Category Archives: Uncategorized
Signor Gaetano – Review
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 7th December 2022Signor Gaetano is the title of tenor Javier Camarena’s latest CD release. It is entirely devoted to the music of Gaetano Donizetti, hence the title. Gli Originali is conducted by Riccardo Frizza who is the musical director director of the Donizetti Festival in the composer’s hometown of Bergamo. The recording took place at the Teatro…
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Why Do COVID Vaccines Fail?
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 2nd December 2022It is now obvious that the COVID vaccines now routinely administered to just about everybody willing to take them has not stopped infection by and spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Data from the CDC show that deaths from the virus occur more often in vaccinated subjects than in those that have not received the vaccine….
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A Few Opera Riots
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 16th November 2022The most fully realized riot in all opera is the one that ends the second act of Wagner’s Die Meistersinger. It’s a gigantic free for all involving everyone in the neighborhood including nine of the meistersingers. Beckmesser starts a serenade full of errors that are marked by Hans Sachs striking his cobbler’s hammer. “David wakes…
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Recording of the Month – Benvenuto Cellini
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 11th September 2022Hector Berlioz (1803-66) was a composer of such unique gifts that he deserves a place among the great composers all to himself. So original were his ideas and talents that even after more than a century and a half after his death, we still struggle to keep up with him. He invented the modern symphony…
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Dickens on Elections
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 5th September 2022In chapter 13 of The Pickwick Papers Dickens describes an election for the House of Commons in the borough of Eatanswill. There are two parties – the Buffs and the Blues. The two candidates, Slumkey (Blue) and Fizkin (Buff), have only one concern – getting elected. They and their supporters will resort to any chicanery…
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Heather Mac Donald on Medicine
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 7th August 2022The outstanding public intellectual, Heather Mac Donald has written a penetrating analysis of the current state of medical education, practice criteria, and organizational structure. Appropriately called the Corruption of Medicine, it details the horrible pit the profession has thrown itself into. Gone is first do no harm. In its place is the patient be damned…
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Unsettled – Book review
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 9th July 2022Steven E Koonin has written a book Unsettled: What climate science tells us, what it doesn’t, and why it matters. The volume is not very long consisting of mostly data (yes data!) and endnotes. It is a sober analysis of a subject that has been a field of landmines maiming the facts that underpin an…
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Limmie Pulliam
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 19th May 2022Limmie Pulliam is an American tenor who is just emerging to operatic prominence. As you’ll hear from the excerpts below he is a dramatic tenor ideally suited for the big Verdi tenor roles. Later this month he is due to sing three performances of the master’s Otello in a concert version with the Cleveland Symphony…
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Schumann Piano Quartet – Andante Cantabile
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 29th March 2022The third movement of Robert Schumann’s Piano Quartet in E flat has one of the greatest melodies found in music of any variety. It’s comparable to the best of Bellini or Verdi. His opus 47 was written in 1842. It closely followed his Piano Quintet (opus 44) in the same key. Both works influenced Brahms…
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Eurydice
Written by Neil Kurtzman | 4th December 2021More operas likely have been written, including the one that introduced the art form, about the Orpheus myth than any other subject. Today the Met’s HD series presented Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice set to a libretto by Sarah Ruhl based on her 2004 play of the same name. The story in this version is told from…
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About Neil Kurtzman
Neil A Kurtzman MD is the Grover E Murray Professor Emeritus and University Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Department of Internal Medicine at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in Lubbock. He has combined careers in clinical medicine, education, basic research, and administration for more than 30 years.› Read the biography
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