Also this issue:

Mirror, Mirror
The world is represented and subverted in “Staging Reality.”
-Robin Rice

Art

Astrid Bowlby: Leaves of Grass
-Susan Hagen

Step One
Run by students for students, Gallery One eases the transition to the real art world.
-Kristina Weise

Mostar/Sarajevo: Modernist Ruins
-Meredith Broussard

Kelly Link
-Helen Thompson

Jennifer Weiner
-Alex Richmond

Barbara Cook: Mostly Sondheim
-David Anthony Fox

September 26-October 2, 2002

artpicks

Cecilia Bartoli with Le Musiche Nove

In an era when hyped nonentities like Russell "The Voice" Watson rule the classical charts and hog public television time, thank heaven for Cecilia Bartoli: a young, vibrant singer whose CDs and live performances live up to (and sometimes even surpass) her superstar billing.

In her early 30s and a fun, live-wire presence onstage, Bartoli triumphs not only through the beauty and staggering agility of her mezzo (which can soar like a high soprano) but through her fierce commitment to verbal expression: You can take dictation from her Italian and French. Bartoli also has great taste in "sidemen": She tours and records with some of the finest early music ensembles in the world. Her Kimmel Center debut features a first-half of Baroque music (including Monteverdi and Vivaldi) playing off the group Le Musiche Nove and, after the intermission, French and Italian Romantic songs with piano (Bellini, Bizet), ending with Rossini's powerful cantata about Joan of Arc. With typical questing flair, Bartoli includes music by two fascinating women, the baroque maestra Barbara Strozzi and the great 19th-century diva Pauline Viardot-Garcia. Expect fireworks.

Cecilia Bartoli with Le Musiche Nove, Sun., Sept. 29, 2 p.m, Verizon Hall, Kimmel Center, Broad and Spruce sts., $25-$97, 215-893-1999, www.kimmelcenter.org.

—David Shengold