Latest Classical music News

From pop to politics, what to know as Sweden prepares for the 2024 Eurovision Song Contest

Apr. 23, 2024 01:38 AM EDT

LONDON (AP) — It’s springtime in Europe — time for the annual blossoming of spectacle and sound known as the Eurovision Song Contest. Taking place in May in Malmö, Sweden, the 68th annual competition will see acts from 37 countries vie for the continent’s pop crown in a...

Conductor Andrew Davis, who headed Lyric Opera of Chicago and orchestras on 3 continents, dies

Apr. 21, 2024 17:28 PM EDT

Andrew Davis, an acclaimed British conductor who was music director of the Lyric Opera of Chicago and orchestras on three continents, has died. He was 80. Davis died Saturday at Rusk Institute in Chicago from leukemia, his manager, Jonathan Brill of Opus 3 Artists, said Sunday. ...

Theater Review: Not everyone will be 'Fallin' over Alicia Keys' Broadway musical 'Hell's Kitchen'

Apr. 21, 2024 01:08 AM EDT

If you were to close Alicia Keys ’ big semi-autobiographical musical on Broadway with any of her hit songs, which would it be? Of course, it has to be “Empire State of Mind.” That’s the natural one, right? It’s also as predictable as the R train being delayed with signal problems. ...

Record Store Day celebrates indie retail music sellers as they ride vinyl's popularity wave

Apr. 20, 2024 13:37 PM EDT

PHOENIX (AP) — Special LP releases, live performances and at least one giant block party are scheduled around the U.S. Saturday as hundreds of shops celebrate Record Store Day during a surge of interest in vinyl and the day after the release of Taylor Swift's latest album. There...

Director Romeo Castellucci drops out of Brussels Ring Cycle halfway through because of money, time

Apr. 20, 2024 13:02 PM EDT

Romeo Castellucci dropped out of his production of Wagner’s Ring Cycle at Belgium’s La Monnaie theater halfway through because of what the company said Saturday was a lack of money and time. The four-part “Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung)” is considered...

Jonathan Tetelman recalls his journey from a nightclub DJ to an international opera star

Apr. 19, 2024 17:44 PM EDT

NEW YORK (AP) — Jonathan Tetelman transformed from a nightclub DJ to an international opera star, a music detour that was quite, well, operatic. He stopped singing in 2011 and mixed music for New York's clubbers at Webster Hall, Pacha, Greenhouse and W.i.P. These days, the...

John Adams' Nativity oratorio 'El Nino' gets colorful staging at the Met

Apr. 19, 2024 16:52 PM EDT

NEW YORK (AP) — The children crumple and fall to the stage, victims of King Herod’s assassins. Then the Virgin Mary, in a voice brimming with anguish and outrage, memorializes the student protesters who were massacred by Mexican armed forces in 1968. This is “El Nino,” a...

New York Philharmonic to tour China this summer

Apr. 11, 2024 15:16 PM EDT

NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Philharmonic will give five concerts in China this summer in what it says will be first visit to the mainland by a U.S. orchestra since 2019. Outgoing music director Jaap van Zweden will conduct the performances at Guangzhou, Nanjing and Shanghai from...

Glass Animals return this summer with a new album, each song exploring a 'different side of love'

Apr. 05, 2024 14:29 PM EDT

NEW YORK (AP) — Glass Animals' latest album was born thanks to a massive storm, a house on a cliff and an existential crisis. What emerged from that? A 10-track collection exploring love. The indie-pop band's frontman, songwriter and producer Dave Bayley found himself in an Airbnb...

Music Review: Lizzy McAlpine tells intimate folk-pop stories on her third album, 'Older'

Apr. 05, 2024 12:25 PM EDT

The opening track on folk-pop singer-songwriter Lizzy McAlpine’s third album, “Older,” is only one minute and 40 seconds long. In that time, “The Elevator” carries the listener into McAlpine’s internal world, climbing a steady piano melody toward a drum-led instrumental before the song...