Paris does glamour better than anyone. But clearly not at the opera. The Opéra National de Paris at the Bastille still looks like a second-tier suburban cinemaplex and the audience looks accordingly. Opening night has no dress code, no glamour,

With the maturation of recording and streaming technologies, it is now possible to listen to the best of classical music in the comfort of our own places. This tremendous change, from having to dress up decently for “physical” concerts to

“Ideas lie everywhere like apples fallen and melting in the grass for lack of wayfaring strangers with an eye and a tongue for beauty, whether absurd, horrific, or genteel.” – Ray Bradbury, writer

In 1952, one year before his death, Sergei Prokofiev was financially broke. The Soviet government had condemned his Symphony No. 6 a couple of years earlier, and the composer was stripped of his reputation and of his state pension. Trying

Sri Lankan composer Tanya Ekanayaka (b. 1977) started as a pianist, making her debut with the Symphony Orchestra of Sri Lanka at age 16. All of her university work has been based around linguistics, concluding with a Ph.D. in Linguistics

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was, and still is, an international musical superstar. However, the first professional composer of consequence in Russia was an elusive man who simultaneously craved and loathed fame. In a letter to his music publisher, he writes, “I

Bugs and music – hmm, not as common as birds, but then when you start to think about it, they start to creep up on you. Probably the first piece of bug music you might have learned was Frank Loesser’s

Russian folklore and literature is incredibly rich in colorful tales of supernatural magic with decidedly down to earth morals. And the fairy tale of the “Golden Cockerel,” written by the great Alexander Pushkin in 1834 is no exception. For Rimsky-Korsakov,