Janos Starker, the Hungarian-born cellist synonymous with refinement as well as pedagogy, having taught thousands of cellists, died Sunday at his home in Bloomington, IN. He was 88 years old.

There's a new opera premiering this month called Steal a Pencil for Me. It's about a real-life Jewish couple from the Netherlands who survived the Holocaust.

There is a subset of orchestral composers who wrote gorgeous songs and had a clear understanding of the human voice, writes Fred Plotkin. One was Mahler. Another is Edvard Grieg.

When Apple launched its iTunes music store a decade ago amid the ashes of Napster, the music industry was anxious to see how the new music service would shake out.

Die Welt newspaper reports that Heinz Dieter Sense will become director of Bayreuth just as the Richard Wagner 200th anniversary year is picking up steam.

Harry Bicket, the British star of the early music movement, is to be the next chief conductor of Santa Fe Opera, starting in October.

Old school or new, singers approach Schubert’s “An die Musik” with a variety of nuances, tempos and inflections. Fred Plotkin considers eight different approaches, with video examples.

Before his appearance on the Operavore show this Saturday, we asked Harry Rose—aka Opera Teen—about his entry into the world of opera, where audiences are typically four times his age.

Sometime in 1958 – amid the launch of the first Sputnik satellite, the invention of the laser and the debut of the hula-hoop – arrived Everest Records. It returns this week.

An Academy Awards-like event debuts in London Monday. Whether the "Operas" eclipse some of the prestigious honors already out there for live performance remains to be seen. Here are five notable awards events.

After several stories of run-ins involving cellists and airlines this year, now comes a more harmonious tale.

Patrick Watson is both a trained opera singer and co-owner of Stinky Brooklyn, a cheese store in Carroll Gardens. His love of opera and cheese inspires Fred Plotkin to consider the two pursuits.

This January, WQXR launched the Operavore show, our weekly "radio magazine" on the world of opera. As we continue to fine-tune, we'd like to get your input.

Wearing running garb, Boston Symphony musicians paid tribute to the victims of the bombings during its concert Thursday night.

In the second of our two-part survey on new books for Operavores, we spotlight a book on the genesis of 15 great operas.

Twitter has launched a service that lets people find music they like and tweet songs from iTunes, Spotify and Rdio.

Yo-Yo Ma arrived in Boston Thursday morning to perform in a memorial service for the victims of the Boston Marathon bombing.

With springtime comes a bounty of new books for Operavores. In the first of two posts, we consider new books on urban history and a much-maligned composer’s modernity.

When the venerable orchestra brings Bruckner's Eighth to NYC, listeners will hear an ensemble completely comfortable with the composer's quirks and thrills.

The conviction of the pianist and composer Fazil Say for blasphemy over a series of Twitter messages has drawn outrage from human rights campaigners and many media outlets.