Arnaldo Carmouze
"Letters from Iraq" |
From the grand implications of the New World Symphony's $200 million Frank Gehry-designed headquarters rising on Miami Beach and the return of the world-acclaimed Cleveland Orchestra to the modest, family-friendly concerts of the 3-year-old SoBe Music Institute, classical music demanded that South Florida pay attention throughout 2008.
Project Copernicus joined the acting troupe Ground Up & Rising in an affecting commemoration of the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War. The Murray Dranoff International Two Piano Competition invoked its familiar luster. Joshua Haberman abandoned the musical bounties of San Francisco to become program director of choral studies at the University of Miami's Frost School of Music and artistic director of the Master Chorale of South Florida. Five years after the Florida Philharmonic fell mute, Seraphic Fire launched its Firebird Chamber Orchestra, and the Concert Association of Florida debuted Florida Symphony, a new house ensemble for visiting artists. The Frost School opened its Festival Miami season with the blasting winds of Circus Maximus by Oscar-winning composer John Corigliano, and Cuban-American soprano Eglise Gutiérrez made her long-hoped-for Florida Grand Opera review as Violetta in la traviata. |
