by Jarrett Hoffman
HAPPENING TODAY:
Ignore the grinches of the world (including a certain editor of ClevelandClassical.com!) — it’s time to embrace music of the holidays, whether on the FM dial, or in concert via stream and onstage.
Les Délices kicks off December with “Noel, Noel,” available on Marquee TV beginning today through the end of the month. That virtual concert is a repeat from last year, when Timothy Robson described it in a review as “a highly enjoyable blend of English, French, and German carols, interspersed with Christmas-themed poetry from authors as diverse as Christina Rosetti and e.e. cummings.” Not to mention recent work by Northeast Ohio poets Dave Lucas, Diane Kendig, and Julie Warther, all read by Dee Perry. Read more about it in Mike Telin’s preview, and get tickets here.
This afternoon brings two more holiday-themed events. First, the noontime Trinity Brownbag “Jazzy Christmas” featuring carols performed by the Gateway Band with vocalist Jennifer Cochran (in person and streamed, freewill offering). And second, a 12:15 organ recital from Florence Mustric at Trinity Lutheran themed around “An American Christmas,” including music by Barber, Ginastera, and Virgil Fox (freewill offering).
In the hours after these events, it is encouraged — no, required — that you grate on the nerves of those around you with endless humming.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Sadly, one holiday event has been taken off the calendar. Tuesday Musical’s concert by The Rodney Marsalis Philadelphia Big Brass on Tuesday, December 7 has been canceled because of the artists’ health concerns.
If you purchased single tickets, refunds will be issued within a few days. If you’re a subscriber, you have the option of transferring tickets to another concert this season, donating the cost of tickets to Tuesday Musical, or receiving a refund. Indicate your choice by December 15 by emailing kjenkins@tuesdaymusical.org or calling 330-761-3460.
Subtraction on the calendar is balanced out by addition. The Cleveland Orchestra announced this morning that its free annual Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Concert will return on Sunday, January 16 at 7:00 pm at Mandel Concert Hall. (Pictured: the 2020 event in a photograph by Roger Mastroianni.)
Tickets are available beginning on Saturday, January 8 at 10:00 am. You can also tune in to an audio broadcast live on WCPN, WCLV, and ideastream. (The previously announced live video stream will be replaced with a re-broadcast of the 2018 concert, available January 17 through February 28.)
The concert, led by Vinay Parameswaran, will feature the Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Chorus under the direction of William Henry Caldwell, as well as soprano Jacqueline Echols. (Interested in joining the all-volunteer chorus? Register here by December 6.)
The program includes works by prominent Black composers such as Dolores White, Mary D. Watkins, Carlos Simon, Brian Raphael Nabors, William Grant Still, and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, as well as music in the African American spiritual tradition.
A free Community Day at Severance Music Center will be held the following day, Monday, January 17 from noon to 5:00 pm, featuring performances by musicians of The Cleveland Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra and Chorus, and a gospel ensemble. Feeling creative? Share a positive message or some artwork on the “I Have a Dream” wall, and take home a free coloring book.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
Sticking to the theme of equilibrium, we’ll touch on one entrance and one exit from the world — two performers for whom Brahms was or continues to be an important part of their career.
By the time German conductor (and composer) Max Fiedler died on this date in 1939, he had achieved a reputation as an important interpreter of Brahms — one critic went as far as to say he was “the greatest Brahms conductor of the present day.” The composer himself doesn’t seem to have complained much about his symphonies in the hands of Fiedler — which, coming from Brahms, is the equivalent of a kiss on the cheek.
As for Fiedler’s current legacy, he is praised by some for his flexibility of tempo, while others feel he goes overboard in individualizing his approach. Listen for yourself here to the first movement of Brahms’ Fourth Symphony in a 1930 recording by Fiedler and the Staatskapelle Berlin.
Austrian pianist Rudolf Buchbinder, born on this date in 1946 in Litoměřice, Czechoslovakia, is still with us. Fifth-prize winner at the 1966 Van Cliburn Competition (it’s interesting to read about what the winners that year have been up to in the years since), he is renowned for his interpretations of Beethoven, Mozart, and Brahms, including the complete concertos of those composers, and a vast discography in general.
Listen to an interview with the New York Philharmonic in which Buchbinder briefly describes studying a copy of the original manuscript of Brahms’ Second Piano Concerto. And hear him perform that work with Zubin Mehta and the Vienna Philharmonic at the Musikverein in a live recording from 2015.