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Super Mario... Orchestra?

Mario's Conductor Wig and Outfit, from Super Mario Odyssey
Nintendo America
Mario's Conductor Wig and Outfit, from Super Mario Odyssey

Hoo, boy. What a week. Give your brain a break from the news -- this link roundup is full of classical music stories that'll make you smile.

1. Take a sonic voyage to far-flung corners of the world: listen to lava running downhill in Hawaii; visit the forests of Madagascar; hear New York City like you've never heard it before.

2. What does it sound like to go skating on thin ice? We certainly didn't expect it to sound like lasers:

3. The first sentence of this article gets right to the point (and boy, we're glad it does): "For the first time in its history, the Metropolitan Opera is commissioning operas by women." And that's just the beginning of the changes that are in store.

4. Violinists break strings all the time in particularly passionate performances. But what about pianists? Alberto Chines played Stravinsky so hard he broke a piano key:

5. Afghanistan's Zohra ensemble, an orchestra named after a goddess of music and comprised entirely of women, is flourishing in the face of oppression. 

6. David Frost, music producer for the Metropolitan Opera, has an incredibly hard job -- one that, if he does it well, makes him invisible.

7. We have a new favorite singer, and she is 7 years old.

8. Maestro... Mario? Yep.

Kendall Todd is the Content Manager for GBH Music.