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Preview: Jieming Tang to make orchestra debut with BlueWater Chamber Orchestra

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by Mike Telin

TANG-Jieming2“I’m very excited,” says 16 year old violinist Jieming Tang. “It’s my first time ever to play with an orchestra.” On Saturday, November 16 at 7:30 pm in Plymouth Church, BlueWater Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Carlton Woods presents a concert that features Jieming Tang in Beethoven’s Romanze No. 2. The program also includes Weber’s Concertino with clarinetist Amitai Vardi, along with works by Peter Maxwell Davies, John Corigliano and Felix Mendelssohn.

Jieming Tang was born in 1997 in Hefei, China and began his violin studies at age three. When he was eight, he began to study at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, and entered the Conservatory’s pre-college division the following year. In April 2010, Tang came to the United States to be part of the Junior Young Artist Program of the Cleveland Institute of Music.

Tang was asked by BlueWater to choose one of the two Beethoven Romanzes and he chose No. 2 because he has performed it several times before with piano. “I’m glad I picked this one because right now there are so many things going on. I can’t imagine if I would have had to learn a new piece.” [Read more…]

Preview: No Exit plans two concerts celebrating the life and work of Raymond Scott

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by Mike Telin

SCOTT-Raymond“Like most of us, as a kid I watched the Warner Brothers cartoons. Of course I didn’t know that was his music,” says No Exit new music ensemble artistic director, Timothy Beyer. “But when as a teenager I heard the proper jazz versions of these pieces I remember thinking, I’ve heard that before!” Whose music is Beyer speaking of? The one and only Raymond Scott. On Friday, November 15 at Spaces Gallery and Monday, November 18 in Drinko Hall at Cleveland State University, No Exit begins their fifth season with a celebration of the life and work of the great Raymond Scott.

The concerts feature new arrangements of some of Scott’s most recognizable works by Geoffrey Burleson (Powerhouse Passacaglia), Russ Gershon (Snake Woman & Song of India), Greg DʼAlessio (War Dance for Wooden Indians), Christopher Auerbach-Brown (The Man at the Typewriter) and Eric Gonzalez (Celebration On the Planet Mars). The concerts also feature new compositions inspired by Scott’s music by James Praznik (Turkey in Twilight)and Timothy Beyer (Egyptian Barn Dance Meditation).

Timothy Beyer says that “Scott was a truly brilliant guy whose genius couldnʼt be contained within a single medium. For instance, he was one of the early pioneers of electronic music — some of which will be featured on the program along with pieces inspired by his Quintette — and he developed many early devices for composing and creating electronic works. [Read more…]

Preview: Organist Nathan Laube to play at Stambaugh Auditorium on November 17

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by Daniel Hathaway

LAUBE-NathanChicago-born concert organist Nathan Laube will be the next featured recitalist on the Stambaugh Auditorium series in Youngstown on Sunday, November 17 at 4:00 pm. Laube will play music by Widor, Mendelssohn, Rossini and Liszt on the recently-restored E.M. Skinner organ, including two of his own arrangements.

Though his Youngstown program is tilted toward nineteenth century Romantic composers, Nathan Laube is omnivorous when it comes to the organ and the music written for that instrument — both of which vary widely from one country to another and across different eras and epochs of musical taste. We reached Laube in Shreveport, LA during a break in his practice time for a recital there last weekend to talk about what he’d been up to since we last heard him several years ago at the Organ Historical Society convention in Cleveland — and he’s been up to a lot.

“I’ve been in Europe for three years, first on a Fulbright to Toulouse in France, then to earn my master’s degree at the Music Hochschule in Stuttgart. I also served as artist-in-residence at the American Cathedral in Paris. During that time, I was lucky to have access to the finest collection of historical organs in the world!”

[Read more…]

Preview: CMA’s “Masters of the Fiddle” — a chat with Natalie MacMaster

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by Mike Telin

MacMaster-&-LeahyOn Friday, November 15 beginning at 7:30 pm in Gartner Auditorium the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Performing Arts Series presents Masters of the Fiddle: Natalie MacMaster and Donnell Leahy. The sold-out concert includes French Canadian, Celtic, Bluegrass and Cajun music in addition to original compositions by MacMaster and Leahy.

