Concert Review: The Motor City Comet

The Detroit Symphony Orchestra plays four Ives symphonies.

by Paul J. Pelkonen

The perihelion of Halley's Comet inspired Charles Ives' Symphony No. 4.

Of all the orchestras scheduled for this year’s Spring For Music festival at Carnegie Hall, none generated more anticipation than the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. These two concerts mark the ensemble’s first return to the historic venue in 17 years, and its first visit under the leadership of its music director Leonard Slatkin.

Obituary: Elliott Carter (1908-2012)

Elliott Carter: 1908-2012.

The American composer was 103. 
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Elliott Carter died peacefully today.

His death comes a little more than a month before his birthday, December 11. A report on NPR.org stated that according to his assistant, the composer died at home, of natural causes.

Mr. Carter was at the cutting edge of composition and new music creation in a career that spanned from the 20th century into the new millenium. An iconoclast even in his later years,, he wa considered the dean of American composers, working out of his W. 12th St. apartment in the heart of Manhattan's Greenwich Village.

His early exposure to music came when he was 15, at a Boston Symphony Orchestra performance of Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring--still a relatively new work. (Pierre Monteux conducted.)