My Year In Music 2013

This year, I’m even more relieved than last year that I’m not a professional critic assigned to assemble a “top ten” music list for 2013. Instead, here is a year-end offering of highlights from my personal musical journey throughout the year.

I also want to recognize the composer and musicians who participated in This Life in Music profiles during 2013: Maxwell J McKee, Sabrina Tabby, Dávid Adam Nagy, Lucy Dhegrae, and Amy Garapic, as well as composer Dylan Mattingly, for his guest post on his new work, The Bakkhai (a report on the premiere of The Bakkhai is included in this post). It was a pleasure and privilege to present each of them on Prufrock’s Dilemma. Thanks to all!

Guest Post: The Bakkhai According to Dylan Mattingly

Bakkhai, The Death of Pentheus

Earlier this year, I attended a preview of Dylan Mattingly’s new choral work, The Bakkhai. I was bowled over by the work and fascinated by the story of its creation. December 10, 7PM, at Bard’s Chapel of the Holy Innocents, Contemporaneous will perform the work live in its entirety, and I can hardly wait. In anticipation of the performance, I’m delighted to present The Bakkhai Accordingly to Dylan Mattingly on Prufrock’s.

Fall and All, Continued

Outdoors, the technicolor display of autumn continues. Indoors, I’ve been having energetic discussions about Bach and Schoenberg with online classmates. I find myself worrying, of all things, about Schoenberg’s prominence in an online music survey curriculum and its effect. In particular, it’s my view that Schoenberg is absolutely the wrong composer through which to introduce listeners to 20^th century music.