25 Tunes to Carry You Through the Holidays
Caramoor’s Artistic Directors and Staff stepped away from work to offer their recommendations for great holiday listening this year. Read more
176 Results for “Blog”
Songs of the Guillotine
Review: ‘Dialogues of the Carmelites,’ Under Will Crutchfield, Finds Beauty Anew
Originally Published by The New York Times
By Anthony Tommasini
KATONAH, N.Y. — The conductor Will Crutchfield’s Bel Canto at Caramoor program has been bringing eager audiences to this festival here in Westchester County each summer for performances of operas from the early 19th century. On Saturday at Caramoor’s Venetian Theater Mr. Crutchfield turned to a work that couldn’t seem further from the era and style of bel canto: Poulenc’s “Dialogues of the Carmelites,” performed in the original French. First presented in 1957, this austerely beautiful and wrenching opera, loosely based on a historical event — the guillotining of 16 nuns from the Carmelite convent of Compiègne during the French Revolution — owes more to Debussy and Neo-Classical Stravinsky than the bel canto composers of an earlier time. Read more
An Imaginary Line From CSN to Sarah Jarosz, Aoife O’Donovan & Sara Watkins
Originally Published on No Depression
By Easy Ed
I awoke this morning with a throbbing left foot. I wore the black boots last night and my toes unconsciously tapped throughout the seventy-five minute set and the well deserved encore that was delivered by three talented singers, songwriters, and instrumentalists. On a beautiful summer night in the Spanish Courtyard of the Rosen House, located on the lush grounds of the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts which is a mere sixty minutes north of Manhattan, I kept my eyes closed for much of time to shut out the visual and allow just the sounds of nature melded with the music to pour over the tip of my head and fill my body and soul. The only distraction to my thoughts and immersion were the whoops and cheers that punctuated the close of each song. Read more
Partnership’s Opening Number: A Day of Jazz
Originally Published by The New York Times
By Phillip Lutz
When Jeffrey P. Haydon took over as the chief executive of the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts in Katonah almost three years ago, favorable attendance at its jazz concerts was a hit-or-miss proposition. So he began networking, eventually approaching Jazz at Lincoln Center about forming a programming relationship. Read more
3 Pieces to Debut at Caramoor Summer Festival
Originally Published by The New York Times
By Phillip Lutz
Over the years, the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts in Katonah has opened its summer stage early, and often, to notable premieres, from the American debut of Benjamin Britten’s trilogy of operatic church parables in the 1960s to the inaugural performance of David Ludwig’s “String Quartet No. 1: Pale Blue Dot” last year.
But this year’s summer festival, the 70th, promises to rank with the best. It will feature three world premieres, a diverse and reflective lot that includes an orchestral divertimento by Christopher Theofanidis and string quartets by Aaron Jay Kernis and Patrick Harlin — all works by Americans whose aesthetics capture a sense of both tradition and innovation.
If Peter Oundjian has a baton, he will travel
Originally published by WAG
By Georgette Gouveia
He had carved out a distinguished career as the first violinist of the acclaimed Tokyo String Quartet. But focal dystonia, a repetitive stress condition, in his left hand increasingly hampered the intricate motor skills needed to finger the violin. Read more
Dialogues Coach
Originally published in Opera News
Francis Poulenc’s twentieth-century take on French Revolution tyranny is a far cry from Caramoor’s bel canto bailiwick, but Will Crutchfield is adding it to the festival’s repertory. ALAN KOZINN finds out why. Read more
The Compositional Journey of a New Sort of Visionary
by William Robin
This summer, composer, singer-songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Gabriel Kahane returns to Caramoor for his third appearance at the festival. Read more
Opera at Caramoor 2015: Donizetti’s La Favorite in Original French (July 11) and Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites (July 25)
Now celebrating its 70th anniversary season, this summer Caramoor presents two operas composed more than a century apart, yet linked both thematically and in their emphasis on vocal beauty.