Musica Angelica to honor Richard Colburn with mighty Bach St Matthew Passion performance

Music
Last month we visited the welcoming campus of the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles for a rousing and very spiritual rendition of Yuval Ron’s “Rumi’s Wedding,” an inspiring mashup of Jewish, Christian and Muslim music and dance. Now the esteemed church will host a performance of the life-affirming Baroque music-masterpiece, Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, ...

Purcell patois at Long Beach Opera

Music
We already have a king, right? Just ask any Republican in Congress. King Donald — aka Ronald McDonald I. So that part is taken care of. It’s just that this new (for America) form of government is unfamiliar; it’s time we learn how the kingly thing works. That, along with purely aesthetic reasons, attracts us ...

Channel your inner ‘Black Cat’ — at Long Beach Opera

Dance · Music
Alcoholism, horror and haunting — a day in the life under the Trump administration, right? No such thing! Now you can be traumatized by Trump by day and then, again, at the opera, in the evening. Seriously, Long Beach Opera‘s upcoming production based on Edgar Allan Poe’s The Black Cat — in conjunction with Musica ...

New live-performance hall for music in downtown L.A. 1

Architecture & Design · Music
Wonderful news,  there’s a new — that is, refurbished — 500-seat auditorium for music performances downtown. It’s called AT&T Center Theatre, and it’s located in the mid-century-modern classic skyscraper designed and built in 1965 by William Pereira, the USC architecture professor and founding partner of Pereira & Luckman (designers of the LAX Theme Building, and ...

From Rio con brio: Musica Angelica returns to Los Angeles 1

Music
I’m looking forward to a marvelous performance by Musica Angelica, the L.A.-based baroque chamber orchestra, just back from a tour of South America, primed to let ‘er rip in Santa Monica and Pasadena performances next weekend. The 20-piece baroque band’s versatile music director, Martin Haselboeck, in a previous concert, conducted while singing, balancing on his ...

Herr Haselboeck’s precarious perch 1

Music · Reviews
Musica Angelica’s Palm Sunday performance of St. John Passion at Santa Monica’s First United Methodist Church had us afloat in the infinite beauty of Bach’s musical soundscape. But it also had us glued to our chairs as Martin Haselboeck, the orchestra’s music director, balanced backwards on the edge of the stage conducting Bach’s massive score ...