“Sold out, how exciting is that!” Natalie MacMaster exclaimed by telephone. MacMaster says that she always looks forward to being on stage with Donnell Leahy, who is also her husband. She is also quick to point out that they do travel as a family and yes, they do travel with their four children. So how does MacMaster juggle everything that comes with the life of a working mother who performs over 100 concerts dates a year? “I don’t really know the answer, but I do know that life is full and rich and exciting and difficult and wonderful. We’re really living and all the things you could hope for are happening for us, with the children, building a home and being able to play music. It’s fabulous.”

MacMaster says the show as always, is very energetic and upbeat. [Read more…]

Preview: Electronic pioneer Morton Subotnick to perform at MOCA on November 14

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by Mike Telin

SUBOTNICK-MortonWhen one thinks of trailblazers in electronic music, the name Morton Subotnick will be near, if not at the top of most people’s lists. On Thursday, November 14 beginning at 8:00 pm, MOCA presents Morton Subotnick in a concert titled From Silver Apples of the Moon to A Sky of Cloudless Sulphur IV: LUCY.

The concert is Subotnick’s only performance in the region and is presented in collaboration with the department of Technology in Music and Related Arts (TIMARA) of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.

Using synthesizers designed by Don Buchla, the music for this concert is both retrospective and forward-looking. “It’s a piece that looks back on two of his previous works which are quoted in the title,” says Chris Auerbach-Brown, Media Program Manager at MOCA. “It’s almost like a remix where he takes sounds from those pieces and rehashes them and comes up with something new.” Subotnick will use a new hybrid digital-Buchla “instrument” loaded with prepared samples from all previous works and new patches specifically created for the current season of performances. [Read more…]

Preview: Akron Baroque — conversations with oboe soloists Thomas Moore and Danna Sundet

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by Mike Telin

MOORE-&-SUNDET“Why was the oboe so popular during the baroque period? Probably because it was the wind instrument most closely associated with the human voice,” says oboist Thomas Moore. “And I think that composers and listeners were intrigued with the instrument’s unique lyrical tone quality.” “It does have a tone possessed by no other instrument,” adds oboist Danna Sundet.

On Thursday, November 14 beginning at 7:30 pm in Akron’s First Congregational Church, Guy Victor Bordo will lead Akron Baroque in a concert featuring Thomas Moore and Danna Sundet, in Vivaldi’s Concerto for Two Oboes in C, RV 534 and Albinoni’s Concerto for Two Oboes, Op.7, No. 11. The concert also includes works by Corelli, Locatelli and Marcello. (See our concert listing page for program details)

“I’m not a scholar, but the baroque composers were also the first to put the instrument into the opera orchestra,” Sundet adds. “It went from being an outdoor instrument like the shawm, to an indoor instrument.” [Read more…]

Review: Oberlin Opera Theater — Hansel und Gretel (November 6)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Oberlin-H&G-1Jonathon Field never fails to bring new insights into his opera productions, and Oberlin Opera Theater’s fall show, Humperdinck’s Hansel und Gretel is full of details that add to the delicious ambiguity of what many of us think of as a children’s opera. After all, it’s a fairy tale decked out with a wicked witch, a gingerbread house and guardian angels. But scratch the surface of this musical rendering of a Brothers Grimm story and disturbing topics come to light.

When we first meet Hansel (Marisa Novak) and Gretel (Alexis Aimé), they seem like normal adolescent siblings who are locked in a continuous squabble — until you notice that there’re a lot of physical blows being exchanged. That’s a stock element in all kinds of comedy from Punch and Judy shows to animated cartoons, but as the scene goes on and mother (Kayleigh Decker) and father (Daveed Buzaglo) come home, the level of physical violence begins to add up to a diagnosis: this is a dysfunctional family who are plagued by hunger, overshadowed by drunkenness and who take out their frustrations on each other with fists and brooms (their cottage industry has stockpiled plenty of weapons close at hand).

