The Philharmonic’s New Yorky Fourth The New York Philharmonic gives an annual Fourth of July concert, and this year the orchestra gave it three times. I attended on July 3. As usual, the concert was conducted by a Brit, Bramwell Tovey. He is one suave and talented Brit, too. I have always called him “your 
About 45 people heard the rambunctious nonet led by high-energy trombonist Craig Harris in a cozy basement studio at the Dwyer Cultural Center on June 25. It was the last “Musical Monday” of the band’s seven-month, once-a-week gig, because the Dwyer, on 123rd Street between St. Nicholas Avenue and Frederick Douglass Boulevard, is cutting hours 
Bestowing awards on what matters If you were to have walked into the Blue Note at 4 p.m. on June 20, you’d have heard guitar wiz Gabriel Marin improvising microtonal figures with a Middle Eastern tinge on double-necked guitar, electric bassist John Ferrara by his side. You could have grabbed a bottle of Brother Thelonious 
The musical language of the Balkans by JUDY GELMAN MYERS Since the ’90s, horrendous images of war have dominated our perception of the Balkan Peninsula. To lay these images to rest, two European foundations engaged the universal healing power of music in “The Balkans—Crossroads of Civilizations,” an extravaganza of suites, sonatas and songs curated to underscore 
Pianists pires and zacharias play concertos in pairs Two orchestras came to town, each bringing a pianist. The first orchestra to appear was from just down the road, Philadelphia. They played in Carnegie Hall with their chief conductor, Charles Dutoit. And their pianist was Maria João Pires, from Portugal. She is very well-known from recordings, 
Gossip and Xenomania make joyful noise By Ben Kessler Arkansas-bred indie band Gossip (née The Gossip; like Facebook, they dropped the definite article) came to A Joyful Noise, their fifth studio album, having exhausted the exhortative possibilities of millennial dance-punk. Ahead of the pop culture curve, singer Beth Ditto went the distance—shorter than it seems—from 
Marcus Roberts sets his own rules Jazz musicians pushing beyond the standard deviations advance the art form, and pianist Marcus Roberts stands out among many excellent current keyboard players with a thrust all his own. Performing the 1920s classics of Jelly Roll Morton faithfully yet also revised at Jazz at Lincoln Center May 11 and 
It’s still the early part of the season, the good part, when summer hours kick into effect (for the luckiest among us), before the tourist invasion starts and the city starts to heat up and emit that special odor that’s uniquely New York in August. There’s no better time to be in the city for 
