by Robert Rollin
Opera Western Reserve’s tradition of giving only one annual performance has always insured a substantial turnout. This year’s crowd was as large and enthusiastic as ever for Georges Bizet’s Carmen on Friday, November 11 at Youngstown’s Stambaugh Auditorium. [Read more…]
by Nicholas Jones
Cleveland-based Baroque violinist Julie Andrijeski, well-known to area audiences for her performances with Les Délices and Apollo’s Fire, premiered a new project on Saturday, November 12 in a lively concert at the Tregoning & Company gallery on West 78th Street. [Read more…]
by Nicholas Jones
I walked into the St. Lawrence String Quartet concert at Oberlin’s Finney Chapel on Friday, November 11 hoping for a respite from the tensions and anxieties of the week’s events, and I was not disappointed. With total conviction and attentiveness, the St. Lawrence played music that soothed the nerves and stimulated the heart. I was expecting beauty, focus, and artistry. But I was not prepared for a further impact: the powerful message of how the St. Lawrence plays. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
After singing its “Americana” program at First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights on October 22, the 30-voice Cleveland Chamber Choir moved to John Knox Presbyterian Church in North Olmsted for a second performance on Friday, October 28. Conductor Scott MacPherson curated his program of American choral music with the election season in mind. Not as a rah-rah patriotic exercise, but rather to explore the rich heritage of vocal traditions that have been practiced within these shores over the past two-and-a-half centuries. [Read more…]
by Mike Telin
Like youth in all its exuberance, fountains make a powerful ascent until the water reaches its highest point. Then, like growing old, it begins to fall back down into the pool. In his new work, composer Roger Briggs uses this metaphor as the inspiration for his eighteen-minute tone poem. On Friday, November 18 at 8:00 pm at Severance Hall, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra (COYO) under the direction of Brett Mitchell will present the world premiere of Briggs’ Fountain of Youth, commissioned by COYO. The program will also include Bruckner’s Symphony No. 4 (“Romantic”).
In the last of three feature articles, we speak with two orchestra members: violinist Daniel Fields and cellist James Hettinga. Click here to read an interview with conductor Brett Mitchell, and here to read an interview with composer Roger Briggs. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
A sizeable crowd turned out to hear VOCES8 at Mary Queen of Peace Church in Old Brooklyn on Sunday afternoon, October 30. The splendid British double quartet rewarded them with a program that could hardly have been more wide-ranging: Purcell and Byrd at one end, and Nat King Cole, Simon & Garfunkel, and Harold Arlen at the other, with Mendelssohn, Palestrina, and folksong arrangements in between — all sung from memory. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
November became Northeast Ohio’s unofficial Opera Month as a number of institutions unveiled productions during the first two weeks. Particularly dense was the weekend of November 4-6, when Opera Circle Cleveland, Kent State Opera, and Baldwin Wallace Opera Theater — in cooperation with Cleveland Opera Theater — all brought titles to the stage. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
French conductor Stéphane Denève and Canadian violinist James Ehnes proposed a multi-course repast of the music of Sergei Prokofiev for Cleveland Orchestra audiences the weekend of October 27-29. Happily, that Russian composer’s music enjoys enough inner variety and contrast to make a well-balanced menu, especially when served up with equal measures of brilliance and nuance. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
The CIM faculty recital on October 26 in Mixon Hall featured members of Ars Futura and guests in a program of music by Pierre Boulez and others, all related in some way to the career of the late, great French composer and conductor. The performance was the fourth of five concerts created by CIM composition head Keith Fitch to celebrate “The Boulez Legacy,” and the second to explore “Boulez the Modernist.” [Read more…]
by Tom Wachunas
On the evening of October 29, while the Cleveland Indians were playing the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field in game four of the World Series, the Canton Symphony Orchestra wasted no time setting a festive mood right here in Umstattd Hall. From the rear of the house, all the CSO members — many wearing Indians caps or jerseys — strutted happily down the aisles and up on to the stage, all to boisterous cheers from the audience. Then Gerhardt Zimmermann led orchestra and audience in a stirring sing-along of Take Me Out to the Ball Game. [Read more…]