The thrilling pianist made his name with John Coltrane in the Sixties — but kept exploring into the 21st century By Bradley Bambarger<2020> Few things are more important to a musician, especially in jazz, than developing an individual sound on his or her instrument, that quality of being recognizable to…

By Bradley Bambarger <2017> The Los Angeles Guitar Quartet had just premiered the biggest work of its career, the nearly half-hour Road to the Sun, composed for the group by jazz guitar icon Pat Metheny. Most witnessing the LAGQ’s autumn performance at the University of Denver, with the attendant exhilaration…

America has never produced a more broadly popular classical instrumentalist than Van Cliburn. Not told as often as it once was, the pianist’s story is both heroic and cautionary. By Bradley Bambarger <2017> America has never produced a more broadly popular classical instrumentalist than Van Cliburn. The pianist wasn’t just…

By Bradley Bambarger <2005> Once upon a time, when the world was much quieter, the lute was the premier, princely instrumental voice — intimate, complex and expressive, ideal for accompanying songs and dances or for playing solo. Not long after Bach and Vivaldi’s day, though, the lute was overwhelmed by…

By Bradley Bambarger <2006> Kate McGarrigle, banjo in hand, sang folk tunes to her infant son, but he didn’t seem to like them. It was only when she sat at the piano playing Tin Pan Alley numbers that he brightened up, eventually learning “Over the Rainbow” himself. …

By Bradley Bambarger <2007> The ostentatious hugs may be as stage-managed as a G8 summit, but at least the smiles appear genuine on the original Van Halen’s reunion tour — finally, after a decade’s on-again, off-again soap opera. Guitar whiz Eddie Van Halen and singer/showbiz-ham David Lee Roth are famous…

By Bradley Bambarger <2004> The Pixies may be bigger, balder and more sedate than when their subversive songs helped skew late-’80s college rock and offer a dynamic template for the alternative boom to come. Yet those songs remain undated, inimitable and wonderfully weird. When the band played the first of…

Book Review: MOZART AND HIS OPERAS by DAVID CAIRNS (University of California Press) By Bradley Bambarger <2006> For all the virtues of Handel, Wagner, Verdi and Britten, the operas of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart have a mix of sensual appeal and emotional subtlety that is, for those lucky to know them…

By Bradley Bambarger <2006> One of Mozart’s pupils, Johann Hummel (who became a noted pianist and composer), described his teacher being of “small build, his face pale; his physiognomy contained much that was pleasant and friendly, with a touch of melancholy seriousness; his large blue eyes gleamed brightly.” This gives…