Word: conductor
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Bach Society Orchestra ended its season last Friday night with a concert neither dazzling nor disappointing. In Stravinsky's "Ragtime for 11 Instruments," out-going conductor Bentley Layton displayed the wit and care his audiences have come to expect of him. Inspired playing by the whole ensemble made the lines of the work as airy as lace...
Gregory Biss, who will conduct the BSO for its next two seasons, introduced himself in a solid, accurate performance of Haydn's Symphony No. 86 in D. Granted that the Haydn offers little latitude for a conductor's virtuosity, Biss's version was singularly unexciting. He made every important cue, handled all the details of podium performance with more polish than one expects of a novice students conductor; unfortunately, the sound lacked a matching professionalism. For example, the dynamics of the first and third movements ventured little beyond mezzo forte and forte; throughout, there was hardly any of the nuance...
...Least a Million. Four times married, 76, and possessor of the $100 million Post Toasties fortune, Marjorie Merriweather Post May (as she is called for short) has long been a darling of Washington society, and long the angel of the orchestra. When Conductor Howard Mitchell suggested the free spring concerts eight years ago, Mrs. May excused herself from the board meeting, called her financial adviser and was back in a minute with the announcement that she would underwrite the concerts singlehanded. "I had just divorced the ambassador (onetime Ambassador to Moscow Joseph E. Davies)," she recalls blithely...
Justifiably Common. The hour-long concerts are bite-sized enough for their audience, but everyone involved finds them uplifting. The orchestra's musicians get five extra weeks' pay beyond the 27-week regular season, and Conductor Mitchell gets to exercise his gently messianic streak with little lectures from the podium. Speaking for the city at large, the Washington Post greeted the new spring's debut with an editorial thought that was justifiably common in Washington. "All of us owe her the warmest thanks," it said...
...louder the better, and let artistry go hang. It takes work to make a concert performance of Handel significantly more than an exercise in sight-reading. The Glee Club, Choral Society, and Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra supplied the necessary work last night. They made things "happen" in Israel in Egypt; conductor Elliot Forbes took good advantage of the vocal discipline which the choruses maintained...