Like most cities with an active cultural life, we are spoiled by performances from some of the biggest and best names around.  They come through Benaroya Hall each season, dazzle with their stardom and occasionally their playing.  Because of the enterprising work of Toby Saks and the Seattle Chamber Music Society, we are also privy…

By R.M. Campbell Musicians from the Curtis Institute returned to the Henry Chapel Wednesday night in the Highlands for its third year. The concerts have become predictable: interesting repertory, exemplary musicianship. Already known and widely respected in the music world, the Philadelphia conservatory wanted a broader profile. And so, among other activities, it has embarked…

Looking for something to do today? Head up to Greenwood for the annual Bach Cello Suites marathon at Phinney Ridge Lutheran Church. The festival runs from 10 to 2:30 pm (today, March 26th). The festival is free and the audience can come and go as they please. Let Slava get you in the mood.

Handel’s Dixit Dominus is a curious testament to GF Handel’s time in Italy. A setting of Psalm 109, it is on the one hand a deeply spiritual statement. Handel’s contrapuntal inventiveness and his flexible, often soaring writing for chorus and vocal soloists, do more than state Christian beliefs, they embody a deep spirituality. On the…

By R.M. Campbell There is very little not to like or admire in Pacific Northwest Ballet’s mixed bill which opened this weekend at McCaw Hall. A good share of it was astonishing. Two works entered PNB’s repertory and two were revivals. One of the most important aspects of Peter Boal’s regime as artistic director has…

Guest conductor Teodor Currentzis — who boasts he will save classical music in a 2005 Daily Telegraph interview — appears with the SSO this weekend in a mildly interesting program.  The all Russian program which features Aram Khachaturian’s jagged violin concerto and the evergreen Fifth Symphony of Shostakovich should test the conductor’s mettle to make…

By R. M. Campbell Thursday’s concert of the Seattle Symphony Orchestra at Benaroya Hall possessed the kind of programming in which a guest conductor can easily make a big impression: Borodin, Khachaturian and Shostakovich. And so Teodor Currentzis, Greek-born, Russian resident, did in some quarters. “Polovtsian Dances” from Borodin’s opera “Prince Igor” are more standard…

By Philippa Kiraly If you haven’t already planned to go, and particularly if you are a singer, don’t miss Friday night’s final performance of “The Man in the Mirror.” It’s the light relief of the ongoing American Handel Festival, and a tour de force by tenor Ross Hauck. Thursday afternoon he performed it at the…

By R.M. Campbell It was with considerable disappointment that one heard the news the Brazilian pianist Nelson Friere had canceled His Seattle engagement Thursday night at Meany Hall. I well remember his striking combination of temperament and technique, but I had not heard him for sometime. Quickly Meany found a replacement — Garrick Ohlsson. The…