Top Story »

Mar 22, 2024 – 1:55 pm

Interview: With Anthony Freud’s announcement that he will depart the Lyric Opera of Chicago as its general director in July of this year, a significant transition in one of the Windy City’s leading arts institutions is upon us. “I feel great about the company, the strength of the institution from which I’m retiring,” said Freud at a recent sit-down interview in his office on the fourth floor of the Lyric Opera House. “I’m proud of the way we have evolved through challenging times. I think the work that we do is exciting, thought-provoking, innovative, and surprising in many ways.”

Read the full story »
Latest Arts News
Classical + Opera
Theater + Stage
Streaming + Disc
Chicago Wine Journal

‘Moby Dick’ at Lookingglass: A man’s obsessive drive to annihilate a whale surges to electric life

Jun 22, 2015 – 7:45 pm
Feature 1

Review: Translating a great novel into a successful stage work is hardly a mere matter of reformulation. They are different beasts, novel and play. All the more marvelous, then, is David Catlin’s imaginative, poetic, indeed galvanic adaptation of Herman Meville’s “Moby Dick” for Lookingglass Theatre. ★★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Classic art of Jaboulet’s new Chapelle mistress

Jun 20, 2015 – 1:46 pm
The Hermitage Hill provides ideal conditions for Syrah, the stuff of Jaboulet's La Chapelle.

Tasting Report: Since my earliest forays into French wines, the brightest stars in my firmament have consistently included the patrician Hermitage La Chapelle produced by Paul Jaboulet Aîné in France’s Northern Rhône Valley. So it was little short of enchanting to step back through time at a vertical tasting of this great expression of Syrah at a recent Chicago seminar sponsored by Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate.

Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony salute the Blackhawks’ Stanley Cup win with a rousing ‘Chelsea Dagger.’

Jun 19, 2015 – 3:16 pm
And it's just his size. Maestro Riccardo Muti after a mean rendition of 'Chelsea Dagger' in honor of the Chicago Blackhawks Stanley Cup. 6-18-2015 (Todd Rosenberg)

Video: The Blackhawks’ victory parade ended a block away from Symphony Center in downtown Chicago, but Riccardo Muti was still in the mood to celebrate.

Grant Park Orchestra, led by ‘goalie’ Kalmar, heats up Beethoven to kick off festive summer

Jun 18, 2015 – 5:40 pm
Carlos Kalmar and Grant Park Orch, opening night June 17, 2015 (Norman Timonera)

Review: Chicago’s getting everything right at the beginning of this summer season. The day after the Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup, the weather was picnic perfect at Millennium Park, where the free Grant Park Music Festival got underway. Thousands laid down their blankets on the great lawn at Pritzker Pavilion. Even the curse of the overture “Drip” – rained out two seasons running – was finally broken. Check out our top festival picks.

New York Aisle: Philharmonic tops off season with rare bounty of Honegger’s ‘Joan of Arc’

Jun 16, 2015 – 9:33 am
?????????????????????

Review: From his earliest days as music director of the New York Philharmonic, Alan Gilbert has indulged New York audiences with an end-of-the-season extravaganza, This year’s offering was Honegger’s dramatic oratorio “Jeanne d’Arc au bûcher,” a work rarely performed if only because of the magnitude of forces, starting with adult chorus, children’s chorus, 11 sung roles, and two lead actors.

From al fresco staging of Williams’ ‘Streetcar,’ American Players promise summer of surprises

Jun 12, 2015 – 12:23 am
Feature 2

Preview: In her second summer as artistic director of American Players Theatre, Brenda Devita can claim her fingerprints alone on the scheme of eight widely ranging plays that will run in repertory well into the autumn. And DeVita embraces that authorship with pride, starting with the company’s first go at Tennessee Williams’ monumental tragedy “A Streetcar Named Desire.” “We’re taking it outdoors,” she says, referring to the starry-domed 1,148-seat Up-the-Hill Theatre.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Aged Burgundian glory from three négociants

Jun 10, 2015 – 12:08 am
Faiveley 2

Mulling Wine: By chance or perhaps my natural gravitation, I just completed a sort of hat trick – meal accompaniments from three of my favorite Burgundy producers, all of whom fall into the somewhat misunderstood category of négociants.

