Berkshire Eagle reviewer Andrew Pincus connects with this year’s premiere of Nico Muhly’s newly commissioned work, Aston Magna, in a generous conversation with Dan Stepner. Writes Pincus:… “artistic director Daniel Stepner says the programming is intended to ‘highlight the forces that became the Enlightenment in the 18th century.’ Continuing the secularizing forces opened up by the Renaissance, the period was marked by advances in science and the humanities, he says, pointing to Galileo and Spinoza as exemplars. Music, he says, reflects this change and the turmoil that sometimes accompanied it. [Read more]