Susan Hall
Bio:
Recent Articles:
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The Elixir of Love at New York City Opera Music
Jonathan Miller's Production Enchants
By: - Mar 29th, 2011Set in the American southwest, this perhaps most popular opera of all time, gets a delightful new look. The New York City Opera has revived Jonathan Miller’s production of The Elixir of Love by Gaetano Donizetti.
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New York City Opera Presents Monodramas Music
Three Sopranos Pushed to Thrilling Extremes
By: - Mar 28th, 2011John Zorn, Schoenberg and Morton Feldman experimented with unusual combinations of singing and the orchestra. In its bold program, New York City Opera brings these three composers from downtown to uptown to exciting effect. Each monodrama features a wonderful soprano.
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God of Carnage at Chicago's Goodman Theatre
A Perfect Production of Yasmina Reza's Play
By: - Mar 22nd, 2011Things get so violent on stage during this superb production that you wonder if the actors will show up for the next performance. The show has been extended through April 17, at Chicago's Goodman Theatre, but demand is understandably high for this wonderful production.
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Ethan Frome at the Lookingglass Theater Chicago Theatre
The Berkshires Travel West
By: - Mar 21st, 2011The newspaper is called The Eagle and the town names sound like Stockbridge, Pittsfield and Lee. Edith Wharton set her only story about poor people in the Berkshires. That she so well understood their world is one of the miracles of Ethan Frome. At the :Lookingglass Theater in Chicago through April 17.
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The Lyric Opera Presents Peter Sellars' Hercules Music
Handel Music Drama Revamped for the 21st Century
By: - Mar 21st, 2011Director Peter Sellars speaks passionately about the state of our world and the need for compassionate reconciliation. As his Hercules unfolds, the wrenching drama reminds us of the problems we need to tend while the beautiful music moves us.
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Andris Nelsons Debuts with the Boston Symphony Music
Carnegie Hall Enhances Mahler's Ninth
By: - Mar 18th, 2011A much anticipated courtship dance began flawlessly in New York last night. Young conductor Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra performed together for the first time. What this all means, no one knows. But one of the feelings described by Mahler in his music is that hope springs eternal.
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The Boston Symphony Arrives at Carnegie Music
Marcelo Lehninger Conducts
By: - Mar 17th, 2011Listening to the magnificent performance of the Boston Symphony with Christian Tetzlaff as violin soloist, you would never have guessed that the orchestra had recently experienced a perhaps predictable but none the less disturbing upheaval. On they went in their inimitable style, producing exciting and beautiful music.
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Meeting Conductor Andris Nelsons Music
Is Rising Star on BSO's Short List
By: - Mar 17th, 2011After a stunning performance at the New York Philharmonic a month ago, when he tackled Shostakovich to shattering effect, Andris Nelsons shot to the top of the list of every orchestra manager around the world. On March 17, he debuts with the Boston Symphony at Carnegie Hall.
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The Collegiate Chorale at Central Synagogue Music
A Moving Tribute to Songs of the Concentration Camps
By: - Mar 13th, 2011The Collegiate Chorale under conductor James Bagwell sang a magnificent program of songs which buoyed occupants on the concentration camps in Europe during the Second World War. Memory was well served by this touching tribute.
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James Levine at the Metropolitan Opera Music
His Intense Schedule is Cause for Concern
By: - Mar 08th, 2011While general manager Peter Gelb tries to keep his artists and staff calm, Maestro Levine's health, and what he will and will not be able to do, is creating daily issues at the Metropolitan Opera. But the artistic concerns extend beyond just the status of Levine.
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Joyce Di Donato Debuts at Carnegie Hall Music
A Mesmerizing Mezzo Captivates
By: - Mar 07th, 2011Di Donato is a favorite among opera afficiandos, While some talent does not translate well from opera house to concert hall, Di Donato is superb in both venues. But the special spell of Carnegie, captured by the Hall's reverberation of sound, made this concert particularly winning.
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Opera Orchestra of New York Presents Meyerbeer Music
Eve Queler Triumphs
By: - Mar 04th, 2011Eve Queler's last performance with her Opera Orchestra was a brilliant performance of L"africaine, an underappreciated Giacomo Meyerbeer opera with libretto by the incomparable Eugene Scribe. She started with Richard Tucker in the role of Vasco de Gama, and ended with Marcello Giordani. An epic opera for an epic moment in her career.
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Maestro Levine Steps Down in Boston Music
Five Years of Health Issues Forces a Change
By: - Mar 02nd, 2011No one wants to see the Maestro go, but in fairness to the Boston Symphony, artists, and the audience, the time had come for a change.
