Musical roundup from the New York Times

I read several interesting articles from the New York Times this morning as I checked my Google Reader account. All of these articles were published in April 2010, and I recommend them for your reading.

Several notable personalities died this month, as seen in the obituaries for critics Mike Zwerin (by Mark McDonald), Gene Lees (by Peter Keepnews), and Alan Rich (by Allan Kozinn); and Afro-Cuban singer Graciela Peréz-Gutierrez (by Ben Ratliff).

The eruption from Eyjafjallajökull volcano made the news for its disruption of airline travel earlier this month. Daniel Wakin reports on how this phenomenon affected several musical performance schedules in his article, "Europe's Cloud of Ash Casts Pall Over World of Music."

Musicologist Richard Taruskin wrote an interesting piece on the Russian-ness of Igor Stravinsky in response to the New York Philharmonic's festival, "The Russian Stravinsky."

Finally, Dave Itzkoff reported on conductor Leonard Slatkin's decision to withdraw from his scheduled performances of Verdi's La Traviata with the Metropolitan Opera.