DAVID GARRETT
7:30 p.m., Robinson Center Music Hall. $30-$90.
Let’s be nice. David Garrett is an amazing violinist. A prodigy defined, even. Born in Germany, he took to the instrument at the age of 5, studying at one of the country’s finest conservatories before heading to London’s Royal College of Music and, soon after, graduating from Juilliard, where he studied under Itzhak freaking Perlman. He’s one of the world’s fastest violinists, able to execute 13 notes in a single second. And, just to prove that gifts are never parceled out evenly, he has supermodel good looks, which must have come in handy when he worked as a supermodel.
Okay. Now, let’s be real. David Garrett is another cheese-ball metal classicist, cock-rocking in fog and strobe lights to shred AC/DC and Michael Jackson on a Stradivarius. His takes on Debussy and Bizet are fine, if not robotic, but the rock repertoire that looks like your junior high Napster library is why he’s here. And that gaudy rock shtick fills every inch in the spectrum between annoying and unlistenable. Slip this one in the “Who Asked for This?” file, right between the third “Big Momma’s House” movie and that “no headphones on pedestrians” bill that bombed last week in the legislature. That said, if you know a youngster who needs a little kick-start to get them into violin, this could be your ticket.