BY ALAN SHERROD Since its founding in 2013, Marble City Opera has followed an…
Music
“If you don’t know what to do, there’s actually a chance of doing something new.”
― Philip Glass, Words Without Music: A Memoir
Preview: Marble City Opera To Present ‘Pagliacci’ in Oak Ridge’s A.K. Bissell Park
Marble City Opera journeys to Oak Ridge for their 2025 springtime offering, Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci, on…
Review: Knoxville Opera Offers A Timely ‘Stuck Elevator’
It would be next to impossible to find a more timely subject matter for an opera libretto than Stuck Elevator, Knoxville Opera’s latest production that had four performances this past weekend at the Old City Performing Arts Center. With music by Byron Au Yong and a libretto by Aaron Jafferis, the one-act opera, first performed in 2013, deals both tragically and poignantly with the immigrant experience that confronts us—immigrant or not—on a daily basis in 2025.
Review: KSO Wraps 2024-25 Season with Impressive New Worlds
BY ALAN SHERROD It was almost exactly three years ago that the Knoxville-based drum…
Review: UT Opera Theatre’s ‘Dialogues of the Carmelites’
When first announced by the University of Tennessee Opera Theatre, a production of Francis Poulenc’s Dialogues of the Carmelites at the Bijou Theatre seemed like a bold and compelling choice. As it turned out, that choice took big advantage of the company’s current wealth of women’s voices. And, it was a marvelous vehicle for minimal, but inventive staging.
Review: KSO Changes Our Mind About Orff’s ‘Carmina Burana’ – And That’s Good
If one needed any more evidence as to the raw popularity of Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, they had only to wade through the diverse crowd in the Tennessee Theatre lobby and partake of the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra’s performance of it this past weekend.
Review: KSO Wraps Chamber Classics Series with Vivaldi’s ‘Four Seasons’ & Baroque Inspirations
The Knoxville Symphony Orchestra wrapped up its 2024-25 Chamber Classics season at the Bijou Theatre on Sunday in rather spectacular fashion. The concert was sold out, proving not only that Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons is intensely popular with audiences, but also that the series itself is attractive to those who gravitate to a Sunday afternoon performance in the intimate acoustic environment of the Bijou. Gratifying, too, is the fact that the series uses its own orchestra members as soloists, something that often leads to truly compelling performances from musicians getting a turn in the spotlight.
Review: Knoxville Opera and Oak Ridge Symphony Collaborate on Beethoven’s Ninth
Artistic collaborations come in different shapes and sizes, but none have been more visibly impactful recently in the Knoxville area music community than one this past weekend that offered a performance of Ludwig van Beethoven’s sublime Ninth Symphony—not in Knoxville, but in Maryville at the Clayton Center for the Arts on the Maryville College campus. Featured was a collaboration between Knoxville Opera and the Oak Ridge Civic Music Association with the involvement of four notable soloists, the Knoxville Opera Chorus, the Oak Ridge Chorus, and the Pellissippi State Variations Choir, with ORCMA conductor Régulo Stabilito on the podium.
Review: Marble City Opera Returns To Westwood for Poulenc’s ‘The Human Voice’
BY ALAN SHERROD When Marble City Opera last offered Francis Poulenc’s one-act opera The…
Review: KSO Concertmaster Wraps Season With Schumann Piano Quartet
Knoxville Symphony Orchestra Concertmaster William Shaub, host and performer of orchestra’s Concertmaster Series, wrapped up the 2024-25 season of three concerts this week with an eclectic program of works that once again featured showcase pieces for violin and piano followed by a notable ensemble work chosen from the gems of chamber music history.
