Electropop Opera at the Zach
This electropop opera, which was first performed in 2012 (written by Dave Malloy) evoked distinctly divided opinions along the audience members. One told me he really wanted to leave at…
SXSW 2024 opener features Space Poetry
With SXSW 2024 just a month away, Austinites are preparing to once again host the foremost annual gathering of creative minds in the country. The Opening Session is entitled Explore…
Wonderettes is Marvelous!
The faux musical group who lend their name to this musical-comedy-drama is The Marvelous Wonderettes; it premiered in Milwaukee in 1999. Currently gracing the stage at the Hill Country Community…
The GIANTS of Sardinia
Standing beside the giant statues of Sardinia, some 7 feet tall, is an awe-inspiring experience. The photo shows the author in Cagliari, the capital of Sardinia. I was in the…
A Marathon Evening with Wagner
“Consider a performance of Wagner’s Parsifal. As you settle into your seat, you look over the program notes, likely to address the Grail legend that inspired the composer. Now imagine…
Challenges of the Baroque
Baroque was not a term used at the time we now think of as the Baroque era, but it is the classic term for that which is not classic, referring…
A Threesome for Beethoven
Three sisters brought an unusual Beethoven Concerto alive at the most recent outing of our great Austin Symphony Orchestra. The Ahn trio play the violin, cello and piano, which is…
Exploring a Socratic Dialogue
There is renewed attention to the Plato’s Euthyphro. In 2017 Harvard University Press updated a version in the famous Loeb Classic series, begun in 1911. In 1914 the Loeb published…
T. S. Eliot and the Nucleus of Modernism
Ask a group of poetry experts what the most consequential poem of the 20th century was. The majority vote will most likely be The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot. Written…
LBJ and the Space Program
Pres. Lyndon Johnson oversaw the Apollo space program during his term of office in the 1960s. The current Administrator of NASA, Bill Nelson, was at the LBJ Library in Austin…