Times Music

Daniel Cariaga, whose modest but deeply informed reviews and features appeared in the music pages of the Los Angeles Times for decades, has died. He was 71. Cariaga died Wednesday morning of heart failure at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center, according to his wife, mezzo-soprano Marvellee Cariaga. "Danny Cariaga was the quiet, careful and profoundly knowledgeable chronicler of Los Angeles' musical life for more than 40 years," Times music critic Mark Swed said Thursday.

The morning commute was like any other - almost. As cars flew by on the northbound 710, I hit "play" on my iPod and a melody swept over me. Rush hour melted away. "Ah-vey, ah-vey, veh-room corrrr-pooose," the choir began. The Latin words open "Ave Verum Corpus" (Hail true body), a choral composition that has captivated listeners for more than two centuries. I sang along, and I wasn't doing it alone. At that moment, two friends in New Jersey and Georgia were singing the words as well.

The Times music critics always manage to represent the extremes in self-indulgence and exaggerated elitism. BILL HAYES Lakewood

Some diversions invite comparison more readily than others. Take "The Sapphires," the most chipper film ever set in Vietnam. Already many have taken it, and liked it. If you enjoyed "Strictly Ballroom" or "The Commitments," which is to say if you fell for the slightly pushy charms of those show-business fables (one fantasy Australian, the other Irish, though directed by an Englishman), then chances are you'll go for this true-ish story of an Aborigine singing group entertaining the American troops, enemy fire be damned, in 1968 - like Bob Hope and Raquel Welch, New South Wales division.

Having seen the premiere of Igor Stravinsky's Requiem Canticles some 30 years ago, I can appreciate the excitement surrounding the premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen's new orchestral work ("An Ode to L.A.," Jan. 18). However, when Times music critic Mark Swed claims that "there is nothing to equal the meaningful experience of hearing a new piece of its time and place . . ." he confuses glamour with art. One might just as well say that there is nothing more meaningful about a presidency than attending the inauguration.

Times music critic Martin Bernheimer gave readers a perceptive and sensitive review of the commendable musical achievements of the Music Center Opera's new production of "Idomeneo" ("Meddling With Mozart," Sept. 27). The conductor, orchestra and singers gave elegant, virtuoso performances, just as Bernheimer reports. However, Bernheimer's editors did us a disservice by not also assigning a theater writer to review this magical new production designed by Maurice Sendak. Bernheimer really misses the mark in his lengthy (70% of his review)

The West Coast premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen's 2007 composition "Homunculus for String Quartet" was supposed to have happened Wednesday at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, at a concert performed by the Guarneri String Quartet and the Johannes String Quartet. But a death in the family forced Johannes Quartet violist Choon-Jin Chang to pull out of the performance. While another violist, Lesley Robertson of the St. Lawrence String Quartet, filled in for Chang that night, the Salonen composition was canceled -- and Salonen told Times music critic Mark Swed that he did not expect that a replacement violist could learn the piece in time for tonight's planned reprise of the performance at UCLA's Royce Hall.

TIMES music critic Mark Swed is frequently too hard on our local music scene. I've often wondered if he and I heard the same concert or opera. For instance, I loved "The Fantastic Mr. Fox," which he disliked. But, if anything, he was too kind to the music of "Nicholas and Alexandra" ("What Could Go Wrong?" Sept. 16). I think the music was not only boring and tedious but also bordered on being unsingable, devoid of any discernable melody. Why did Placido Domingo choose to put on this dog in the first place?

Times music critic Mark Swed shows scant regard for the musical tastes of Los Angeles' classical music lovers ("Debating the Philharmonic and Faith," May 30). Indeed, to prefer Beethoven and Brahms, or any of the great masters who have stood the test of time, to the music of Schnittke, Messiaen or Ligeti, is seen as a severe failing on our part. Once, at one of the usually splendid free Sunday afternoon concerts at the Bing Theater of the L.A. County Museum of Art, we sat dutifully, trying to find something musical in the dissonant sawing and scraping that was going on. For one piece, a bizarre water-bubble machine was employed, making incomprehensible sounds.

On June 1, Times music critic Martin Bernheimer reviewed the Music Center Opera's presentation of "Lucia di Lammermoor," calling it "a regular laff riot" and setting off a Counterpunch debate. The opera's director, Andrei Serban, adds his unexpected thoughts in an open letter to Bernheimer from Bucharest. Dear Mr. Bernheimer, Knowing from past experiences that answering back to a critic is as useless as pouring water from the empty into the void, after your "coup fatal" I thought you might be pleasantly, if not strangely, surprised to receive from me a fan letter.

