"And because she intimately knows those lyrics and the message they convey, she's able to anticipate and color phrases in an especially empathetic way".
It also rendered the excitable Morgan so out of control he yelled an off-color phrase to the crowd that the TBS microphones picked up live.
The accompanying instruments were deployed almost at random, changing colors phrase by phrase, or even in midphrase, and sometimes departing unpredictably from the solo line to make rather senseless harmonies.
"Of course, being Russian, I understand it very well and I can immediately, you know, color the phrase," she said.
Ms. Graham's account of Brahms's colorful "Zigeunerlieder" was an object lesson in what can be accomplished with changes of color and phrasing in repeated sections, and what an elevating effect thoughtful, fluid phrasing can have.
But where the composers wanted two- and three-way discussions, as in Fontana's Sonata Sestadecima (1641), the players adopted subtly distinct approaches to color and phrasing.
In the Clarinet Concerto (1996), the soloist, Thomas Martin, moved among widely placed instrumental groups, each eliciting a different kind of clarinet color and phrasing.
Olga Borodina, in the title role, and Roberto Alagna give a searing account of the last act, with passion in every flicker of vocal color or phrasing.
Olga Borodina in the title role gives a searing account of the last act, with passion in every flicker of vocal color or phrasing; she is joined by Neil Shicoff as Don Jose.
With impeccable tuning, timing and precision of color and phrasing, the Sherry Quartet, four young players coached by the cellist Fred Sherry, shows the way through a labyrinth in which one essential melodic and harmonic idea is endlessly rediscovered in new forms.
