"There is a long and violent history of white women making themselves the metric by which womanhood is measured, while those whose experiences do not resonate with those of white women — specifics of employment or cuisine aside — are treated by those in power as less than fully women, less than fully human. Despite the numerous composers of color involved in this project, having Birrittella sing this poem re-enforces and perpetuates that history, and ends the work with an extraordinarily flimsy politics of similarity, one that has no room to imagine that some women may themselves be in positions of structural power over other women. (There is no consideration, for example, that the woman in the business meeting may be making bombs to drop on the woman herding goats.) People are too varied for a politics of similarity to ever succeed; we need a politics of solidarity instead."

I saw the entire PROTOTYPE contemporary #opera festival again this year and it was . . . not great. Read all about it in #TheLogJournal: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2020/01/21/in-review-prototype-festival-2020/

#MusicJournalism #MusicCriticism #MyArticles

Come for the captivatingly physical bass playing, stay for the nonchalantly virtuosic drum solo — my latest in #TheLogJournal: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/12/19/in-review-brandon-lopez/

#MusicCriticism #MusicJournalism #MyArticles

ICYMI: I saw violin superstar #Midori at (Le) Poisson Rouge on Monday and wrote all about it — from Azerbaijani fiddle dances to sonic miscalculations — for #TheLogJournal :

https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/11/05/in-review-midori/

#reviews #MusicCriticism #MusicJournalism #MyArticles

On Site Opera produced my favorite opera of all time in a perfect setting with a solid cast and an utterly incoherent phalanx of Directorial Concepts. Read all about the resulting train wreck in #TheLogJournal: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/10/29/in-review-the-turn-of-the-screw/

#TurnOfTheScrew #TheTurnOfTheScrew #Britten #BenjaminBritten #Piper #MyfanwyPiper #OnSiteOpera #MyArticles

I'm not saying the best part of this past weekend's #GeorgeLewis #concert at #NYU was a startled violinist, but there was a startled violinist and it was Quality Entertainment — read all about it in my latest for #TheLogJournal: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/10/22/in-review-george-lewiss-soundlines/

#ClassicalMusic #ContemporaryClassical #MyArticles

Have you ever wanted to leave it all behind and just . . . go become a tree? Orna, the main character in Grey Grant's new #trans #opera, sure has, and she set out to do just that. Read all about it in my latest for #TheLogJournal: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/10/15/in-review-michigan-trees/

hello hello hello! there's a fascinating new #trans #musical cast recording that just dropped at the start of this week, and i wrote all about it for #TheLogJournal! check out my review, and then head over and give the album a listen: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/07/24/album-review-eamon-boylan-soft-butter/

#MusicCriticism #MusicJournalism #SingingTheatrePieces

are we going to claim Hildegard as a "proto-lesbian"? mmmmmmaybe. are we going to say that her map of the universe is *extremely* vaginal? ABSOLUTELY. i had a lovely time talking with two of the founders of #ChamberQUEER and wrote up our conversation for #TheLogJournal: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/06/19/chamberqueer-identity-inclusiveness-and-audience-participation/

"All these elements come together to produce striking tableaux, like the sequence in the Z section that started with the performers silhouetted far upstage by a dazzling backdrop. Over Dessner’s thunderous, irregular groove, the vocalists sing a tumult of interweaving lines, the only clearly audible text (“When you shoot a black body…”) popping to the foreground again and again. One by one, the singers stepped forward into bands of light streaming in from each side, culminating in a stage picture with the cold, implacable fury of baleful Renaissance statuary. Other moments were more tender, as when Moran stepped in front of the foremost scrim to deliver a fragmentary spiritual, a vision of otherworldly grace."

my latest #review is live in #TheLogJournal! talking about a new dramatic musical reaction to #RobertMapplethorpe including the ache of desire and the racism of certain white queer gazes: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/06/12/in-review-triptych-eyes-of-one-on-another/

"I normally hate holiday creep, but I make an exception for the gays"

Read my latest #review for #TheLogJournal about four very #gay #opera offerings and some thoughts about what #Stonewall might mean for us today!

(NB: contains passing mention of street harassment and an anti-gay slur)

https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/05/24/in-review-the-stonewall-operas/

Part two of this multi-voiced interview with some other brilliant #NewMusic folks is now live on #TheLogJournal! We're all talking about making #art that intersects with and crosses lines of identity, and I think it's very worth a read!

https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/04/09/making-art-in-todays-social-climate-self-and-other/

my latest #review is live in #TheLogJournal! I saw an evening of nine (yes, nine!) composer-performers, and wrote all about it! be proud of me, i only compared one thing to a fish: https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2019/02/12/review-soloicity/

#NewMusic #MusicJournalism #MusicCritic #MusicCriticism

new #review! i'm in #TheLogJournal writing about a concert from the new #feminist composer collective #KindsOfKings! i compare a #BariSax piece to an entrapped poltergeist, and i'm p happy with how it turned out:

https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2018/12/11/in-review-kinds-of-kings/

#ClassicalMusic #music #MusicJournalism #NewMusic #ContemporaryClassical

i have a new #review out in #TheLogJournal about an evening of #ModularSynthesis #opera! we've got time machines! we've got werewolves! we've got musico-dramatic decisions that were not always the best!

#MusicJournalism #MusicCriticism #ClassicalMusic

https://nationalsawdust.org/thelog/2018/11/07/in-review-experiments-in-opera-modularias/