35-year-old violinist Daniel Hope about his Jewish heritage, make sure you have time. It’s a complicated question.

“On my mother’s side was an incredibly Orthodox Jewish family that goes back to the first rabbi of Potsdam,” he said during a recent late-night cell phone call while in transit to Hamburg, Germany, for a concert the next day.

Itzhak Perlman — The Incurable Optimist

Published on December 3, 2009

Itzhak Perlman left his native Tel Aviv in 1958, as a 13-year-old, to perform on the “Ed Sullivan Show” and kept on going. In a career spanning more than 50 years, the violinist has performed with almost every major conductor and orchestra in the world. Awarded a Kennedy Center honor in 2003, Perlman was also invited to perform in January at President Obama’s inauguration. Speaking by phone from New York, Perlman called the inauguration experience “chilling” and said he brought an inferior violin so his priceless Stradivarius wouldn’t be damaged in the cold. He also said the music had been prerecorded.

‘Dirty Dancing’ Comes Alive on Stage

Published on May 20, 2009

Remember the classic line from the 1987 hit movie, “Dirty Dancing,” when the lower-class Johnny Castle (Patrick Swayze) walks up to the cosseted Jewish girl, Frances “Baby” Houseman (Jennifer Grey), and in front of her parents says, “My Baby belongs to me. Is this clear?”

Wagner’s Music to Ring Out

Published on February 19, 2009

L.A. Opera to perform its first full cycle of “The Ring,” the German composer’s 15-hour masterpiece.

Mitisek and Co. expand boundaries of opera with puppets, poetry and ‘Frankenstein!!’

Published on March 13, 2008

Critics have called the Long Beach Opera (LBO) "daring," "unconventional" and "innovative." While all those are accurate, another word that perhaps better describes the company is "playful."