17 stories by "Hannah Edgar"
This opera premiered in 1904, a year after the death of Czech composer LeoÅ¡ JanáÄek's daughter. That trauma seeped into every brutal detail.
And was that the first ever Lyric encore? Tenor Lawrence Brownlee stops the show on opening night.
J'Nai Bridges and Charles Castronovo are the central lovers, telling a rich and densely layered story.
Newly renamed and the lobby renovated, the Athenaeum, owned by the neighboring St. Alphonsus parish, has moved toward more religious programming and keeps closer watch on the shows being sta…
Chicago's Lyric marched to its own drumbeat for this French "Don Carlos." This is not the Italian "Don Carlo," as Giuseppe Verdi's opera is usually performed.
When she filmed the music video for "OMG BRITT," a trap anthem off of her new record, Natural Brown Prom Queen, Brittney Parks was determined to smash a violin on […]
The post With <i&g…
Flutist Nicole Mitchell and composer Fabio Paolizzo first performed together live in 2018, in a concert at the University of California, Irvine. More accurately, Mitchell played a duo set wi…
Like any music fest, the Chicago Jazz Festival is basically a Choose Your Own Adventure that you listen to. It's even more multifarious than most"not only does it take over […]
The post Th…
Most bassists have to be chameleons. It's more or less in the job description when your instrument can be played upright or electric, be bowed or plucked, and appear in […]
The post Matt U…
For as long as Bruce Finkelman can remember, the Morton Salt factory has set his heart racing. It's not that he gets salt cravings any worse than the next guy. Rather, he remembers that when…
In 2018, Back Alley Jazz, an offshoot of the Hyde Park Jazz Festival, thrummed the heartstrings of nostalgic south-siders when it resuscitated the popular neighborhood-alley jams that took p…
Camae Ayewa, aka Moor Mother, has always been one to cite her sources. In addition to performing as a member of Philly-based free-jazz collective Irreversible Entanglements, the contralto wo…
Joseph Bologne, the son of a Senegalese woman and her French enslaver, was nothing short of a Parisian celebrity in his time. This is his only surviving opera, and it's great fun.
Saxophonist Isaiah Collier and his celebrated quartet, the Chosen Few, are among our city's mightiest conduits of spiritual jazz. So when Collier and Chosen Few percussionist Michael Shekwoa…
Drummer Makaya McCraven has always been a bit of a rabble-rouser. He mixes audio from his live gigs with studio overdubs in intricately layered tracks that feel like jazz approached with a D…
Since January 2020, vocalist Julian Otis and Elastic Arts executive director Adam Zanolini have programmed AfriClassical Futures, a series offering an antidote to the overwhelming whiteness …
Tacked to the wall of a beloved Hyde Park dive, a time capsule hides in plain sight.
"Looking for someone?"…
