Monthly Archives: April 2018
Dr. Donald W. Seldin, ‘intellectual father’ of UT Southwestern, dies at 97
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 30th April 2018Dr Seldin died April 25, 2018 at the age of 97. I was one of thousands of physicians whose life and career was shaped by this great man. The article below is the tribute to him that was published by Southwestern Medical Center, the institution that he devoted his life to and which was shaped…
› Read the full entry
Ella Brennan – Commanding the Table
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 29th April 2018This is not a film review, rather it’s a recommendation that you see the movie the title of which is above. Netflix has it. The movie tells the story of Ella Brennan who has been the Doyenne of New Orleans restaurateurs for more than 60 years. She first made Brennan’s into a eating powerhouse. She…
› Read the full entry
Cendrillon in HD
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 28th April 2018The Met’s current run of Massenet’s opera is the first time the company has performed the French composer’s version of the Cinderella story. Laurent Pelly’s production originated in 2006 at the Santa Fe Opera as a vehicle for Joyce DiDonato who also starred in the current mounting of the opera. In the ensuing 12 years…
› Read the full entry
Court Rules Wagner’s Music Dangerous to Health
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 26th April 2018I written about the medical danger to health associated with Parsifal, now a British court has added Die Walküre to the list of hazardous Wagner operas. Violist Christopher Goldscheider convinced the court that playing in a cramped orchestra pit during a 2012 rehearsal of the opera subjected him to a noise level which resulted in “acoustic…
› Read the full entry
My Smart TV Has a Stupid DVR
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 24th April 2018The march of technology is like a drunken sailor on his way to the next bar. He more or less knows where it is, but his pickled neurons send him on an erratic path. Thus we get driverless cars that run over a pedestrian in the dark because the car forgot to turn its high…
› Read the full entry
Quando le sere al placido
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 18th April 2018One of opera’s most moving and beautiful tenor arias occurs near the end of the second act of Verdi’s Luisa Miller. The aria is a test for any tenor as it requires a powerful spinto for its explosive introduction followed by an aria which is sensitive, lyrical, and has a classical beauty. The words followed…
› Read the full entry
Luisa Miller in HD
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 14th April 2018Verdi’s 14th opera was brought back to the Met after an absence of 12 years. Elijah Moshinsky’s production with sets and costumes by Santo Loquasto is set in 19th century England rather than 17th century Tyrol. This change made little difference to opera’s effect, though the time and place specified by Verdi makes a little…
› Read the full entry
A Troublesome Inheritance – Book Review
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 11th April 2018Subtitled Genes, Race and Human History, Nicholas Wade’s book has managed to get itself denounced by 144 geneticists in a letter to the New York Times Book Review. How has Wade managed this feat? He has a long and distinguished career as a science writer which includes a stint as Science Editor for the same…
› Read the full entry
How to Gum a Steak
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 10th April 2018Why would you want to gum a steak? Well, because London’s murder rate now exceeds New York’s. London’s gun laws are tougher than Chuck Norris, so would be murders have resorted to knives. There seems to be no limit to human ingenuity when homicide is the issue. London’s mayor, Shadiq Khan, has responded as any…
› Read the full entry
Tutto Verdi: Aida
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 5th April 2018When Verdi composed Aida he was well past the point where he had discovered, as Benjamin Britten remarked, the secret of perfection. If this opera does not plumb the emotional and psychological depths of its immediate predecessor, Don Carlo, it is a work of both grandeur and intimacy that comes from an operatic world inhabited…
› Read the full entry
