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Archives for May 2022

Thirty years with Apollo’s Fire: looking back — and forward — with Jeannette Sorrell

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by Daniel Hathaway

Cleveland’s Baroque Orchestra, Apollo’s Fire, will celebrate its 30th anniversary this weekend with three concerts: one in the 1930s splendor of Mandel Hall at Severance Music Center on Saturday, May 7 at 7:30 pm, flanked by programs in Akron and Bay Village on Friday and Sunday.

Founder Jeannette Sorrell will welcome soprano Sonya Headlam and violinist Francisco Fullana for music by Mozart — the Don Giovanni Overture, Exsultate, Jubilate, and the “Haffner” Symphony, No. 35 — nestled among two works by Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges: an aria from L’Amant anonyme and a violin concerto.

The venues symbolize the stature the period instrumental ensemble has attained in mainstream concert music, as well as its determination to bring performances out into the community. I reached Jeannette Sorrell for a Zoom conversation last week to gather her thoughts about the past three decades, and to muse about what lies ahead for an organization that started in a sheep barn on Cleveland’s East Side but now enjoys access to some of the world’s premiere performance spaces and summer festivals. (The sheep barn is still among them.) [Read more…]

BlueWater Chamber Orchestra: flutist Jessica Sindell plays Mozart

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by Mike Telin

Flutist Jessica Sindell has the distinction of being one of the few members of The Cleveland Orchestra who are native Clevelanders. A graduate of Western Reserve Academy, she was a member of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra from 2005 to 2007. Since 2018 Sindell has served as the Orchestra’s assistant principal flute, a position she calls “her dream job.”

In that position, she often finds herself playing the principal part on concertos featuring the week’s soloist. On Saturday, May 7 at 7:30 pm at Church of the Covenant, Sindell will move to the front of the stage when she performs Mozart’s Flute Concerto in D with BlueWater Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Daniel Meyer.

The program, “Taking Flight,” also includes Hilary Tann’s With the Heather and Small Birds and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 2. At 7:00 pm George Leggiero will play a prelude on the McGaffin Carillon. Pay what you wish. Click here to reserve tickets. [Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra: a conversation with violinist Moonhee Kim

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by Stephanie Manning

When Moonhee Kim’s violin teacher said he wanted her to learn the Prokofiev Violin Concerto, she was hoping he would say the second one. Of the composer’s two concerti for the instrument, No. 2 is more commonly performed, and it was the one Kim was most familiar with. But Concerto No. 1 was what he had in mind — and as it turns out, that was the perfect choice.

On Sunday, May 8 at Severance Music Center, Kim will perform Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 1 with the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra under the direction of Vinay Parameswaran. The 7:00 pm program will also feature Reena Esmail’s She Will Transform You, Mendelssohn’s Verleih uns Frieden, and Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances. Tickets are available online.

“I can’t imagine doing a different concerto for this performance, because it’s become one of my favorite pieces that I’ve ever played,” Kim said in a recent phone interview. “The more I talk about No. 1, the more I hear things like, ‘Oh, I heard that concerto for the first time the other day, and I fell in love with it immediately.’ Even though Prokofiev 2 is so much more accessible, I think there’s this appeal to the first one that really draws people in.”

[Read more…]

Theater + Music: The Cleveland Orchestra explores “The Chevalier”

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Concluding this season’s Family Concert Series, The Cleveland Orchestra will use both theater and music to shine a spotlight on the singular figure of Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges — composer, violinist, conductor, fencer, colonel, and abolitionist.

On Saturday, May 7 at 11:00 am at Mandel Hall, conductor Vinay Parameswaran and the Orchestra will be joined by guest violinist Brendon Elliott and four actors in a play-turned-concert-production titled “The Chevalier.” Written and directed by Bill Barclay, the show examines Bologne’s friendships with Mozart, Marie Antoinette, and Alexander Dumas, as well as his little-known contributions to the anti-slavery movement in France. Tickets are available here.

“Joseph Bologne is a tremendously important figure,” Parameswaran said during a recent telephone conversation, while also noting that the composer’s music is not particularly well known. “When people say that he was brilliant, that certainly comes through in these pieces that we’re playing.”

[Read more…]

DIARY: Wednesday, May 4, 2022

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. Trinity FranckFest, Gordon square postcards, Tuesday Musical on Wednesday: “genre bending transformations” from Nu Deco Ensemble

. Jeremy Denk webinar

. Precursors of the grand piano, the phonograph record, and the international orchestral tour

TODAY’S EVENTS:

Today at Noon, Trinity Cathedral begins its celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of “French composer” César Franck with two of his organ works played by Nicole Keller and Josh Kraybill, and his Violin Sonata performed by Andrew Sords and pianist Elizabeth DeMio. [Read more…]

DIARY: Tuesday, May 3, 2022

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by Jarrett Hoffman

IN THIS EDITION:

•Trumpet and organ at Church of the Covenant this afternoon, and Takács Quartet with a guest at the Cleveland Chamber Music Society tonight

•News: the Final Round / Winners Concert for the Tuesday Musical Scholarship Competition, and The Cleveland Orchestra’s MLK Celebration and Honoring Black Composers program

•Heinrich Biber, using the company card to jet off for a new job, so to speak

[Read more…]

DIARY: Monday, May 2, 2022

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. Kent State mega-concert at Severance tonight marks 1970 shootings

. May Day follow-ups: Magdalen Choir goes live again, lay clerks trounce choristers

. Almanac: Haydn’s Creation debuts in Vienna

TODAY’S FEATURED EVENT:

Tonight’s 7 pm performance at Severance by some 300 Kent State School of Music and University students will commemorate the tragic Kent State shootings of May 4, 1970 through “Stories of Peace, Protest, and Reflection.” [Read more…]

Kent State moves delayed May 1970 observance to Severance on May 2: 300 to appear onstage

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by Daniel Hathaway

May 4, 2020 marked the 50th anniversary of the tragic shooting of Kent State students by Ohio National Guard members during protests around the Vietnam War, but COVID-19 upstaged KSU’s plans for a memorial.

Two years later, the University will be ferrying more than 300 performers from Kent to Cleveland for an extraordinary event at Severance Music Center on Monday, May 2 at 7:00 pm.

Musicians, dancers, singers, and poetry readers will commemorate the events of that day in 1970 in a mammoth concert. According to a press release, Stories of Peace, Protest and Reflection “explores social justice, civil rights and the complex emotions felt before, during and after tragedy.”

Having read the press materials, I was eager to learn more about how this event was put together — a feat of human choreography and logistics that seemed comparable to staging a small version of D-Day. Happily, I was referred to an old colleague, clarinet professor Amitai Vardi, who was charged with coordinating the event. In a phone call, I asked him how it all came about. [Read more…]

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