By Kevin McLaughlin
The Cleveland Chamber Music Society’s February 3 recital, presented by Hawaiian baritone Quinn Kelsey with pianist Craig Ketter, offered something both rare and reassuring: a major operatic singer heard up close, singing beautifully and without a lot of fuss.
They offered a program of early- and late-twentieth century American and English songs by Aaron Copland, Florence Price, John Alden Carpenter, Margaret Bonds, Gerald Finzi, and Ralph Vaughan Williams. From the opening notes of Copland’s “The Boatmen’s Dance,” Kelsey demonstrated a full, ringing voice that filled the room.
Asked at the post-concert talkback about her musical influences, composer Kamala Sankaram described an eclectic hodgepodge — Kaija Saariaho, Radiohead, and the Cameroonian electronic musician Francis Bebey, to name a few. “For the most part, things that I write sound very different from each other,” she said. “So it’s interesting that these two pieces sound kind of similar.”
Despite the frigid Wednesday weather dumping snow outside the Cleveland Museum of Art, January 14 almost felt like a pleasant spring day inside Gartner Auditorium. That phenomenon had nothing to do with temperature and everything to do with Trio Seoul, whose warm camaraderie and excellent musicianship brightened the venue considerably.