Role Playing: Francis Guinan embraces conflict of father who fled from grim truth in ‘The Herd’

Jun 9, 2015 – 5:26 pm
Feature 1

Interview: The alienated, indeed despised husband and father Francis Guinan portrays in Rory Kinnear’s marvelous first play “The Herd,” at Steppenwolf Theatre, elicits deeply ambivalent feelings, and not just from the audience. Guinan admits he also sees the guy in decidedly conflicted terms.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Burgundy-style Pinot Noir from an Oregon star

May 27, 2015 – 3:35 pm
???

Tasting Report: Since its founding in 1989, Domaine Serene in Oregon’s Willamette Valley has emerged as one of the top producers of Pinot Noir in a region famous for that wine. In a horizontal tasting with friends of four different Domaine Serene bottlings from the 2011 vintage, it became readily apparent why this house continues to enjoy such high esteem.

Role Playing: Sophia Menendian reached back (but not far) as plucky Armenian refugee of 15

May 26, 2015 – 6:03 am
Feature 1

Interview: The most disarming, lovable character I’ve seen on a Chicago stage this season has to be 15-year-old Seta, refugee of the Armenian genocide and mail-order bride in Richard Kalinoski’s “Beast on the Moon,” played with big-eyed, open-hearted exuberance by Sophia Menendian, who’s all of 20. She says she captured Seta’s buoyancy by recalling her own unbridled spirit as an adolescent.

CSO’s ‘French Reveries and Passions’: Spirit and imagination set crown on a dream festival

May 24, 2015 – 12:09 am
Night falls on the final act of CSO's Pelléas et Mélisande by Debussy. (Todd Rosenberg)

Festival Review: It’s that time of the year when orchestras change their pace, kick back a bit and come a-bloom with new ideas in the spirit of the warming clime. Thus the New York Philharmonic celebrates its 50th season of Concerts in the Parks, the Cincinnati Symphony’s May Festival gets underway, the Boston Symphony is deep into its Pops concerts. But the place to be this season is in the Windy City, where the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is midway through an extravagant multidimensional festival “French Reveries & Passions.”

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: A new Spanish horizon for old-vine Garnacha

May 23, 2015 – 12:11 am

Tasting Report: With the dramatic emergence of Spanish wines in recent years, Grenache has gained familiarity in its Spanish robes as Garnacha – which might lead one to assume that the “two” grapes are one and the same. Indeed they are, and yet there’s a world of difference between them. That became clear during a Chicago seminar last week presented by Spanish producers of Garnacha from Cariñena, a small appellation long overshadowed by the likes of Rioja and Ribera del Duero.

Role Playing: Lindsey Gavel’s distressed Masha, in ‘Three Sisters,’ began with a touch of cheer

May 21, 2015 – 7:01 am
Feature 1 Evan Hanover

Interview: Lindsey Gavel knew, heading into her performance as Chekhov’s unhappily married Masha in “Three Sisters” with The Hypocrites, that sorrow-on-sleeve was not the way she wanted to go with it. She decided instead to put a happy face on Masha’s heavy heart – and created a nuanced portrait of a woman caught between her longing for real love and the empty reality of her life.

‘Side Man’ at American Blues Theater: Honey pours from a trumpet, bile from a bitter wife

May 18, 2015 – 10:36 pm
sub feature 2

Review: Everything that is so remarkable, so rich and treasurable, about Chicago’s far-flung storefront theater scene is embodied in American Blues Theater’s resonant and poignant production of Warren Leight’s “Side Man.” Eloquently directed by Jonathan Berry, this model of tight, smart ensemble acting is well worth adjusting the calendar to catch, but it runs only until May 24 and will not be extended. ★★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: The pleasures (and alluring price) of Chablis

May 18, 2015 – 10:35 pm
Locator map

Tasting Report: Somewhat to the northwest of the heart of what we think of as Burgundy – that is, the glorious Côte-d’Or with its world-famous Pinot Noir and Chardonnay — lies the appellation of Chablis. Technically, Chablis is part of Burgundy, though it’s more like an island. Or perhaps an unfavored stepchild. But for wine lovers, especially devotees of Chardonnay, Chablis is a discovery-in-waiting.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: It’s Chicago-sur-Rhône at Robert Parker soirée

May 15, 2015 – 11:43 am
Rhone-style wines will be presented in four different master tastings on May 23 at Chicago's Park Hyatt Hotel. (Courtesy Robert Parker's Wine Advocate)

Mulling Wine: Wines of the Rhône Valley in southeastern France – and others modeled after them from sundry parts of the world – will be spotlighted, explained and, not least, savored in a series of “master” tastings followed by dinner May 23 at Chicago’s Park Hyatt Hotel. The public event is being presented by Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate.

