James Conlon Sees His Time At Ravinia As A Continuous Highlight

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In looking back over my years at Ravinia, it is almost impossible to gather my thoughts in a linear fashion. The memories are so many; the musical experiences so rich, varied and exciting; the immense presence of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra so monumental, that it is difficult to condense into words.

Since I became music director of the CSO’s residency in 2005, I have been struck by how many music lovers I have met around the country and even overseas, who have told me that they heard their first concerts at Ravinia.

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Singing In Tongues

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I recently had one of those conversations that only occur between opera lovers and non-classical-music-loving friends. I mentioned having attended a performance of Debussy’s opera Pélleas et Mélisande with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, an offering in their recent French festival. “An opera?” my friend asked, with a puzzled look. “Don’t operas have to be in Italian?”

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Brandi Carlile fires up her music with familial fondness

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“When you make a record on a major label, especially if you’re not a huge artist, you end up having to make demos. A lot of demos. When you record a song more than once, it loses something every time. I really loved getting to make a record where those moments—albeit less refined than if we’d worked them out—those moments sound like the songs still had control over us, as opposed to the other way around.”

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Symphonic Shocker

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from http://intergalacticrobot.blogspot.com/2005/11/symphonie-fantastique.html

To today’s audiences, who have heard nearly two centuries of music after the Symphonie fantastique received its premiere in 1830, Berlioz’s music sounds safe, melodious, beautiful, and brilliantly constructed, but nowhere near as jaw-droppingly shocking as it did to its first audience.

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Fantasia: Disney’s once and future experiment in sight and sound

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When Disney released Fantasia in 1940, it was so revolutionary in its scope, design, and use of technology that few knew what to make of it. Critics, often an impatient lot when confounded, mostly shunned it, as it fit no particular category. Was it a highfalutin cartoon, an animated anthology for longhairs, or a music-appreciation lesson for lovers of Mickey

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Ravinia CEO Is Lookin’ Sharp as Edward Scissorhands on WGN

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Every Monday, Ravinia President and CEO Welz Kauffman appears with announcer Mike Toomey on WGN’s “Ravinia Minute” segment which airs in the 9 a.m. hour every Monday on WGN-TV. Each week Welz highlights upcoming events at the festival and presents them in very creative fashion. Today, he took a stab at something new, costuming up as

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Animated Music

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By Warner Brothers Pictures/Leon Schlesinger Productions (A public domain cartoon featuring this title card) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The marriage of music and animation seems apt enough, since the essence of both is movement, and animation giants like Warner Brothers and Walt Disney issued their short theatrical cartoons under the series headings of “Merry Melodies” and “Silly Symphonies.” Often the music behind the cartoons consisted of sappy pop songs of the day or

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Piano Men

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When you love something as much as I love the sound of the harpsichord, it’s easy to slip into the invalid assumption that everyone else would love it too, if they were only familiar with it. But that notion took a knocking about five years ago when I was going to lunch in a car with several of my 20-something colleagues at Ravinia. I had just acquired the most spectacular-sounding recording of Bach’s Concerto for Four Harpsichords, and I put it in the car stereo to treat my coworkers to that glorious sound. But within 15 seconds of the start of

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Dean Richards and Bill Zwecker Talk Movie Music at July Concert

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Dean Richards and Bill Zwecker

Entertainment journalists Dean Richards of WGN TV and Radio and Bill Zwecker of Fox News and the Chicago Sun-Times have seen it all—and heard it all, too. They’ll share their insights and experiences at a special discussion before the July 14 performance by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra of Danny Elfman’s music from the films of Tim Burton. This unique discussion with two of the most famous faces in Chicago is free and open to ticketholders of the evening’s concert. Topics will include the

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Music means everything to Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga

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He’s been putting a masterful spin on the Great American Songbook since the 1950s, earning the unparalleled distinction of landing albums on the Billboard charts in every decade from then through the present, selling over 50 million titles, and scooping up 18 Grammy Awards, a pair of Emmy Awards, plus a plethora of other esteemed distinctions too numerous to mention. She’s been one of the most provocative and creative presences in pop music since

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Ravinia Mixtape: Cover Songs by 2015 Artists

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Ravinia Mixtape The Covers

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and in the music world, a hit is bound to be covered. When an artist creates their version of a well-known song, they get to recreate it while putting their own stamp on it. Our 2015 Artists Covers Mix contains a wealth of these worthwhile covers by artists performing in our 2015 season. To start, check out Aretha Franklin’s cover of Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep,” and listen to how the Gipsy Kings add a flamenco flavor to The Eagles’ “Hotel California.” The playlist is organized so that similar genres of music are presented together. It starts off with pop and rock and then settles into calming classical and jazz towards the end. 

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Igudesman and Joo are in the vanguard of growing an audience through YouTube

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There are two current trends in classical music presentation that are driven by a desire to connect with younger audiences, a reflection of the fear among many that the graying of contemporary audiences bodes ill for the future of the genre. There is ever-increasing adoption of visual media like YouTube to extend lines of communication beyond the live concert experience or traditional audio-only, hard-copy studio recordings. Another is

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Bobby McFerrin hears the history behind the Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess

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Some years ago I was browsing through bins of CDs at a music superstore and one album virtually jumped off the rack and yelled, “Buy me!” The album was entitled Hush, and pictured on the cover were two smiling gentlemen I admired very much: cellist Yo-Yo Ma and the inimitable, multiple Grammy Award–winning singer and conductor Bobby McFerrin.

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