Thursday reads

The maestro is back, as the Boston Symphony Orchestra opens its season.

“They’ve taken my career away from me,” said Donald Rosenberg tells Daniel Wakin in today's story about the deposed critic.

Richard Armstrong takes over for Thomas Krens at the Guggenheim. CultureGrrl has a delicious sound-byte to share.

Yowza. Mark Feeney's review of Karsh is worth a close read. A taste: "He wasn't so much a photographer as a brand name. Karsh of Ottawa was a label on a conspicuously worn luxury good. Run down the checklist: shirt by Turnbull & Asser? shoes by Lobb? portrait by Karsh of Ottawa? They're badges of having made it - really, really made it. Presidents, popes, monarchs, movie stars, Nobel Prize winners, all eagerly sat for Karsh. Of course they did. He showed the famous - "the great of spirit," as he earnestly called them - the way they wanted to be shown."

BSO music director James Levine returned to the podium at Symphony Hall last night. (michael j. lutch)