Versatile ‘Jersey Boys’ actress knows Chicago, and some crazy quick-change parts in musical

May 14, 2015 – 3:47 pm
Feature 2

Interview: New Orleans native Leslie Rochette, who plays – among a lightning paced scramble of other roles – Frankie Valli’s daughter Francine in the tour production of “Jersey Boys” currently at the Cadillac Palace Theatre, seems to have found a second home in Chicago. Knowing the richness of Chicago’s theater scene, Rochette made a bee-line for Columbia College to study theater, graduating in 2008. When the first national tour of “Jersey Boys” hit Chicago in 2012, Rochette was in the ensemble, and now she’s back as one of three women in the cast who all fill multiple parts.

‘Sense & Sensibility’ at Chicago Shakespeare: Austen’s beloved sisters glow in new musical

May 14, 2015 – 8:05 am
'Sense and Sensibility' at Chicago Shakespeare Theater 2015 (Liz Lauren)

Review: You can just as easily chart a path from Jane Austen to Stephen Sondheim as you can from Austen to Disney, and thus it is not surprising that Chicago Shakespeare Theater’s artistic director Barbara Gaines should create the world premiere production of Paul Gordon’s diverting new musical based on Austen’s first published novel. “Sense and Sensibility” tells the astonishingly vital story of two sisters of marriageable age – one a yin to the other’s yang – in the 1790s. ★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Grgich revisits crowning of Chardonnay king

May 12, 2015 – 2:02 pm
Feature 1

Mulling Wine: In an epochal Chicago event 35 years ago, Miljenko Grgich’s 1977 Napa Valley Chardonnay, the first he’d produced under his own name, beat out 220 other Chardonnays from all points on the compass (yes, including France) in the largest single-varietal blind tasting ever held up to that time. Last week, Grgich’s daughter Violet and other representatives of Grigich Hills Estate returned to Chicago for a small commemorative tasting of their library Chardonnays and three from the 2012 vintage.

Piano wizardry rules as Chinese star Lang Lang mixes Chopin, calendar’s worth of Tchaikovsky

May 11, 2015 – 11:56 am
sub feature

Review: Pianist Lang Lang’s recital May 9 at the Civic Opera House was, at its best, a display of brilliance of a high order. Taken end to end, it was also a curious affair. To say this lionized, still infectiously youthful Chinese pianist – he turns 33 on June 14 — is a technical wizard may be understatement. Lang Lang is one demonic virtuoso for whom the most daunting technical demands seem more like expressive opportunities than hazards of execution.

Ravel opera rarity (an armchair sings) injects pure fantasy, great fun into CSO French fest

May 9, 2015 – 3:34 pm
?

Review: It isn’t every Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert that ends with the conductor leading a gaggle of children across the stage like the pied piper. But there he was, Esa-Pekka Salonen, smiling ear to ear, a little child’s hand in his, marching the Anima-Young Singers of Greater Chicago into view for their ovation after a deliciously witty performance of Ravel’s one-act opera “L’enfant et les sortilèges,” an evident if unexpected hit at the CSO’s “French Reveries and Passions” festival.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: Like a parade of tall ships, Antinori fleet sails in

May 7, 2015 – 10:25 pm
Antinori Pian delle Vigne

Tasting Report: For a wine buff, it was an evening of almost silly delight: A tasting of wine after great wine from the astonishing portfolio of Italian producer Marchesi Antinori, an array that extended from Brunello di Montalcino to Super Tuscans the likes of Guado al Tasso, Tignanello and Solaia.

