Words and Music

Recipe Me This Dept .: Although I need no excuse to tuck into a dish made from lamb, Easter offers a chance to make it the centerpiece of a ...

30 March 2013 | Photo by B. A. Nilsson

Great White Way Dept. : I don’t often get the chance to take a critical whack at a Broadway show, but I saw one recently and decided, for yo...

From the Kitchen Dept. : Today’s Metroland features my profile of Jack’s Oyster House , an Albany mainstay celebrating its centenary. I’ve w...

Guest Blogger: P. G. Wodehouse . He was the drama critic, among other writing duties, for the U.S. version of Vanity Fair during the centu...

From the Vault Dept. : Schenectady’s Proctors Theatre recently announced its 2013-14 Broadway season , and as a reminder that they’re old ha...

Balls in the Air Dept .: As was the case with violinist Julia Fischer , I’ve reviewed the Flying Karamazov Brothers more than once – more th...

From the Classical Vault Dept .: We in New York’s Capital Region were lucky to have a few visits from violinist Julia Fischer as her career ...

23 March 2013 | Photo by B. A. Nilsson

From the Classroom Dept .: Several years ago I was invited into an area high school as an artist-in-residence, charged with preparing a grou...

Lost Masterpieces Dept .: Many years ago, I wrote a few sample chapters of a tome titled The Fat Man's Diet , which included essays on t...

From the Vault Dept. : Just to emphasize the disconnect between the snow on the ground and the start of spring, here’s a piece I wrote a cou...

From the Wine Cellar Dept. : Sure, we’ve got wine stores a-plenty throughout the Capital Region. But this was nowhere near the case 25 years...

“I ENJOY YOUR BOOKS very much,” the letter probably began. I never kept a copy of it. I was eight or nine when I wrote it. It was my first p...

Critical Blarney Dept. : Seems to me that the Capital Region was a lot more Hibernian in its mid-March entertainment in years past, before w...

From the Classical Vault Dept .: Neither the piece below nor the pieces described come from too many years back, at least by clssical music’...

Guest Blogger: Saki. It was the Farsi pen name of Burma-born, Scottish writer H.H. Munro, who was born in 1870 and whose mother died two ye...

From the Computer Vault Dept .: Although this piece dates back thirteen years, most of its advice still holds true (and the credit bureau ph...

MY WATERSHED MOMENT came a couple of Sundays ago, as pianist Vladimir Feltsman returned to the stage of Union College’s Memorial Chapel and ...