Lloyd Schwartz
Lloyd Schwartz is the classical music critic for NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross.
In addition to his role on Fresh Air, Schwartz is the Senior Editor of Classical Music for the web-journal New York Arts and Contributing Arts Critic for WBUR's the ARTery. He is the author of four volumes of poems: These People; Goodnight, Gracie; Cairo Traffic; and Little Kisses (University of Chicago Press, 2017). A selection of his Fresh Air reviews appears in the volume Music In—and On—the Air. He is the co-editor of the Library of the America's Elizabeth Bishop: Poems, Prose, and Letters and the editor of the centennial edition of Elizabeth Bishop's Prose, published by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux in 2011.
In 1994, Schwartz was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for criticism. He is the Frederick S. Troy Professor of English at the University of Massachusetts Boston and teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing.
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Fitzgerald's warm, yet ultra-cool voice was at the opposite pole of jazz singing from Armstrong's gravelly growl. There's absolutely no reason their voices should blend so effortlessly — but they do.
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The New York Philharmonic celebrates its 175th birthday with a box set dating back to its very first recordings a century ago, featuring some of the greatest musicians of the 20th-century.
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Callas, who died in 1977, was known for her ability to merge musical notes with complex feelings. Now Warner Classics has released a box set of her live recordings — including 20 complete operas.
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Freire plays tribute to the noted German composer on his new album. Music critic Lloyd Schwartz doesn't always love Brahms, but he loves this recording.
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In 1942, the Austrian pianist recorded a set of Schubert Impromptus that were never released. Those recordings, plus others from the session, are now available in a new CD set.
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A new two-CD set features music inspired by Shakespeare as well as actors reading his work. Critic Lloyd Schwartz says any excuse to honor the master playwright is a good one.
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Danish composer Hans Abrahamsen explores questions of time, memory, nature and human isolation. His recent collaboration with soprano and conductor Barbara Hannigan has garnered worldwide attention.
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The opera, by the late composer Maurice Ravel, spins a modern fairy tale about a naughty child at bedtime. Critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews a new recording of it by conductor Seiji Ozawa.
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A two-CD set featuring performers from the Lyric Stage of Irving, Texas, revives the complete score of the 1954 musical, The Golden Apple. Critic Lloyd Schwartz calls it a "game-changing" recording.
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In the 1940s, recording engineers perfected new sound techniques that were used in World War II — and which launched a hi-fi revolution. Lloyd Schwartz reviews the new 53-CD Decca box set.