by Robert Rollin
Last Saturday evening, May 14, as its final subscription concert of the season, the BlueWater Chamber Orchestra presented a lively and interesting program at the beautiful Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights. Guest conductor Raphael Jiménez replaced artistic director Carlton R. Woods, who was indisposed. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
This weekend, Ross W. Duffin will lead the professional singers of Quire Cleveland in two concerts celebrating the sacred music of English Renaissance composer William Byrd (1540-1623). The programs — on Saturday, May 21 at 7:30 pm in St. Bernard’s Church in Akron, and on Sunday, May 22 at 4:00 pm in Historic St. Peter’s Church in downtown Cleveland — will include a selection of Byrd’s English and Latin motets interspersed between movements of his Mass for Five Voices.
Byrd has always puzzled historians. Considered by many to be the greatest English composer of his era, he skillfully navigated the troubled religious currents of the time, remaining staunchly Roman Catholic during the several waves of the Protestant Reformation. Others lost their heads while Byrd survived — and thrived, first as organist of Lincoln Cathedral, then as a member of the Chapel Royal, where he enjoyed close connections with the Protestant courts of both Elizabeth I and James I while clandestinely writing Latin music for private households and chapels. [Read more…]
by Mike Telin
In a promotional video Cleveland Orchestra Music Director Franz Welser-Möst says that Slavic music has a specific language which is often on the dark side, while pointing out that there’s always an element of folk music in it as well. (Click on the screenshot to view the video.)
On Thursday, May 19 at 7:30 pm at Severance Hall, Franz Welser-Möst will lead The Cleveland Orchestra in the first of four concerts of a program featuring Antonín Dvořák’s The Wood Dove and Leoš Janáček’s Suite “From the House of the Dead.” The performances will also include Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5 (“Emperor”) with Rudolf Buchbinder as soloist. Check our Concert Listings page for additional days and times.
From the House of the Dead is Janáček’s last opera, with a libretto translated and adapted by the composer from the novel by Dostoyevsky. Welser-Möst says in the video that the opera, set in a Siberian prison camp, is “darker than almost any other opera,” although he points out that in the end, it celebrates the human spirit. [Read more…]
by Mike Telin
There will be an explosion of world-class chamber music when ChamberFest Cleveland kicks off its fifth season beginning on Wednesday, June 15. In their directors’ message, Diana and Franklin Cohen say, “With Season 5, ‘Tales & Legends,’ we are offering more concerts and special events at some very cool venues that will delight and surprise you at every turn…not to mention a spectacular cast of musicians, vocalists, actors, and composers like none to date. The pieces that comprise ‘Tales & Legends’ spin tales from the profane to the divine…and in at least one instance, the controversial. Hold onto your hats as ChamberFest Cleveland takes you on one fantastical ride!”
In the first of a series of articles highlighting this year’s ChamberFest activities, Franklin Cohen talks about some new additions to the Festival.
“I can’t believe this is our fifth season,” Franklin Cohen said during a recent conversation. “I’m very excited because we have a lot of great people returning this year and a number of first-timers, including the accordionist and composer Merima Ključo, who performed her Sarajevo Haggadah at the Cleveland Museum of Art last fall.” [Read more…]
by Staff
ClevelandClassical is pleased to announce that New Hampshire native Neil McCalmont has been named the 2016 ClevelandClassical.com Young Writer Fellow. The two-month summer fellowship is designed for aspiring writers who wish to hone their skills and prepare for careers on the new frontiers of musical journalism.
McCalmont is completing his second year at Oberlin where he is a double degree student majoring in Classics and Musical Studies with a focus on Greek and Latin literature and Wagnerian opera. “I am incredibly grateful for this opportunity,” he said. “As an aspiring music writer, I will gain great journalistic experience through this fellowship by writing reviews and previews, and conducting interviews with artists.” [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Music director Franz Welser-Möst returned to the Severance Hall podium on May 12 to lead the first of three end-of-season programs. The Thursday evening performance featured violinist Frank Peter Zimmermann in an exceptional performance of Béla Bartók’s Violin Concerto No. 2. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Carl Orff intended his immensely popular “Scenic Cantata” Carmina Burana to be a staged work with dancers rather than just a concert piece — the form in which we usually encounter it today. On Saturday, May 7 at E.J. Thomas Hall, the Akron Symphony and Chorus joined with David Shimotakahara’s GroundWorks Dance, Ballet Excel Ohio, the Dance Institute at the University of Akron, soprano Grace Kahl, tenor Timothy Culver, baritone Brian Keith Johnson, and the Cleveland Orchestra Children’s Choir in a performance that splendidly fulfilled the composer’s original vision. [Read more…]
by Timothy Robson
When the young man at the admissions desk offered me earplugs for experimental electronic musician Otomo Yoshihide’s appearance at Transformer Station on Monday evening, May 9, I knew that this was not your run-of-the-mill concert. [Read more…]
by Mike Telin
In an interview with ClevelandClassical.com, composer and pianist Gregg Kallor said that when choosing a poem to set to music, it’s not enough for him to simply be moved by the text, the poem also needs to have a musical quality to it. On April 21, at E. J. Thomas Hall, Gregg Kallor and the excellent mezzo-soprano Adriana Zabala performed an enthralling program of Kallor’s settings of poetry that touched on a range of emotions as well as being musically captivating. Presented by Tuesday Musical, the concert was given in honor of National Poetry Month. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
The Cleveland Orchestra packed a full dose of excitement into 75 minutes on May 6 with its final Fridays@7 concert of the season. Led by Houston Symphony music director Andrés Orozco-Estrada and further animated by the dark piano pyrotechnics of Kirill Gerstein, music by Rachmaninoff and Stravinsky left different lasting impressions on the ear. [Read more…]