• AARP Jukebox
  • Tour the Country with Tony Bennett
  • What is your music IQ?

More Music

Music

This blogger, Richard Gehr, is not an employee of AARP. The opinions expressed in the blog are not necessarily the opinions of AARP and AARP assumes no liability for the content posted by Mr. Gehr or any other participant

Richard Gehr | June 20, 2007

0 Comments

Can you hear/see quality classical music between the coasts? New Yorker classical music critic Alex Ross catches a plane, rents a car, and, "[t]hanks to generous speed limits," manages to see the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, the Nashville Symphony, and Birmingham's Alabama Symphony Orchestra in their native habitats over the course of two days. Condescending characterizations such as "regional" and "second tier" no longer apply, Ross discovers, and he writes: "I learned what touring musicians have been saying for years: that lesser-known orchestras can deliver sure-footed, commanding performances, and that the notion of a stratospheric orchestral élite is something of an illusion." Read Ross's "On the Road" and feel a little better about the state of classical music in the hinterlands.

Moreover, Ross documented his two-day trip photographically on his blog, The Rest Is Noise.

Post a comment

(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)

Disclaimer: You are fully responsible for the content that you post, and AARP assumes no responsibility for the messages or content of others. We also reserve the right to remove or edit postings because of length or other reasons in our sole discretion. Please do not post commercial messages. Please behave respectfully to other members of this blog community. We reserve the right to delete or edit comments that may be inflammatory, abusive, off-topic, obscene, sexually explicit, use excessive foul language, are of a personal nature, or are otherwise inappropriate. You agree that AARP, its affiliates and sublicensees can use your comment and derivative works based on your comment on this blog and in any other media. Please do not post personal contact information and do not impersonate other members of this blog community or anyone else. We reserve the right to change these rules at any time.