Menotti and Barber
This article evolved in an odd way with many switches in my own point of view. It all began with a New York Times article in the Arts and Leisure section by John Adams lamenting the fact that neither of [...]
The MGM Musical
When I sat down to write this piece I had in mind "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers," "An American in Paris," and "Singing in the Rain" as the epitome and essence of an MGM musical. All a combination of magnificent [...]
Pushkin and Eggs
The Brooklyn Record About twenty-five years ago when I became interested in Russian Opera, I took out of the library a Modern Library Giant of all the works of Pushkin. Alas, Modern Library regular and Giant are out of print, [...]
Schubert’s Operas
This is the 200th anniversary of Schubert's birth. The major record magazines are pulling out all the stops, or maybe I should say almost all the stops. BBC "Music Magazine" for March 1997 has "Schubert at 200" with seven essays about [...]
Cadillac Zarzuela
When I was a kid, upper middle class people drove Buicks and rich people drove Cadillacs. Thus giving rise to expressions such as this is the Cadillac of toothbrushes or vacuum cleaners, or whatever. Then, of course there was Elvis's [...]
La Traviata
I have been at these articles for over two years and suddenly I realized we've never had Verdi. So, we'll set out to partially rectify the situation, In number of productions I'm sure La Traviata leads all of his other [...]
Arias and Madrigals of Giulio Caccini
One of the things I like to do on a Saturday afternoon is browse the Tower Records Bargain Annex. I'm looking for new composers (new to me) and new labels (new to me). Somewhere I'd always heard of Caccini, but [...]
El Cid
This column was inspired by watching the four-hour version of Anthony Mann's movie El Cid on television. I remember seeing the original in the theatre and that version was shorter. As a matter of fact, I remember liking the tighter [...]
The Great Waltz
The Great Waltz is a film I happened to catch on Channel 13 at 2 a.m. on a Sunday morning. It is a fun film which purports to be a biography of Johann Strauss II In it, young Strauss is [...]
The Million Dollar Quartet and The Million Gulden Quartet
If you go to 706 Union Avenue, Memphis, Tennessee, you will see Sun Studios. It is remodeled and modernized for state-of-the-art recordings, but the ghost of Elvis Presley still hovers over the place. On December 4, 1956, Elvis, who had [...]
The Man Who Wrote the Music for Psycho.
When Vera Miles (Lila Crane) goes into the cellar in search of Mrs. Bates I remember wanting to hide under m y seat! However, I had a date that was out of the question. Fear was created not just by [...]
From 1994 through 1999 Mr. Rubin wrote articles for several Brooklyn newspapers, including The Brooklyn Record and The Phoenix. His articles covered a wide variety of subjects including; Opera, Classical Music, Broadway, Musicals, Film and Popular Culture. Many of the articles began life at his favorite place to write, the Central Library at Grand Army Plaza.