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It was, very much, Kigawa’s recital – not Boulez’, not Ligeti’s. The force of personality might have gotten in the way had the flair on pianoforte not been so strong. 

Combining seasoned chamber musicians, new works, and a cabaret-style venue, Hotel Elefant performed musical narratives ranging from horseback riding in Northern Iran to the public suicide of a Pennsylvanian State Treasurer. 

Violinist Pekka Kuusisto and composer Nico Muhly performed at (Le) Poisson Rouge, with music by Bach, Pärt, Glass, and Muhly.

Nils Frahm and Dawn of Midi delivered an enchanting, dramatic pair of sets at (Le) Poisson Rouge.

It can be difficult to focus on the music at (Le) Poisson Rouge, a venue “serving art and alcohol” on Bleecker Street in New York. During any of their widely varied avant-garde and new music sets, you will hear forks clinking against plates and see waiters striding across the space to deliver drinks to the audience members, seated around tables or at the bar.

In keeping with the theme of Tuesday’s (Le) Poisson Rouge concert entitled “Do Something Different”, I will diverge from the ordinary by opening with the evening’s closing remark: “This is opera in New York City today!”Opera Singers Initiative founder Anna Lee excitedly delivered this terse eight-word proclamation on the venue’s dimly-lit stage, where she was joined by vocalists from Opera Singers

On Sunday evening the JACK Quartet, seemingly ubiquitous in new music circles, performed an enlightening array of musical styles at (Le) Poisson Rouge, joined by rising young cellist Joshua Roman. The thoughtful programming was almost as chronologically diverse as it could have been.

Jennifer Koh and Ensemble LPR helped celebrate the five-year anniversary of (Le) Poisson Rouge Friday night, with a lively program of works by John Zorn, Charles Wuorinen and Ludwig van Beethoven. The club-like atmosphere of LPR was in full swing before the show began, waiters ferrying salads and glasses of wine as percussionists adjusted their instruments on stage under colored blooms of light.

Going to a concert at (Le) Poisson Rouge reminds me of listening to the old recording of Sviatoslav Richter and Andrei Gavrilov playing Handel’s keyboard suites. It sounds a bit like they were playing in a hotel lobby: teacups clink, throats are cleared, glasses smash, and the occasional telephone lingers unanswered.

(Le) Poisson Rouge is always an exciting venue for classical music, but to have John Adams in the house Tuesday night was a real treat.The Attacca Quartet, comprised of violinists Amy Schroeder and Keiko Tokunaga, violist Luke Fleming and cellist Andrew Yee, began the concert with absolutely no pretenses.

No ordinary youth orchestra, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra causes quite a stir wherever it performs. Comprised of a mix of Arab, Israeli and Spanish musicians, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra is committed to coexistence and a peaceful solution to the violent conflict in the Middle East.

Dutch composer Simeon ten Holt passed away last November, and groups all over have been honoring his memory by performing what is perhaps his most well known composition, Canto Ostinato.

Elliott Carter was a real maverick composer. Born into the era of Igor Stravinsky, Charles Ives and Arnold Schoenberg, Carter went onto to create an exciting world of new music in the 20th and 21st century. Never slowing down, Carter composed over 40 new works between the ages of 90 and 100. The result: Carter’s music is current and exciting today... and he has an incredible repertoire of music.

At once, Max Richter’s avant-garde remix of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons is both strange and familiar. Poised atop the stage at (le) Poisson Rouge sat the LPR ensemble – complete with a harpsichord! – ready to begin their performance. But something curious happened: the players remained silent as an electronic hum radiated out of a laptop on stage.

A successful performance of Steve Reich’s music requires performers with stamina, a groove, and an audience willing to come along for the ride. The music itself is at its best when Reich layers gesture on top of gesture, creating a complex rhythmic tapestry that can put listeners into a trance and trigger unexpected emotions.

The stage was set at (Le) Poisson Rouge: a royal blue curtain and a brilliant red light contrasted nicely with the shine of the black and white piano. Simple yet bold, the stage was akin to a Mondrian painting. And as Scarlatti’s notes rolled off Alexandre Tharaud’s fingers, this striking visual matched the crisp performance perfectly.

Good news for skeptics: modernist music can be beautiful. If what keeps listeners away from the “difficult” music written in the past century is a fear of dissonance, they can rest assured.

‘There's no such thing as new music, just music’, Bruce Levingston remarked halfway through the 10th anniversary gala concert for the ‘Premiere Commission’ Monday night. After hearing the evening’s performances, it feels impossible to disagree.The two opening piano pieces were like impressions, snapshots of emotions from a particular place or time.

Celebrating the worldwide release of his first orchestral album, Tchaikovsky and Mendelssohn: Violin Concertos, Ray Chen presented a fairly typical selection of classical music: Bach, Brahms, Tchaikovsky and Saint-Saëns. But from the moment Chen took to the stage at (Le) Poisson Rouge, it was clear the evening’s concert was bound to break a few rules.

Danielle de Niese, the much-marketed new star of the opera world, has been performing at the Met in The Enchanted Island this week, and came downtown on a night off this Monday to promote her new album of Baroque arias. A packed house filled (Le) Poisson Rouge, a club popular for both classical and mainstream artists, despite its unsuited acoustic.

Classical music is the last thing one would expect to find behind the historic Village gate at (Le) Poisson Rouge. Don’t let the venue fool you; (Le) Poisson Rouge regularly plays host to a myriad of performers. Thursday night, it was the Takács Quartet.