by David Kulma
The Magalen in Slavic Village was full of the musically adventurous for the strangely fantastic second installment of the Re:Sound New Music Festival on Friday, June 8. [Read more…]
Archives for June 2018
Re:Sound New Music Festival opens with concert at Bop Stop (June 7)
by Timothy Robson
Cleveland Uncommon Sound Project is a new non-profit devoted to the creation and performance of new music. Their first annual Re:Sound New Music Festival opened on Thursday evening, June 7 at the Bop Stop, where a large, diverse crowd sat around tables and the bar to hear four equally diverse and alluring ensembles. [Read more…]
ChamberFest’s “A Free for All”: A conversation with bassist Nathan Farrington
by Delaney Meyers
ChamberFest’s Tuesday, June 19 concert, “A Free for All,” will take place in the Crawford Rotunda at The Cleveland History Center, which houses the restored Euclid Beach Park Grand Carousel. Bassist Nathan Farrington says it will feature “a spectrum of pieces,” offering everyone at least one thing they can “dip their toes into.”
The unconventional program will include music by virtuoso fiddler and composer Mark O’Connor, a diverse set of old folk songs played by Farrington and clarinetist Franklin Cohen, Dvořák’s folk-inspired Songs My Mother Taught Me with soprano Amanda Powell. In a phone conversation, Farrington said he is most looking forward to playing one of the lesser known pieces on the program: Krzysztof Penderecki’s Duo Concertante for violin and bass, written in 2010 and inspired by the composer’s long-term friendship with violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter.
[Read more…]
76 Trombones Head to CSU: 7th Annual Cleveland Trombone Seminar
by Alice Koeninger
From June 16-24, the Cleveland Trombone Seminar, spearheaded by Cleveland Orchestra assistant principal trombone Shachar Israel, will feature a series of performances by faculty and students in Drinko Hall at Cleveland State University. CTS is a week-long seminar for young trombonists designed to further their professional education. In addition to master classes, it presents clinics on form and performance anxiety and focuses on optimal progress through correct practice.
Guest instructors include Randall Hawes, bass trombone for the Detroit Symphony and professor at Northwestern University; Stephen Lange, second trombone for the Boston Symphony and New England Conservatory faculty; and Craig Knox, tubist for the Pittsburgh Symphony and faculty at Carnegie Mellon. Tickets can be purchased at the door for all concerts and recitals. Ticket pricing and parking info are available here. [Read more…]
ChamberFest Cleveland at CSU’s AHA! Festival (June 8)
by Delaney Meyers
Violinist David Bowlin, pianist Roman Rabinovich, and cellist Oliver Herbert left no heartstrings un-tugged in ChamberFest Cleveland’s debut performance at the AHA! Festival on Friday afternoon, June 8 in Drinko Hall at Cleveland State University. [Read more…]
CIPC Guest Recital by pianist Drew Petersen (June 4)
by David Kulma
The prize-winning young pianist Drew Petersen gave an excellent guest recital for an appreciative crowd in Mixon Hall on Monday night, June 4, as part of the Cleveland International Piano Competition for Young Artists. His chronologically organized program stretched from repertory mainstays by Beethoven and Chopin to two wonderful American works by Griffes and Barber. [Read more…]
Syndicate for the New Arts: a septet from Atlanta & a duo from Cleveland
by Jarrett Hoffman
Maybe in the future, a barcode will be slapped on every piece of music, and you’ll just whip out your handy scanning device to identify any and all genres at play. Until then, listeners will have to settle for being delightedly mystified by the sounds of Atlanta-based septet Faun and a Pan Flute and Cleveland-based Duo Decibel System. That double-bill will give a concert this Tuesday, June 19 at 8:00 pm at St. John’s Ohio City, presented by Syndicate for the New Arts.
Faun and a Pan Flute is a band of cello, alto saxophone, guitar, bass guitar, marimba, percussion, and tuba (Benjamin Shirley, Peter Webb, David Gray, Dan Bailey, Chris Childs, John Gregg, and Julian Hinshaw). They draw on rock, impressionistic jazz, and modern classical music, and over the years have ranged in size from four to twelve members.
Collectively they lead, and collectively they compose.
I recently spoke with John Gregg, the group’s friendly, laid-back percussionist, who had just been watering some of his herbs when he picked up the phone. [Read more…]
Opinion:The Cleveland Orchestra — Prometheus or Epimetheus?
by David Kulma
As noted in The Cleveland Orchestra’s program book for The Prometheus Project, the mythological Titan’s forgotten brother Epimetheus “spent much of his time thinking about yesterday, and last week, or looking at the history of a hundred years ago.”
The Orchestra ended its 100th season celebrating two revolutionaries: Prometheus and Ludwig van Beethoven. Music director Franz Welser-Möst’s goal for The Prometheus Project was to link the light-giving Titan to the powerful Enlightenment composer, and through them connect to “the idea of fighting for good.” This celebration of revolutions past is noble, but it also points out how the Cleveland institution appears more like his backward-looking sibling than Prometheus himself.
In a way, TCO’s festival of Beethoven symphonies and overtures makes all the sense in the world. [Read more…]
Tigue percussion ensemble at Bop Stop (June 3)
by David Kulma
In a concert that could have been titled “The Joy of Hitting Things,” Tigue — cheered on by family and friends — filled the Bop Stop with exuberance as the sun went down on Sunday, June 3. Ohio-born and educated together as undergraduates at Ohio State, Matt Evans, Amy Garapic, and Carson Moody are touring Strange Paradise, their new second album. [Read more…]
No Exit: a clarinet and five flutes at Appletree Books on June 15
by Jarrett Hoffman
Clarinetist Gunnar Owen Hirthe + flutist Hong-Da Chin = quite the duo.
Combining Chinese traditional music with contemporary repertoire, their upcoming concert — presented by No Exit on Friday, June 15 at 7:00 pm at Appletree Books — will include three duets (one of them by Hong-Da), six solo works, and six instruments (the two likely suspects, in addition to four Chinese flutes).
Let’s start with the bookends of the program. Giacinto Scelsi’s Ko-Lho and David Liptak’s Duo meld together the sounds of the clarinet and Western flute to fascinating effect, treating the instruments almost like conjoined twins.
Hearing an all-Scelsi program at Bowling Green State University is what first drew Hirthe to that composer. “I was really struck by how simple and powerful his music is,” the No Exit clarinetist, Flint Institute of Music faculty member, and BGSU doctoral candidate said during a recent telephone conversation. [Read more…]