Skip to Content

The Arts Intel Report

Online from Los Angeles Sound/Stage

Sept 25, 2020 – Sept 20, 2021
111 S Grand Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90012, USA

“Listen less,” says Gustavo Dudamel. “Watch me more!” Filming music videos in a pandemic takes adjustments. In strict compliance with public-health protocols, the string players wear masks and observe six feet of social distance. For wind and brass players, who can’t mask up, the prescribed distance is twice that, with triple layers of Plexiglas between them. Happily there’s room to spare on the Bowl’s mammoth concert platform. Over the summer, the LA Phil has documented seven events there, all performed to the camera before an empty auditorium seating 17,500. The first episode of the resulting video series “Sound/Stage” goes live September 25, with further installments to follow in weeks ahead. Classic fare runs the gamut from Beethoven to Ravel and Gershwin and Ellington. Premiering October 9, “Power to the People!,” showcases Black voices, including the soul singer Andra Day with her now canonical anthem “Rise Up.” The following week, Day headlines a “Sound/Stage” episode of her own. —M.G.

Filming the concerts at Hollywood Bowl in early August. Photo: Natalie Suarez for Los Angeles Philharmonic.