Bruce Hodges
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brucehodges.bsky.social
Bruce Hodges
@brucehodges.bsky.social
Writer | editor | more-than-decent cook. Where: The Strad (London), WRTI (Philadelphia). Music | architecture | art + design | photography | theater + film | journalism | science | climate change

Photo: Luis Barragán, Cuadra San Cristóbal, Mexico
Right now, live from the George and Joyce Wein Jazz & Heritage Center in New Orleans, the Shannon Powell Traditional Allstars

youtu.be/EH7d9pYeEBg
November 22, 2025 at 2:27 AM
Today is the 125th birthday of The Philadelphia Orchestra (@philorch.bsky.social). This 1961 Ormandy recording was my intro to classical music. It still rocks, but thank goodness for brass, winds, percussion, voices, and electronics.

Bonus: living in the @nezetseguin.bsky.social era

#PhilOrch125
November 16, 2025 at 5:38 PM
After the final bars of Szymanowski's Violin Concerto No. 1 with the Minnesota Orchestra (@minnesotaorchestra.org) and conductor Thomas Søndergård, soloist Benjamin Beilman transfixes with silence

One of the high points of a concert that began with Takemitsu and ended with Berlioz
November 15, 2025 at 4:33 AM
If you see this, post a byrd
November 15, 2025 at 12:28 AM
The Mowing-Devil (1678)
Woodcut

More on the image here:
publicdomainreview.org/collection/t...
November 12, 2025 at 10:52 PM
On Friday at 9 pm (ET), an enticing livestream from the Minnesota Orchestra (@minnesotaorchestra.org), with conductor Thomas Søndergård and violinist Benjamin Beilman

Takemitsu: Night Signal
Szymanowski: Violin Concerto No. 1
Berlioz: Symphonie fantastique

www.youtube.com/@minnorch/st...
November 12, 2025 at 6:30 PM
A year ago I saw Le Samouraï (1967) for the first time, in 4K on the big screen — what a movie. Stunning visuals and sound, and of course, with Delon impossibly cool

(📷: classiq.me/style-in-fil...)
November 8, 2025 at 4:40 PM
Yesterday's Philadelphia ballot was hardly marquee material — dozens of judges, many up for term renewals. But if the last 10 years have taught us anything, our system is built on more than the headliners.

Proud to affirm the work of those judges, and to be able to vote for them in the first place
November 5, 2025 at 3:59 PM
This week — again thanks to the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society — the Modigliani Quartet from Paris, in this excellent lineup:

Kurtág: Quartet, Op. 13, Microludes (Hommage à Mihály András)
Beethoven: Quartet in F Major, Op. 18, No. 1
Beethoven: Quartet in C Major, Op. 59, No. 3
November 3, 2025 at 1:37 PM
Juliano Mazzuchini (Brazilian, b. 1981)

Canto (2019)
Oil on canvas

julianomazzuchini.com
November 2, 2025 at 10:51 PM
It wouldn't be Halloween without Boris Karloff's guacamole recipe, including an ingredient not seen elsewhere. (No, not human blood.)

IIRC I first encountered this lovely shard of history via @bcdreyer.social, with continuing thanks
October 30, 2025 at 4:53 PM
Homemade black beans, andouille sausage, onions, peppers, carrots, celery, topped with sour cream and Crystal hot sauce, on basmati rice

A fave comfort food
October 26, 2025 at 12:01 AM
At age 14, I stumbled across this LP and bought it — partially for the Swingle Singers and the New York Philharmonic, but mostly for John Berg's striking cover art. "Sinfonia" totally altered my teenage brain, and ultimately was the rudder that steered me into contemporary music

#Berio100
October 24, 2025 at 12:22 PM
"The reward of roguery - or the roasted cook"
from
"The World Turned Upside Down," Chapbooks of the Eighteenth Century

Anonymous, 18th century
Woodcut

University of Toronto Libraries (via @pdimagearchive.bsky.social)
October 22, 2025 at 10:01 PM
From "Rosemary's Baby," a favorite moment: as Mia Farrow helps Ruth Gordon wash dishes, Farrow gazes back into the living room, where John Cassavetes and Sidney Blackmer are talking—with only a faint trail of smoke visible

Watch free on the invaluable Internet Archive:
archive.org/details/rose...?
October 21, 2025 at 12:00 AM
In their finale this afternoon, early music specialists The Sebastians — in sneakers! — blaze through Vivaldi's Sonata, Op. 1, No. 12, "La Folia." Earlier, soprano Lucy Fitz Gibbon was splendid in short works by Montéclair and Handel.

The concert will be up for 72 hours

youtu.be/FWoqKYzbcX0
October 19, 2025 at 8:58 PM
Shots from the finale of the Donaueschinger Festival, with the SWR Symphonieorchester on fire in Hanna Hartman's "Advanced Weather Information Processing System" for orchestra and electronics

Gorgeous

Hope they leave the link up for awhile, the whole concert is worth hearing: youtu.be/tUEYncik_go
October 19, 2025 at 5:17 PM
Watching the final Donaueschinger Festival concert, live in outstanding audio and video, with works by Mirela Ivičević, Naomi Pinnock, Laure M. Hiendl, and Hanna Hartman

A field day for the percussionists

SWR Experimentalstudio
SWR Symphonieorchester
Elena Schwarz, conductor

youtu.be/tUEYncik_go
October 19, 2025 at 4:06 PM
Something I drew in about 5 minutes last June, now in a semi-permanent place on my bathroom door, to be revived tomorrow

And because #EverythingIsMoreGlamorousInSpanish
October 18, 2025 at 2:22 AM
*mood*

Kple kple mask
Côte d'Ivoire, c. late 1800s

The Cleveland Museum of Art (via @pdimagearchive.bsky.social)
October 13, 2025 at 2:44 PM
Well, dang.

Diane Keaton (1946-2025)

📷: Inez and Vinoodh / trunkarchive for Elle
October 12, 2025 at 3:39 PM
Ismail al-Jazarī’ (1136-1206)

From "The Book of Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices" (1206)

(Staatsbibliothek, Berlin via @pdimagearchive.bsky.social)
October 12, 2025 at 3:30 PM
Charles Butler (British beekeeper, 1571-1647)

"Illustration concerning the arrangement of hives" from The Feminine Monarchie, or the History of Bees (1623)

(via @pdimagearchive.bsky.social)
October 7, 2025 at 2:55 PM
Welp, so much for downsizing. A friend gifted me this overwhelming, toaster-sized box of 120 early monaural recordings by Eugene Ormandy and The Philadelphia Orchestra — each with the delightful original artwork, and almost all never released on CD

Contents here:
www.discogs.com/release/1927...
October 4, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Ooh, coming in November, a new Adès recording on @pentatonemusic.bsky.social, and the first release from the Minnesota Orchestra (@minnesotaorchestra.org) with its new music director, Thomas Søndergård

The Exterminating Angel Symphony (2020), plus the Violin Concerto (2005) with Leila Josefowicz
September 29, 2025 at 8:05 PM