You can set that level of analysis aside if you like, but it keeps coming back. [Read more…]

Preview: Composer Mark Fell to present “ambisonic work” at the Transformer Station

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by Mike Telin

FELL-Mark“I became interested in electronic music around the age of thirteen,” recalls Sheffield (UK) based multidisciplinary artist Mark Fell. “At the time there was a movement in England called new romantics, which was kind of like synthpop with groups like the Human League and Soft Cell.”

On Wednesday, November 13 beginning at 7:30 pm, CMA Concerts at Transformer Station presents Mark Fell in what he calls an “ambisonic” work that uses thirty-two channels of analogue synthesis that goes from the border of silence to the other extreme. “It’s an immersive experience, but I’m struggling to think of a name for it,” he told us by telephone from EMPAC at Rensselaer in Troy, New York.

Fell, who is known for combining popular music styles with computer-based compositions — with a particular emphasis on algorithmic and mathematical systems — says he developed the concept for the piece this past summer in Stockholm. “The studio I was working in had these big analogue modular synthesizers and what I did was to record a lot of very basic tonal material from the static oscillators, lots of variations of this very simple thing. The piece that I am doing in Cleveland uses thirty-two of these oscillators.” [Read more…]

Review: Cleveland POPS Orchestra — “Ballroom with a Twist” (November 9)

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by Guytano Parks

TOPILOW-red-clarinetSeverance Hall sizzled on Saturday night as fifteen stellar performers from TV’s Dancing with the Stars, So You Think You Can Dance and American Idol took to the stage in Ballroom with a Twist. This razzle-dazzle production presented by Scott Stander with choreography by Louis van Amstel and Patricia Kaniowski as dance captain, music editing by Will Hollis, costumes by Randall Designs and lighting by Michael White —opened the Cleveland POPS Orchestra’s 18th season under founding artistic director and conductor Carl Topilow’s baton on a spectacular note.

Topilow led his orchestra in a tantalizing taste of the music of Henry Mancini as an overture to the evening. Among the most prolific and celebrated of film composers, Mancini “grew up just a stone’s throw away in Little Italy,” as Topilow said from the stage in his brief comments after conducting a rousing The Great Waldo Pepper March. Flutist Mary Kay Robinson then made her way to the front of the stage to play a very cool, laid-back theme from the Pink Panther which was followed by the orchestra in a funky and energetic Baby Elephant Walk from Hatari.

The Days of Wine and Roses was seductively romantic with lush, legato string playing. Topilow said in his introduction, “you may hear it like you’ve never heard it before,” and demonstrated by playing his clarinet as the song repeated, up-tempo and jazzy. [Read more…]

CD Review: Gideon Whitehead, classical guitar — Russian Romance

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by Daniel Hathaway

WHITEHEAD-Russian-Romance-CDClassical guitarist and Cleveland Institute of Music alumnus Gideon Whitehead has produced his debut CD, Russian Romance, a project funded by a modest KickStarter campaign and apparently produced on a shoestring (the proposal included the purchase of recording equipment, another member of the Whitehead clan was the recording engineer and the album was recorded in a Michigan church). Though charmingly homegrown, Russian Romance sparkles with professionalism and introduces unusual repertoire that will be of interest both to guitarists and lovers of classical guitar music.

Whitehead wrote at the beginning of that project, “For me, it is much more than simply recording an album of music that I love to play — it is a means for me to introduce some really incredible music that has (as far as I can tell) been almost completely ignored by musicians outside of Russia. I know of only a few guitarists who are familiar with this repertoire and I know of absolutely no musicians outside of the guitar community who have ever heard of all but a couple of these composers.”

So right. Those composers include Andrei Sychra, Sergei Rudnev, Nikita Koshkin, Grigori Korchmar and S. Osipov, and they’re all names new to these ears. [Read more…]

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