Cleveland Classical

BlueWater & Verb Ballets collaborate — at a distance

by Daniel Hathaway

On Saturday, November 21, two Cleveland institutions will come together in a collaborative project without ever having been in the same room.

“Building Bridges Together” is a joint project between BlueWater Chamber Orchestra (Daniel Meyer, artistic director) and Verb Ballets (Margaret Carlson and Richard Dickinson, artistic directors). The program includes performances of Heinz Poll’s Adagio for Two Dancers, set to a famous piece attributed to Albinoni, and Michael Escovedo’s Broken Bridges, choreographed to Shostakovich’s Chamber Symphony. In between, BlueWater will play Anton Webern’s Langsamer Satz.

The program, pre-recorded at the Shore Cultural Center in Euclid, will debut at 7:30 pm on November 21 and remain available to ticket holders for 24 hours.

Speaking from his home in Pittsburgh, Daniel Meyer, who also conducts Pennsylvania’s Erie Philharmonic and Westmoreland Symphony, as well as Ohio’s summertime Lakeside Symphony, said that the idea of working with a dance company came to him when he was auditioning for the Lakeside job. “That happened to be the same weekend Verb was in residence at Lakeside, and I was deeply impressed,” he said. “If I got hired, I definitely wanted to continue the tradition of working with this group.” [Read on…]

Cleveland Classical Guitar Society
to present Raphaël Feuillâtre online

by Jarrett Hoffman

“I remember intensely the very end, which was so unexpected.”

It was March of this year, and guitarist Raphaël Feuillâtre had a week off in LA as he neared the end of what was supposed to be a 7-month, 50-city tour of the U.S. and Canada — a prize for winning the Guitar Foundation of America International Concert Artist Competition in 2018.

But the outbreak of the novel coronavirus in the U.S. was getting serious. In the end, the last fifteen dates of the tour were cancelled. Fortunately for us, Feuillâtre had already made his stop in Northeast Ohio — a visit to the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society’s International Series in October 2019 that marked his Cleveland debut.

All of that puts Feuillâtre’s return to the Guitar Society — a pre-recorded recital from his home in France which airs on YouTube on Saturday, November 21 at 7:30 pm — in a different perspective.

[Read on…]

Violinist Emily Cornelius on escaping the inescapable — performing in a pandemic

by Stephanie Manning

In such an unpredictable year for musicians, Emily Cornelius feels overwhelmingly grateful to continue performing for others. From a small, socially distanced concert with the Canton Symphony to a recent guest concertmaster appearance with the Eric Philharmonic, the violinist considers herself lucky to have been staying busy these past few months. “Like most musicians, my work is really the center of my life—it’s not just a job, it’s who I am,” she said in a recent Zoom interview.

“To get to continue doing that in some form is enormous.” With her time in Erie now behind her, she is focusing on her next performance, a live streamed recital on November 19th sponsored by the Local 4 Music Fund.

The three composers and their pieces on the program are all well-known, but familiarity was the goal. She and her collaborator, pianist Eric Charnofsky, chose works “that would be personally challenging and satisfying for us to play and hopefully a joy for the audience to hear.” [Read on…]

Crocus Hill Ghost Story
on Friday the 13th

by Mike Telin

Friday the 13th — the mere mention of this day conjures up fear for those suffering from triskaidekaphobia. Or perhaps that fear stems from seeing one or more of the twelve slasher films. And, we must not forget that Italian composer Gioachino Rossini died on that most unlucky day.

On Friday, November 13 at 7:00 pm, St. Paul-based Zeitgeist will present Crocus Hill Ghost Story, the first of three broadcasts as part of the “Here and There 2020” collaboration with Cleveland-based No Exit. Listeners can access the free, pre-recorded performance at No Exit’s website or Facebook page on the night of the concert.

