Category: Arts & Culture
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Harry Connick Jr.: From Carnegie Hall to the Ryman, A Tale Of Two Sacred Stages
There are certain places that change how you hear music. Carnegie Hall in New York City is one of those places. The Ryman Auditorium in Nashville is another. This spring and summer, I had the rare gift of hearing the same artist, Harry Connick Jr., on both of those storied stages. Two cities, two venues,…
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From Sargent to Caravaggio
It was a warm, drizzly September morning in Rome. I walked cobblestoned streets to arrive at Santa Maria del Popolo, navigated my way up the stairs, and stepped into the Cerasi Chapel. There, positioned above my head among a grouping of three paintings, was The Conversion on the Way to Damascus by the Italian Baroque…
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Death of a Salesman and Echoes of Homer
There’s something fitting about returning to Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman at this point in my life and no longer encountering it as assigned reading but choosing to step back into its world with a bit more perspective. My first exposure came in high school, where the play’s themes of ambition, identity, and disillusionment…
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Is There a Rekindling of Homer Afoot
It was a beautiful spring day, and I had the opportunity to enjoy one of favorite pastimes, sitting in Lola’s Café sipping a cappuccino and reading. This morning I had just cracked open The Odyssey, Homer’s second epic poem, having just recently finished The Iliad. When subtly a movement was detected at the small table…
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La Traviata: When the Voices Became the Orchestra
A brisk one mile walk through the streets of Manhattan, along packed sidewalks, and construction barriers. Tickets tucked neatly into the iPhone that is simultaneously directing our steps. Turning the corner onto Lincoln Center Plaza, I suddenly slowed to an almost reverent pace. I was caught by the blaze of glass and stone, the five…
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Every Brilliant Thing – Is One Brilliant Thing
Many plays and musicals you attend. Others attend you. I didn’t know which category Every Brilliant Thing would fall into, not until Daniel Radcliffe was standing in the row directly in front of me, twenty minutes before the curtain went up. E-tickets secured … in line along the sidewalk on Broadway… anticipating the opening of…
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Harry Connick, Jr at Carnegie Hall
He walked to a childhood upright piano at the center of Carnegie Hall’s stage and sat down. Not the grand instrument you’d expect. His. The one he grew up playing. And before a note was struck, I understood that what was coming wasn’t a concert. It was a conversation with his mother. After having visited…
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What Sherlock Taught Me About Ballet
For approximately the last 65 years, or at least for as long as my memory serves me, I have thought of ballet as something for … well … not for me. Even with the occasional story of the possibly mythical football player who took ballet to strengthen balance and power, I remained skeptical that it…
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My Trip to 1885
On a cool spring day in May, I found myself in one of my favorite places to be in Boston when not in a coffee shop or Fenway Park. I found myself in a gallery in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. This day in a small gallery off to the side, centered in front…
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A Cello Walks Out on a Country Music Stage
I recently attended a performance at the Grand Ole Opry House in Nashville, Tennessee, the newer venue built on the former Opryland park site and opened on March 16, 1974. That date marked the first Grand Ole Opry show held outside the Ryman Auditorium; the final Opry performance at the Ryman had taken place just…
The Curious Table 