Slate Magazine - Music Box

The music of the castrati.

Jan Swafford — Mon, 9 Nov 2009 13:28:41 EST

It's not the pyrotechnic pieces that are the most difficult, Cecilia Bartoli says. "The beautiful sad arias are the hardest to sing, because I am moved almost to tears. I know they were singing those arias out of their own sorrow." Bartoli is talking about her new recording, Sacrificium, which concerns the most exquisitely unsettling episode in the history of music: the castrati and the music written for them.

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Is it OK to like Chris Brown's new single featuring Lil Wayne?

Jonah Weiner — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:47:59 EST

If your stomach turns a little at the thought of ever hearing Chris Brown's voice again—or, for that matter, his name—get ready for one nauseous winter. The R&B singer, who pleaded guilty in June to beating his ex-girlfriend Rihanna during a February argument, is set to release his third album, Graffiti, in December. Last month, the lead single, "I Can Transform Ya," hit radio, and the follow-up, "Crawl," came out last week. There's something audacious about Brown's return, and not just because it took a scant three months for him to slide back into album-promo mode after entering his guilty plea. Brown has been exposed in the Rihanna saga, after all, as more than an abusive boyfriend. Promising affection and pleasure in his music but brutish and violent in real life, his love oil turned out to be snake oil: An R&B loverman best known for a domestic-violence conviction is an insupportable contradiction.

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Creed is totally underrated.

Jonah Weiner — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 09:30:24 EST

In 1997, an unknown Florida hard-rock group called Creed spent $6,000 to make its debut album, My Own Prison. Talk about a good investment: An independent label, Wind-Up, signed the group, got Sony to provide distribution, and Creed became, for four years or so, one of America's hugest bands. Its 1999 single, "Higher," topped the modern-rock chart for 17 straight weeks. "With Arms Wide Open," released the following year, reached the top of the pop charts, and won the Grammy for best rock song. Between 1997 and 2002, the band grossed more than $70 million touring. To date, it has sold 26 million records in the United States.

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Paramore's new album Brand New Eyes, reviewed.

Jonah Weiner — Tue, 6 Oct 2009 08:29:48 EST

Tennessee rock band Paramore released its third album, Brand New Eyes, last Tuesday, and if sales projections hold true, it will enter the charts in the No. 1 spot. Paramore, fronted by 20-year-old belter Hayley Williams, is often referred to as an emo band or a punk band, but those designations fall short. The group's songs are full of unresolved hurt and anger, but they're ultimately too galvanizing and upbeat to feel quite emo, too luxurious and windswept to feel quite punk.

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Miley Cyrus' "Party in the USA" is great, goofy, bipartisan fun.

Jonah Weiner — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 09:38:19 EST

At 16, Miley Cyrus is an actress, singer, memoirist, clothing designer, cancer-research advocate, highly ranked member of Forbes' "Superstar Earners Under 25" list, and the subject of a magazine-cover mini-scandal, twice over. Recently, she enjoyed a new career milestone when her song "Party in the USA"—released to promote not an album but a Wal-Mart-exclusive clothing line—became her highest-charting single ever, debuting at No. 2 on Billboard's Hot 100.

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