‘Beast on the Moon’ at Raven: After Armenian genocide, an improbable pair retool their lives

May 7, 2015 – 6:47 am
Seta (Sophia Menendian) is thrilled with the beautiful new mirror she receives as a wedding present from Tomasian (Mat

Review: Outwardly, Richard Kalinoski’s play “Beast on the Moon” is about a young man and a teenage girl, refugees from the 1915 Armenian genocide who have lost their families and embark on a new life together as immigrants in Milwaukee. But as Raven Theatre’s exuberantly funny and sensitive production so urgently telegraphs, this tragi-comedy is ultimately about the beast within – a fearsome creature of the mind spawned by terror, isolation and guilt. ★★★★

Musical accent unmistakable, French pianist Tiberghien gives CSO fest pitch-perfect start

May 4, 2015 – 3:03 pm
?????????????????

Review: The French pianist Cédric Tiberghien turns 40 years old on May 5, but it was he passing out the presents May 3 at Orchestra Hall. His recital, devoted largely to Ravel and Debussy as the official opening event of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s three-week festival titled “French Reveries & Passions,” was a veritable shower of musical gifts from a pianist making his Chicago debut and, incredibly enough, still just barely known in the U.S.

‘Three Sisters’ at Hypocrites: Shattered hearts, vanished hopes, and Moscow a distant dream

May 2, 2015 – 3:49 pm
Feature 1

Review: Two generations before Jean-Paul Sartre and his coterie of French existentialist playwrights, there was Anton Chekhov, dealing with the same core moral issue of accepting accountability for one’s own life and the hellish consequences of evading that necessity. Such is the specter that confronts the characters in Chekhov’s “Three Sisters,” which the Hypocrites have brought to the stage under the penetrating, indeed searing direction of Geoff Button, who also adapted the play. ★★★★

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: In Ferrari-Carano’s Trésor, a Bordeaux accent

May 2, 2015 – 3:23 pm
tresor2010 350

Tasting Report: Among the treasures of my wine cellar are several vintages of Ferarri-Carano’s Bordeaux-style blend called, fittingly enough, Trésor. More than merely Bordeaux-styled in concept, the 2010 Trésor’s combination of layered fruit, ripe tannins and crisp acidity lends it the native character of its classic model.

Famous trouser roles folded away, opera star von Stade channels a queen of Egypt (Texas)

Apr 26, 2015 – 10:41 pm
Frederica von Stade, as Myrtle Bledsoe, in 'A Coffin in Egypt.'

Interview: Frederica von Stade broke through to opera fame in the ’70s for her boyish roles that showcased a slim physique and impish wit. Now composers and directors seek her out for a new genre — dames and dowagers such as Myrtle Bledsoe in Ricky Ian Gordon’s “A Coffin in Egypt,” now onstage at Chicago Opera Theater.

CHICAGO WINE JOURNAL: A Chardonnay toast to the ‘secret’ of DuMOL

Apr 26, 2015 – 10:07 pm
DuMOL winemaker Andy Smith

Tasting Report: Chardonnay lovers, as well as those who insist they’d rather drink anything but, take note of the name DuMOL. I have just tasted a trio of this 20-year-old Sonoma County winery’s 2012 Chardonnays, and I am star-struck.

‘American Clock’ at Redtwist: There are songs but the key is bitter irony in this Depression tale

Apr 25, 2015 – 11:37 am
????????

Review: Arthur Miller’s plays consistently center on the vicissitudes of ordinary folks, with economic plight as a common theme. What might this avowed life-long liberal, who died in 2005, have written about America today? Actually, a plausible answer is before us, in Redtwist Theatre’s gritty, chilling production of Miller’s “The American Clock,” a cautionary retelling of the saga of the Great Depression. ★★★★

New York Aisle: ‘An American in Paris’ bounds to B’way stage with balletic flair. S’Marvelous

Apr 23, 2015 – 3:37 pm
Feature 4

Review: There’s a new triple threat on Broadway. He can sing, he dances extraordinarily, and his acting isn’t bad either. Robert Fairchild, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, is currently making his Broadway debut in “An American in Paris,” the stage version of the 1951 movie musical that starred Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron. Along with a constant twinkle in his eye, Fairchild possesses and a sense of bonhomie that just won’t quit, ★★★★