Jason Aldean and Jamey Johnson are both country singers who were born in the mid-1970s. Both hail from the Deep South. And both men have new albums out on Tuesday, in each case the anticipated follow-up to a profile-boosting 2010 disc. But that's about the extent of what these two share: With "Night Train" and "Living for a Song," respectively, Aldean and Johnson are positioning themselves at opposite ends of the current country-music scene; their records reflect vastly different ideas about the meaning (and the usefulness)

Warner Bros.' decision to delay the release of "The Great Gatsby" from December to next summer will give director Baz Luhrmann more time to finish its extensive 3D effects and a planned all-star soundtrack, according to two people close to the picture not authorized to speak publicly. The costly adaptation of the classic F. Scott Fitzgerald novel was originally set to come out on Dec. 25. In a news release, studio executives said the move was made to give the film a higher-profile summer date.

The London Olympics won't get underway until this weekend, but numerous songs from these pop-heavy games have already been released. As part of its "Rock the Games" music program, the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games commissioned five songs. The first to appear was Muse's "Survival," and the last will be Dizzee Rascal's "Scream," which will be released midway through the games on Aug. 6. Here, we pit the official Olympic songs against one another and rank them the only way the Olympics know how: gold, silver and bronze.

Here are sample playlists put together from my own (admittedly limited) library, each one "arced" for a particular purpose. Then I asked a few folks who can really pick out a tune to share their sample lists. AMINA KHAN PICK-ME-UP: It's siesta time. I feel myself lapsing into food coma, eyelids drooping and motivation flagging. Flo Rida's sunny dance beats shake me awake, and LMFAO'sdriving base gets me going. Calvin Harris evens out the energy level, and Cypress Hill's vibrant melodies with Marc Anthony's soaring vocals send my spirits flying.

The Last Holiday: A Memoir Gil Scott-Heron Grove Press: 321 pp. $25 It's impossible to pass through Gil Scott-Heron's memoir "The Last Holiday" without "hearing" it in the musician's own voice - the pitch and cadence of his unmistakable burnished baritone; the declarative positions and improvisational digressions that wander deep into a thicket. Scott-Heron's death at 62 last spring unleashed a wave of global remembrances from all manner of self-described inheritors - politicians, poets, musicians, teachers, writers - who spoke not just of influence but inspiration: a paradigm for not just thinking but speaking out and taking action.

NOTE: This is a blog about two guys attempting to lose weight over a six-week period.  They kicked off their weight loss "strategies" on Jan. 10 . Temptations. Everyone wants to know about temptations. Do I freak out when I see someone eat a cheeseburger? How do I handle three pizzas being delivered to our part of the office? How do I deal with the L.A. food trucks lurking around every palm tree? Yes I want those things. Badly. January is almost over, and I haven't had anything from a fast-food window for most of the month, and last night I was more tempted than ever to eat bad things.

Face it: Classical music is a dead language. In the latest skirmish of the Thirty Ears War, music-lover Claire Rydell writes that composers "Milk a Dead-End Aesthetic" (Counterpunch, May 2), composer Burt Goldstein retorts with ad hominem tut-tutting ("New Music Merits Respect, Not Attack," May 16), Times Music and Dance Critic Martin Bernheimer scolds the troops for defecting ("Modern Progress Under Salonen's Green Umbrella," May 18), and UCLA Professor Paul Reale preaches that history will go on ("In Support of Well-Conceived Music--Old and New," May 23)

Why did someone who has visited Brazil and always been fascinated by its dynamic traditional culture walk out midway through a performance last weekend by the Viver Brasil Dance Company at the John Anson Ford Amphitheatre? Because the amplification of the company's live music proved so extreme and ruinous that it created an impenetrable screen, nullifying the dancing.

An urban peacock whose tribal look samples the preppies of Brentwood, the punks of North Hollywood, the skaters of Venice, the hippies of the canyons and the hip-hoppers of South-Central, Taz Arnold is one of the most stylish men of the moment. Maybe you've seen him staring out from the pages of indie magazines such as Trace or Index, singing "Ima Vote Obama Way" in his self-made fan video on YouTube, or sitting next to Kanye West at a fashion show. Arnold, a native of South L.A.

The West Coast premiere of Esa-Pekka Salonen's 2007 composition "Homunculus for String Quartet" was supposed to have happened Wednesday at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, at a concert performed by the Guarneri String Quartet and the Johannes String Quartet. But a death in the family forced Johannes Quartet violist Choon-Jin Chang to pull out of the performance. While another violist, Lesley Robertson of the St. Lawrence String Quartet, filled in for Chang that night, the Salonen composition was canceled -- and Salonen told Times music critic Mark Swed that he did not expect that a replacement violist could learn the piece in time for tonight's planned reprise of the performance at UCLA's Royce Hall.