Words and Music

WHEN “CABARET” OPENED ON BROADWAY a half-century ago, it was the edgy exception to a lineup of musicals that included “Mame,” “Sweet Charity...

THE LAST PIECE I’D EXPECT TO SEE first on the program is Beethoven’s first violin sonata. In fact, I’m surprised to see this runt of litter ...

From the Food Vault Dept. : I profiled Perreca’s bakery in a 1987 issue of Capital Region magazine, at which point I’d already been convinc...

ROBERT SCHUMANN’S MENTAL VOLATILITY worked its way into the music he wrote not in a stormy Wagnerian way but as something that agitated in t...

ONE OF THE STORAGE SHEDS on my Montgomery County farm property sports a side room finished with lath and plaster, which usually is only foun...

THE PHOENICIANS RESTAURANT opened in 2007 in an unassuming building on Albany’s Central Ave., not far from Fuller Road. Business has increas...

A YOUNG MAN, spurned by his beloved, sets off on foot across a chilly winter landscape, exploring a range of volatile emotions as he surveys...

A BEAUTIFULLY ACTED, cracklingly funny study of some of the indignities of dating had its world premiere at The REP last week, shrewdly meld...

THE FANTASTIC FOOLISHNESS of Groundhog Day has been worsened for me since my early teens, when I fell under the spell of violinist Jascha He...

Oh, No, Not Poetry! Dept .: One of the most unique theatrical/musical events I’ve ever been involved with takes place (as of this writing) q...

PROKOFIEV’S FIRST PIANO SONATA is over a hundred years old; he finished his ninth and last in 1947. There hasn’t been a time more tumultuous...

Given the Choice Dept .: When The Alt debuted in New York’s Capital Region last November, I wrote the piece below to celebrate the concept o...

BE-BOP WAS THE FIRST SIGNIFICANT JAZZ STYLING to achieve popularity without first having been co-opted by white musicians, but its formative...

THIS HAS BEEN THE KIND OF YEAR that imprints its many aspects on all edges of our cultural life, and we need to go into 2017 with music that...

THANKS TO DENZEL WASHINGTON, we have a Moroccan restaurant in Schenectady. “I’d signed a lease on a building in Harlem,” says Aneesa Waheed,...

THERE WAS A TIME when it was considered unseemly to perform Bach’s solo violin sonatas without added piano, and Schumann was among those who...

Girding Our Loins Dept .: The national tour of “Dirty Dancing” landed at Proctors in Schenectady shortly after the election. The timing offe...

THIS YEAR'S THANKSGIVING theme was French Country Bistro, an excuse for making as many casseroles as possible, thus sparing me a lot of ...

From the Culinary Vault Dept .: What with Thanksgiving looming, let’s skip dinner and move right into dessert – or make dinner a little more...

From the Vault Dept .: Singer-songwriter-guitarist Jim Gaudet has been a folk scene fixture for enough decades to earn every accolade availa...