Cleveland Classical

DIARY: Monday, May 23, 2022

by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. Today’s events: Eric Charnofsky on WRUW, a duo cello recital at Harkness Chapel and Cleveland Art Song Festival gets underway

. In the News: a new opera at Spoleto USA and great reviews at home for The Cleveland Orchestra in the NY Times

. The Almanac: birthdays of Agustín Barrios Mangoré, Edmund Rubbra, Alicia de Larrocha, and Robert Moog.

TODAY’S EVENTS

From 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm today, tune in the radio broadcast of Not Your Grandmother’s Classical Music from WRUW at Case Western Reserve University with host Eric Charnofsky. His playlist includes works by New Zealand composer Douglas Lilburn, Ottorino Respighi, Georges Auric, John Corigliano, and Swedish Festival Music by August Söderman. Click here to listen to the internet feed. [Read More…]

Art Song Festival rises again
from May 23-28 at CIM

by Daniel Hathaway

It’s been rough going for Art Song Festival for the past two years. Founder George Vassos passed away after a long teaching and entrepreneurial career in February of 2020, and although detailed plans were in place to hold the festival that year, concerns about the well-documented spread of COVID via aerosols among singers dictated a postponement.

“It feels like such a gift that the Art Song Festival is actually happening,” director Dean Southern said in a recent phone conversation. “It’s also time for reflection, and I find myself getting to a really reflective place.

“More than two years ago, George, Tamara Wilson, and Warren Jones were planning the 2020 Festival, The Cleveland Orchestra was going to do Otello, and we worked it out so that Tamara could do both, then that all got canceled. We postponed to 2021, when it all got canceled again. So it feels quite amazing that it’s all going to come back this year. For me, spring and Art Song Festival just go together.” [Read on…]

Soprano Tamara Wilson to open Cleveland Art Song Festival

by Mike Telin

The last time Tamara Wilson was in town, she was here to perform the title role of Richard Strauss’ Ariadne auf Naxos with The Cleveland Orchestra. Next week the critically acclaimed soprano will open the Cleveland Art Song Festival with a recital on Monday, May 23 at 8:00 pm in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

Assisted by pianist Warren Jones, the program, titled “Enchantment,” includes works by Debussy, Severac, Chausson, Han, Handel, Strauss, and Grieg, along with the world premiere of Evan Snyder’s Tiffandra’s Spellbook. Tickets are available online.

In addition to Monday’s recital, Wilson will present master classes on Friday, May 27 at 10:30 am and 3:00 pm in Mixon Hall. And you can also catch her down the street at Severance Music Center where she will be singing the role of Desdemona in The Cleveland Orchestra’s concert performances of Verdi’s Otello on May 21, 26, and 29.

Like many, the long absence of live performances due to the coronavirus caused Wilson to re-examine things, one of which was a program she had created for a performance that was postponed.

“I was looking at it and I thought, you know what, I don’t want to sing these songs anymore,” Wilson said during a recent telephone conversation. “So I talked to Warren and said, can we just build a whole new program? And he said sure.” [Read on…]

Fourth time’s the charm: Blue Streak celebrates CIM

by Jarrett Hoffman

Any graph tracking cases of coronavirus is a looping one: up, down, up, down. So if the timing is just unlucky enough, the same program could potentially be postponed once, twice, thrice…

That hypothetical has been a reality for the Blue Streak Ensemble. The group aimed to celebrate the Cleveland Institute of Music’s centennial in 2020 with a set of three programs that would include, in part, music by composers connected to CIM. But new variants, new spikes, and rescheduled student recitals have meant cycling through one date after another.

So composer and Blue Streak director Margaret Brouwer had a proclamation to make during our recent conversation on Zoom. “We’re giving these concerts no matter what!” she said with a laugh. “Even if we have to stand in the street and play.”

[Read on…]

The Cleveland Orchestra: Honoring Black Composers

by Jarrett Hoffman

It was disappointing in January when The Cleveland Orchestra’s Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Concert had to be postponed due to a surge in COVID. But there’s good news, and it’s two-fold.

First, time has passed, and the rescheduled date is not far away: early next month. Second, the concert’s companion program, “Honoring Black Composers,” has found a new setting of its own, or rather three new settings. A very good thing, because the first date, an hour-long program on May 24 at Karamu House, has already sold out.

That still leaves you with two options. On Friday, May 27 at 6:30 pm and Saturday, May 28 at 7:00 pm, the program will move to Reinberger Chamber Hall at Severance, albeit in a slightly different form: a half-hour concert of music by Brian R. Nabors, Dolores White, George Walker, Melika Fitzhugh, H. Leslie Adams, and William Grant Still.

[Read on…]

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