Fanfare Contributor Bio
Barry Brenesal
I first began collecting classical recordings at the age of 11, and can still remember finding the textures of Schumann’s “Rhenish” Symphony too confusing and muddy. (I did, however, enjoy Jussi Björling singing “O paradiso.”) Some time later I began working in public radio management and production, staying at that for 17 years. I then became a freelance writer for various publications. Almost 50 years later, I find more to like in the “Rhenish,” and I still relish that aria with Björling, though my tastes have broadened a bit over the intervening period. I no longer play Irish folk music or try to push asthmatic breath through a soprano recorder in a vain attempt to perform Baroque sonatas. But I have been known occasionally to direct Gilbert and Sullivan revivals, and to write incidental music for plays.