Toy-piano advocate Phyllis Chen opens the new season of Barbès
Classical—a casual series produced by the Concert Artists Guild's New
Music/New Places initiative—on Sunday, September 12 at Barbès in Park Slope, Brooklyn, also celebrating the release of her new CD, Mesmers. (PhyllisChen.net)

The partisans of queer opera blog Parterre Box are running up a tally of exactly what's so great about the Metropolitan Opera's new CD and DVD box sets commemorating James Levine's 40th anniversary as music director. (Parterre Box)

Timothy Mangan, the smart, stylish classical-music critic of the Orange County Register, failed to offend any music directors, board members or superior editors, yet still got reassigned to the Lindsay Lohan rehab-watch desk. (Classical Life)

Never mind Andrea Bocelli at the Met—Houston Grand Opera has announced its first-ever presentation of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen, a co-production with Opera Australia, to be launched in 2014. (Houston Chronicle)

Gerard Schwarz is ending his long, often-distinguished and lately rocky tenure at the Seattle Symphony with a final season featuring 18 newly commissioned works by major American composers, including Augusta Read Thomas, Bernard Rands, Joseph Schwantner and Philip Glass. (Seattle Symphony)

Playlist:

Popol Vuh – In den Gärten Pharaos (SPV)

Keith Fullerton Whitman – Playthroughs (Kranky)

Robert Schumann – Symphonies Nos. 1-4; Overture, Scherzo and Finale – Staatskapelle Dresden/Wolfgang Sawallisch (EMI Classics)

King Crimson – Live in Chicago, IL, November 29, 1995 (DGM King Crimson Collectors Club)

Robert Schumann – Piano Works – Wilhelm Kempff (Deutsche Grammophon)

Matthew Herbert – Mahler Symphony X (Deutsche Grammophon)

Various artists – 14 Tracks: tracing Psyche-Dub (Boomkat download sampler)

Sarah Kirkland Snider – Penelope – Shara Worden, Signal/Brad Lubman (New Amsterdam)

Robyn – Body Talk Pt. 1 (Konichiwa)

Luke Abbott – Holkham Drones (Border Community)