Torsten

A sequel to 2014's Torsten the Bareback Saint, this 2016 release continues the collaboration between Erasure vocalist Andy Bell and theatrical writers Barney Ashton-Bullock and Christopher Frost and revives their Torsten character, who is described completely in the opening "Statement of Intent." "Used to be someone doesn't mean that I'm a has-been" it goes, but this thoroughly modern Millie also proudly crows "I'm gonna do it all before I go to seed." Later titles "Blow Jobs for Cocaine" and "The Slums We Loved" prove that Torsten's "do it all" is different than the everyday "do it all," but debauchery rarely comes framed in such artful flair, as Torsten joins Dr. Frank-N-Furter, Hedwig, and Quentin Crisp on the Mt. Rushmore of the queer and aggressively inquisitive…

Composed over wide time intervals, Hans Werner Henze's three Violin Concertos represent key stages of his development, and mark his early efforts in twelve-tone composition, his mature phase of experimental political theater, and his late, emotionally charged programmatic style. The Concerto No. 1 (1948) is similar in some respects to Alban Berg's Violin Concerto, particularly in Henze's blending of the row with tonal features; yet in its comparative leanness and transparency, this piece is less like Berg than the complex Concerto No. 3 (1997), which, in its intense evocation of Thomas Mann's Doktor Faustus, shares much more of the passionate and disturbing colors and textures of Wozzeck or Lulu.