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Can a simple story, deliberately lacking in operatic gestures, make a good play? Thornton Wilder's 1938 Our Town certainly did. It was a subtle, laid-back, and whimsical account of small-town America, more of an archetypal abstraction than practical reality.

If posting the phrase "World Premiere" on a concert program seems to lend a certain aura to the proceedings, imagine how aurific a program must be that consists solely of premieres, three "world" and one "U.S." Such was the promise of the first concert of the Cabrillo Music Festival of Contemporary Music on Friday, whose music turned out to please listeners mightily, despite the varying q

In a concert Friday night at St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Palo Alto, the Music@Menlo festival featured the world-class artists for which it is known, playing music both familiar and strange.

The good ship Pinafore sailed into Walnut Creek Thursday, mooring at the Lesher Center. She was manned by the Lamplighters, arguably the best Gilbert and Sullivan crew in the world. H.M.S. Pinafore is a delightful spoof on the subjects of class, rank, and bureaucracy.

If thoughts of nonprofessional community choruses make you cringe, rest assured: The San Francisco Choral Society is something else.

Choral directors who tackle Gesualdo’s Tenebrae Responses do so at their own peril.

Mythological absurdities, deadly rivalries, and over-the-top emotion — topped by the 20-minute death throes of oversize sopranos — are familiar opera cliches.

This article is excerpted from the new book Why Classical Music Still Matters (University of California Press, 2007).

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Brahms’ Clarinet Quintet begins with a consummation. The solo instrument gleams forth over murmuring strings in a single harmonious tone. It melts into a lustrous shimmer, gleams anew, and shimmers again.

This article is excerpted from the new book Why Classical Music Still Matters (University of California Press, 2007).

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Brahms’ Clarinet Quintet begins with a consummation. The solo instrument gleams forth over murmuring strings in a single harmonious tone. It melts into a lustrous shimmer, gleams anew, and shimmers again.