A Conversation with Brendan White

By Nestor CASTIGLIONE People whose only knowledge of music is rooted in the expectations of pop culture may often find themselves scratching their heads as to why so many classical musicians perform the works of the greats time and again. One can attempt a “breakdown” as to how this works. But perhaps it’s best to […]

Ireland Coming

By Charly SHELTON The Leisure section of the Crescenta Valley Weekly is about to undergo a metamorphosis. Starting this week, it has been renamed as the Travel and Leisure section. What that means to the average reader is … more travel stories! This change is due, in part, to the popularity that our travel articles […]

Thoughts and Impressions of Nintendo’s Switch Preview Tour

Thoughts and Impressions of Nintendo’s Switch Preview Tour

By Brandon HENSLEY After touring select cities in North America this winter, Nintendo held the last leg of its Switch Preview Tour in LA on March 4 and March 5, offering players a chance to sit down (or stand) and demo some of the games currently on shelves, and most that are planned for 2017. […]

Scene in LA – March

Scene in LA – March

By Steve ZALL And Sid FISH Spring is just around the corner, bringing many new shows, such as: “Disinherit the Wind” In this riveting courtroom drama, a renowned neurobiologist sues a prominent university for the right to teach theories of evolution that challenge the scientific status quo. His argument: neo-Darwinian materialist thought, like Creationism – […]

theBlu Takes Guests Under the Sea

theBlu Takes Guests Under the Sea

  By Charly SHELTON It’s all fine and good to sit in a room, comfortable and dry, and read about the depths of the ocean in a book or see it on TV. You get the facts, see some fish pictures and you get it. But what about actually inhabiting the space? Going underwater to […]

Symphony of a Great City » Nestor CASTIGLIONE

The shadows of war loomed large in the programs presented this past weekend by the Lark Musical Society and Le Salon de Musiques. In one it was a cry of outrage, a plea for peace that was heard; in the other it was the lyrical creation of a man whose career and life were displaced […]

Baby Bongo Born at LA Zoo

Baby Bongo Born at LA Zoo

By Charly SHELTON For the first time in over 20 years, a new baby bongo is frolicking and hooping around the LA Zoo. A male calf was born to 5-year-old first-time mother Rizzo and 7-year-old father, Asa, on Jan. 20. These large African antelope have always been exhibited at the LA Zoo, but breeding them […]

Intriguing Music Found this Weekend

By Nestor CASTIGLIONE Not a weekend passes by in Southern California when there isn’t some kind of intriguing classical music concert or other that well rewards the listener for their search. This weekend – with beloved Baroque classics, 20th century masterpieces, and somehow overlooked gems of Late Romantic chamber music among the options – promises […]

‘War Requiem’ by Lark Musical Society

By Nestor CASTIGLIONE “An injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,” Dr. Martin Luther King once said. It’s a sentiment that carries over into other spheres, sometimes unexpectedly. War, for example. For English composer Benjamin Britten, who was a dogged and lifelong pacifist, the fact that war, especially in the 20th century, made victims […]

Matt Damon Builds Bridges on China’s ‘Great Wall’

Matt Damon Builds Bridges on China’s ‘Great Wall’

By Susan JAMES Somewhere in the smoky backrooms of studio politics, producers from the U.S.-China joint venture production company Legendary East and from Le Vision Pictures, one of the largest production companies in China, met to come up with a concept for a blockbuster motion picture. One bright sprig had a brilliant idea. “What if […]