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Archives for June 2025

ChamberFest 2025: a conversation with composer/pianist Roman Rabinovich

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by Mike Telin

Ever since childhood, Roman Rabinovich has been driven by a desire to create — whether that was sculpting from dirt and found objects or improvising character pieces on the piano.

Although you may know him as an extraordinary pianist and ChamberFest Cleveland co-artistic director, you may not know him as an accomplished composer. That’s about to change.

On Thursday, June 26 at 7:30 pm in Mixon Hall, Rabinovich will make his ChamberFest debut as a composer/pianist with the U.S. premiere of his Cappriccio Errante for Violin and Piano. The program also includes Brahms’s Two Songs for Voice, Viola and Piano, John Adams’ Hallelujah Junction, and Felix Mendelssohn’s Piano Trio No. 1. Tickets are available online.

[Read more…]

Hao Yang and Helen Zhibing Huang celebrate Chinese culture at the Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival (June 5)

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by Stephanie Manning

The opportunity to hear rare repertoire is exciting enough. But hearing it performed so beautifully made the evening of June 5 truly special.

As part of the Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival, guitarist Hao Yang and soprano Helen Zhibing Huang presented a lovingly curated program that blended their Chinese heritage and Western musical training. At the centerpiece was a collection of songs set to Chinese poetry — providing a look into this gorgeous repertoire.

Both performers grew up in China before coming to study in the U.S., and each spoke about their personal connection to this program. “We’re so grateful we get to connect to our culture through this beautiful music,” Huang told the audience in the Cleveland Institute of Music’s Mixon Hall. [Read more…]

Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival: recitals by Alan Mearns, Laura Snowden & Petra Polácková (June 7 & 8)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Northern Ireland-born guitarist Alan Mearns, now based in North Carolina, gave the first of three very different recitals I heard at the Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival. He performed on Saturday afternoon, June 7 in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

Following the plan he described in an interview, his solo recital largely featured transcriptions and arrangements of works not originally intended for the guitar, a topic he addressed in a lecture conversation with Jonathan Leathwood the day before.

The gist of that session, Mearns said, was that arrangers are really re-composing pieces that should sound as native as possible on new instruments, but need not slavishly include every note of the original. [Read more…]

DIARY, Wednesday, June 18, 2025

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by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

2:00 pm – Ohio Light Opera presents Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel in Freedlander Theatre at the College of Wooster. Tickets available online.

7:30 pm – ChamberFest Cleveland presents “Mood Swings.” Eight festival artists perform Mozart’s Ganz kleine Nachtmusik and Richard Strauss’ Piano Quartet in C minor. Then, composer-vocalist-pianist Errollyn Wallen joins them to perform selections from The Errollyn Wallen Songbook. Mixon Hall, Cleveland Institute of Music.

NEWS BRIEFS:

R.I.P. Alfred Brendel

Barry Millington writes in a Guardian obituary for Alfred Brendel, who has died at the age of 94, that “the pianist’s art was characterised by a paradox. On the one hand lay an intellectual discipline, academic rigour and search for perfection; on the other a delight in the absurd. He once listed “laughing” as his favourite occupation and was fond of observing that “humour is the sublime in reverse.” [Read more…]

Judith Markovich’s Oh, my son… to receive world premiere at ChamberFest

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by Mike Telin

“When Frank Cohen called and said he had received an email from David Stern, I thought, oh my goodness,” composer Judith Markovich recalled during a Zoom conversation. “Frank told me that David had sent him a poem and it’s devastating. Frank said ‘Go to your email because you have to read it right now.’ And so I went to my computer and we read it — we were nearly in tears.”

On Friday, June 20 at 7:30 pm in Mixon Hall, ChamberFest Cleveland will present the world premiere of Judith Markovich’s Oh, my son… The program also includes Witold Lutosławski’s Variations on a Theme by Paganini, Bright Sheng’s Four Movements for Piano Trio, and Franz Schubert’s Cello Quintet in C major. Markovich will join pianist Eric Charnofsky for a pre-concert conversation beginning at 6:30 pm. Tickets are available online.

[Read more…]

DIARY, Tuesday, June 17, 2025

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by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

At 2:30 this afternoon, ChamberFest Cleveland hosts “Meet Composer Errollyn Wallen!, a family-friendly event that begins with a performance of Remember, Marimba by percussionist Tanner Tanyeri, followed at 3:00 by a conversation with Errollyn Wallen CBE & Sandra Morgan OBE (interim mayor of East Cleveland).

From 4 to 5:30, a hands-on percussion activity will be led by Gabriel Globus-Hoenich. The day ends at 6 pm with a concert of Wallen’s music, — including selections from the Errollyn Wallen Songbook. The event at East Cleveland Public Library is free.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Neighborhood Connections has approved $325,792 in grants to support 83 projects in Cleveland and East Cleveland. Cuyahoga Arts & Culture (CAC), the local public funder for arts and culture, will co-fund 24 of these resident-led arts and culture projects through a partnership with Neighborhood Connections. Read more here. [Read more…]

DIARY, Monday, June 16, 2025

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by Daniel Hathaway

TODAY’S ALMANAC:

On this date in 1986, French composer Maurice Duruflé (pictured) died in Paris. Appointed titular organist of St-Étienne-du-Mont in Paris in 1929 while he was still Louis Vierne’s assistant at the Cathedral of Notre-Dame, Duruflé held the post for the rest of his life, eventually sharing it with his wife, Marie-Madeleine.