During a recent telephone conversation, No Exit artistic director Timothy Beyer confessed that the date is a coincidence. He also noted that this year is different from the previous “Here and There” collaborations. “Since we can’t get together to perform, Friday will be only Zeitgeist. Later this month, we (No Exit) will perform alone, and in January we’ll do an online concert together.”

Crocus Hill Ghost Story is a tale about a house possessed. Inspired by the author’s experiences of living in a St. Paul mansion during the 1980s, the piece follows the relationship between two longtime friends, and how that relationship evolves as they find themselves in the midst of a haunting. The work features an original story by Cheri Johnson, music by Julie Johnson, sound design by Eric M.C. Gonzalez, and video by FIX Agency. Performers include Heather Barringer and Patti Cudd (percussion), Pat O’Keefe (woodwinds), Jill Dawe (piano), and Krisanne Weiss (narration) of Zeitgeist.

[Read on…]

Cleveland Orchestra:
Episode 3 of “In Focus”

by Mike Telin

“We have Severance Hall and we have Blossom Music Center, and Adella feels like our third home — a digital home for the 21st century,” Cleveland Orchestra chief brand officer Ross Binnie said during a recent telephone conversation.

On Thursday, November 12 at 7:00 pm, The Cleveland Orchestra will present “In Focus: Episode 3.” Recorded at Severance on the 22nd and 23rd of October under the direction of Franz Welser-Möst, the program features Haydn’s Piano Concerto in D with Emanuel Ax as soloist, and Bartók’s Divertimento for Strings. Click here to access the Orchestra’s Adella streaming platform (available on demand following the premiere), and here to purchase Adella premium.

Although behind-the-scenes discussions had centered around the creation of digital concerts for some time, Binnie noted that “like our ‘On a Personal Note’ podcasts, creating ‘In Focus’ was accelerated because of the pandemic.”

While acknowledging that they are not the only orchestra to offer their own digital platform, Binnie does see Cleveland’s as being a little different from the others. “We’re all trying to tell our stories, but I think ours is more focused on our music-making than our history, although there is a part of the site that’s devoted to archives.”

Ultimately, when audiences cannot attend in-person performances, Adella provides a way for the Orchestra to stay in touch with their donors, subscribers, and single-ticket buyers. “We typically play to 400,000 people in a year, and Adella helps us transport our story across the world. It helps us keep in touch: it’s great for our audiences in Miami, it’s great for our audiences in Europe and Asia — they can see what we’re doing the rest of the year, which I think is a tremendous asset.” [Read on…]

Music by J.S. Bach’s the choice for the second live stream performance by Vieaux & Davin

by Daniel Hathaway

Early in June, the Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival stepped into the in-person performance void with a live-streamed concert by Jason Vieaux and Colin Davin. Building on the success of that performance, festival director Armin Kelly has invited the two artists to broadcast another live concert on Saturday, November 14 at 2:00 pm. This time they will adapt solo violin and cello music by Johann Sebastian Bach for the classical guitar.

Davin will play the Cello Suite No. 6 in D, BWV 1012, and the Violin Partita No. 2 in d, BWV 1004. Vieaux has chosen the Violin Sonata No. 1 in g, BWV 1001, and the Cello Suite No. 1 in G, BWV 1007. You can join the event here for a donation of $10.

I caught up with Vieaux and Davin for a Zoom conversation on Monday afternoon and started by asking them how they had decided on an all-Bach program for next Saturday.

Davin: It was sort of our idea, but Armin Kelly was readily enthusiastic about it. We had talked about another program right after we finished the one in June, and I think I might have suggested all-Bach.

Vieaux: You did.

Davin: We thought that two suites each would make a nice program.

Vieaux: By June 6 we were already three months into this quasi-isolation, pandemic thing, and preparing a half hour of music and sharing a program with a great guitarist seemed like getting a whole concert together. I’ve been practicing three different Bach suites over the last two months trying to decide what to play, and that was just wonderful. It felt like being a musician again. [Read on…]

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