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Jansen and Barnatan Perform at Poisson Rouge Music
New York's Hot Venue for Music New, Newer and Old
By: - Mar 02nd, 2011Le Poisson Rouge on Bleeker Street in Greenwich Village packs an audience in nightly for intimate performances of all kinds of music. On Monday, Janine Jansen and Inon Barnatan performed their magical dialogue.
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Dmitri Hvorostovsky's Song Fills Carnegie Hall Music
Faure, Taneyev, Liszt and Tchaikovsky
By: - Feb 22nd, 2011Dmitri Hvorostovsky's voice is as distinctive as the songs he choses to sing, and was unforgettable in his most recent Carnegie Hall performance. He is in Boston on February 27 at Symphony Hall.
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Invasion by Khemiri Arrives Next to Ground Zero Theatre
The Play Company Presents Immigration Issues
By: - Feb 21st, 2011You never quite know what's going on during Invasion, but invasions tend to be mysterious and solving who came when and why preoccupies us because its unanswerable. Invasion by the brilliant Swedish writer Jonas Hassen Khemiri doesn't answer questions, but it asks more questions than have ever crossed your mind. And it asks them in a novel and thoroughly engaging production.
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James Levine Conducts The Bartered Bride Music
Juilliard and the Metropolitan Opera Join Forces
By: - Feb 18th, 2011Hopefully this union of the Met and Juilliard will result in more early productions of future Met stagings. The Bartered Bride, a favorite of Maestro Levine's, proved a wonderful jumping off point for the alliance. Levine had his young orchestra sounding wonderfully close to the Met Orchestra. The staging by Stephen Wadsworth bodes well for the future Met production.
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Sex with Strangers at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre
Playwright Laura Eason Provokes
By: - Feb 16th, 2011To be sure, Sex with Strangers is hot, but it is also funny, provocative and entertaining. This play produced in the Upstairs theatre at Steppenwolf in Chicago will at the very least give pleasure and maybe even make you think twice about tweeting.
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Girl of the Golden West: Chicago Lyric Opera Music
Deborah Voigt and Marco Vratogna Star
By: - Feb 15th, 2011Debate about whether or not this opera is Italian, disappointment that the arias were shorter than usual, ignoring brilliant performances by Caruso and Destinn, the opera went into hiding for a hundred years. The Lyric production shows why it will be good to have it live and kicking again.
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In Darfur at TimeLine in Chicago Theatre
Never Again May be Ever Again
By: - Feb 15th, 2011TimeLine, the Wall Street Journal's pick as number one theatre company in the nation, has produced a riveting drama about rape and genocide in the Sudan. It is wonderful theatre and raises unanswerable questions about US policy.
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A Triumphant Lohengrin at the Lyric Music
Johan Botha Soars as the Swan Knight
By: - Feb 12th, 2011The Lyric Opera of Chicago has mounted a production of Wagner's great lyric musical drama with six voices of equal stature led by the stentorian Johan Botha. Wagner's music is gorgeous, and when it is realized as it is in this Lyric production, it is an event not to be missed. It continues through March 8.
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Creators Discuss Nixon in China at the Metropolitan Opera Music
What to Expect in HD Telecast
By: - Feb 11th, 2011Any ideas that Nixon in China is inaccessible were dismissed by five collaborators on this great American opera which premiered two decades ago in Houston. The Metropolitan Opera has mounted a Convent Garden production. It will be broadcast live in HD on February 12.
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Lysistrata at LaMama E.T.C. Theatre
Theodora Skipitares Shows Women How to Strike
By: - Feb 08th, 2011A rousing production of Lysistrata arrives at LaMama. Women of all ages as well as brave and brilliant men will enjoy this production enormously. Theodora Skipitares has often combined original texts with material she unearths.
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Nixon in China at the Metropolitan Opera Music
Live in HD February 12
By: - Feb 07th, 2011Nixon in China by John Adams and directed by Peter Sellars has traveled the world for twenty years and finally arrives at the Metropolitan Opera. It is wonderfully entertaining and at local theaters on February 12. In the Berkshires the opera will be screened Live in HD at the Mahaiwe in Great Barrington, Beacon in Pittsfield and in Williamstown at the Clark Art Institute.
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The Collegiate Chorale's Rousing State of the Union Music
James Bagwell Conducts at Alice Tully Hall
By: - Jan 27th, 2011While our pols gathered in the well of the House of Representatives to listen to the state of the union, the Collegiate Chorale made clear that not much has changed about our state of the union since New York was Nieuw Amsterdam.
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