A severe self-critic, Duruflé wrote only a few pieces which he kept revising, and only played some of them in public. Listen here to his own performance of the Prélude et Fugue sur le nom de Alain, which encodes the name of fellow composer Jehan Alain (Duruflé plays the Cavaillé-Coll organ of the Institut National des Jeunes Aveugles in 1953).

The most famous of Duruflé’s works is his 1947 Requiem, which reveals his lifelong commitment to Gregorian Chant. Watch a performance by Matthew Robertson and The Thirteen from 2018, recorded at the Church of the Epiphany in Washington, DC, with Jeremy Filsell at the organ. [Read more…]

DIARY, Weekend, Friday-Sunday, June 13-15, 2025

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by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

June has become summer festival month in Northeast Ohio, and our classical music listings this weekend are either part of ChamberFest Cleveland, the ENCORE Music & Ideas Festival, or the Ohio Light Opera summer season. Here’s what they’re offering, in alphabetical order:

ChamberFest Cleveland continues on Friday, June 13 with “Reflections” at 7:30 at the Church of the Saviour in Cleveland Heights), and two events on Saturday, June 14: “Rhythm & Clues,” a free, family-friendly concert by the Nate’s World Trio including a scavenger hunt (11 am at the Nature Center at Shaker Lakes), and “A Musical Feast” featuring a new work by Errollyn Wallen (pictured, 7:30 at Heights Theater in Cleveland Hts.)

Wallen returns to ChamberFest on Tuesday, June 17 for an afternoon-long series of free “Meet Composer Errollyn Wallen” events beginning with a 2:30 performance of her Remember, Marimba and ending with a 6 pm concert of her works, all at the East Cleveland Public Library. ChamberFest tickets are available online.

On Friday, June 13, ENCORE Music & Ideas Festival will present faculty and guest pianist Shuai Wang in “1, 2, 4, 8…Tango!” and on Saturday, June 14 will host Trio Seoul in “The Ringing of Cimbalom.” On Sunday, ENCORE will present “The Golden Waltz,” with guest pianist Kyu Yeon Kim at  the Maltz Performing Arts Center, Cleveland.) Tickets for all events available online.

On Saturday, June 14, Ohio Light Opera will raise the curtain on its 46th summer season at the College of Wooster with the first of fourteen performances of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Carousel. Five more shows will open this summer through August 3. (7:30 in Freedlander Theater, Wooster. Tickets available online.

For details of these and other classical events, visit the ClevelandClassical.com Concert Listings.

ANNOUNCEMENTS: [Read more…]

Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival: recitals by the Patterson-Sutton Duo & Jason Vieaux (June 6 & 7)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

The Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival just keeps getting better and better. For 2025, there are masterclasses, lectures, a youth competition, guitar-maker showcases, and several headliner recitals by guitar royalty — a heady blend, whether you’re a die-hard or a casual listener. The concerts were held in the Cleveland Institute of Music’s Mixon Hall, an acoustic and sensory jewel of a room to hear music in, especially the soft-spoken kind.

On Friday June 6, cellist Kimberly Patterson and guitarist Patrick Sutton — the Patterson-Sutton Duo — offered a varied and vivid program, moving easily from the folk-infused music of Wales to more contemporary sounds. Their taut and expressive playing balanced the program’s strands of tradition and invention.

Stephen Goss’s Welsh Folk Songs, a suite of six traditional melodies arranged for cello and guitar, opened the program. The work communicates the rich folk heritage of Wales and allowed both instrumentalists to evoke a world of fable and memory.

[Read more…]

June festivals get up to speed this week in Northeast Ohio

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by Daniel Hathaway

June has become the unofficial summer festivals month in Northeast Ohio, with ChamberFest Cleveland, the ENCORE Music & Ideas Festival, and the Ohio Light Opera summer season all beginning at once — and with more to come. Here’s what they’re offering just this week (in alphabetical order):

ChamberFest Cleveland continues its thirteenth season on Friday, June 13 with “Reflections.” Ten artists perform music by Arvo Pärt, Anton Arensky, and Camille Saint-Saëns (7:30 at the Church of the Saviour in Cleveland Heights).

ChamberFest offers two events on Saturday, June 14: “Rhythm & Clues,” a free, family-friendly concert by the Nate’s World Trio including a scavenger hunt (11:00 am in the Friends Pavilion at the Nature Center at Shaker Lakes), and “A Musical Feast” featuring a new work by Errollyn Wallen in a “chamber cabaret” performance from Nate’s World — the fertile imagination of bassist Nathan Farrington (7:30 at Heights Theater in Cleveland Heights). [Read more…]

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