by Daniel Hathaway
IN THIS EDITION:
. Britten at Trinity at noon, Apollo’s Fire and Trio Mediaeval in Lakewood and at CMA tonight
. Oberlin Orchestra concert available for replay
TODAYS EVENTS:
Today at Noon at Trinity Cathedral the high voices of the Cathedral Choir and harpist Jody Guinn will present Benjamin Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols. Freewill offering.
At 7:00 pm, Apollo’s Fire and Jeannette Sorrrell will continue their run of performances of Handel’s Messiah at Lakewood United Methodist Church. Sopranos Sonya Headlam and Erica Schuller, mezzo-sopranos Amanda Crider and Kim Leeds, tenor Steven Caldicott Wilson, and baritone Edward Vogel are the soloists. Tickets are available online.
At 7:30 pm in the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Gartner Auditorium, Trio Mediæval — Anna Maria Friman, Linn Andrea Fuglseth, and Jorunn Lovise Husan — an ensemble that has captivated audiences since the group was founded in Oslo, Norway, will perform its program titled Wolcome Yole, which features traditional Scandinavian Christmas songs and hymns, medieval English carols, and contemporary works written for the group. Tickets can be purchased here.
Last Friday, Oberlin Orchestra and Choirs played an exclusive concert for the United Nations General Assembly at Carnegie Hall! Now, that program, recorded live on Tuesday, November 29 in Finney Chapel, is being made available so the rest of you can hear it too. Tonight at 8:00 pm you can revisit that concert, which includes Adolphus Hailstork’s Fanfare on “Amazing Grace,” Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9. Soloists include pianist Byron Wei-Xin Zhou, soprano Sarah Tisba, mezzo-soprano Kathryn Leemhuis, tenor Kevin Ray, and baritone Marco Chingari.Watch the one-time only broadcast here.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
Today we celebrate two inaugurations and a premiere that took place on December 7 in classical music history.
On this date in 1842, the precursor of the New York Philharmonic played its first concert in the Apollo Rooms at 410 Broadway. The Philharmonic Society of New York opened the evening with “Beethoven’s Grand Symphony in c minor,” and in a typical mid-19th century format, went on to a scene from Weber’s Oberon, a Hummel Quintette, the Overture to Oberon, a duet from Rossini’s Armida, a scene from Fidelio, an “Aria Bravura” from Mozart’s Belmont and Constantia (aka The Abduction from the Seraglio), and a “New Overture in D” by Kalliwoda. View the printed program (pictured) here on the NY Phil’s comprehensive archives website.
And on another shore, on this date in 1898 the Paris Opera-Comique extended its long history by opening Salle Favart, its third theater (Building No. 2 had been destroyed in a fire on May 25, 1887 that killed 84 of its patrons.) As time went on, the distinctions between serious and comic opera in Paris eroded, and the Opera-Comique was responsible for producing such titles as Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande in 1902, and Ravel’s L’heure espagnole in 1911.
Speaking of premieres, on this date in 1939, Artur Rodzinski led the first performance of William Walton’s Violin Concerto with Jascha Heifetz and the Cleveland Orchestra. Listen here to a later, live performance conducted by George Szell in 1968 with Zino Francescatti as soloist.