Ben Heppner

Latest Articles

Year in Classical: Celebrate!

Comings and goings
In Handel's Hercules, the demented Dejanira's loss is still so painful, I was afraid to listen; now I don't want to hear anything else.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 22, 2008

Epic undertaking

Berlioz’s Les Troyens at the BSO; Opera Boston attempts Verdi’s Ernani
The act four sequence of quintet, septet, and love duet is non-stop musical orgasm.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | May 12, 2008

Orpheus in the afterworld

Harbison and Mahler at the BSO, and the return of Dubravka Tomsic
Tomsic’s last Boston recital was four years ago. We can’t afford to be without her this long.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | April 22, 2008

Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius, BMOP, Marc-André Hamelin, and Sasha Cooke
A youthful 80-year-old Sir Colin Davis was back in front of the Boston Symphony Orchestra last weekend with one of the pieces he loves most.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | January 29, 2008

Love and loss

Classical: 2007 in review
Boston’s biggest classical-music story this year was also its saddest.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | December 18, 2007

Hail and farewell

The Berlin Philharmonic’s Mahler, the St. Lawrence String Quartet, and the BSO’s Smetana
The season’s most eagerly awaited (and, with its $187 top ticket price, most expensive) classical concert was not a disappointment.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | November 27, 2007

Not quite eternal

Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic in Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde
When what’s arguably the world’s best symphony orchestra expectations run high.
By JEFFREY GANTZ | November 26, 2007

Voice of authority

Thomas Quasthoff holds forth
German baritone Thomas Quasthoff has overcome adversity (his mother took Thalidomide) to become the outstanding German lieder singer of his generation.
By JEFFREY GANTZ | November 14, 2007

World music

The BSO goes traveling, and Berlin comes to Boston
There’s more to Boston’s classical music scene than the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | September 12, 2007

Amazing weekend

James Levine with the BSO and BSO Chamber Players, Hoose and the Cantata Singers
James Levine’s opening salvo for his year-long Beethoven/Schoenberg series with the Boston Symphony Orchestra couldn’t have been more ambitious: the work that opened Symphony Hall in 1900.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | January 24, 2006

Boston feasts

Winter concert preview: classical goodies in 2006
The Boston Symphony Orchestra, Celebrity Series, Emmanuel Music, Boston Early Music Festival, and more.
By LLOYD SCHWARTZ | January 14, 2006