Music

My first encounter with the Czech soprano Magdalena Kožená came about when I stumbled on a video of her singing Bach’s Cantata No. 199, performed in 2000. Over the years her pristine voice has darkened, leading to such lustrous recordings as “Love and Longing” (2012), with songs by Dvořák, Ravel and Mahler, but the shimmering quality is thrilling.

The Hotchkiss Concert Series will present the American Brass Quintet on Friday, Oct. 7, at 7 p.m. in Katherine M. Elfers Hall, Esther Eastman Music Center, at The Hotchkiss School in Lakeville. The program will feature works by Osvaldo Lacerda, Thomas Stoltzer, Kenneth Fuchs and Eric Ewazen. The concert is free and open to the public. The group features Kevin Cobb (trumpet); Louis Hanzlik (trumpet); Eric Reed (horn); Michael Powell (trombone); and John D. Rojak (bass trombone).

Last year, Jim Wright and a team of individuals and sponsors — including those behind the Wassaic Project and The Lantern restaurant and bar in Wassaic, N.Y. — put together the first Oldtone Roots Music Festival.
The festival is devoted to the preservation and performance of traditional American string band music.
This year, Wright’s at it again — but this time around, the festival will be a much bigger deal.

Two guys, a lifetime in opera, a love of the Berkshires and — presto! — we have our first regional opera in nearly 20 years. 
All right, so it takes doing the hard work of raising money, too, and finding enough talent to stock a staged production of “Madama Butterfly,” Puccini’s masterpiece. For Jonathon Loy and Brian Garman, co-founders of the Berkshire Opera Festival, that was not such a stretch.