by Daniel Hathaway

Featured today: Noonday concerts in Cleveland and Youngstown, CIM’s Music for Food Benefit, one in a string of Oberlin faculty concerts to open a new semester, and replays of ChamberFest performances. Also, links to articles about a Grammy nomination controversy, the future of international orchestra tours, and the legacy of conductor Michael Gielen. And a nod to the birthday of Handel and the passing of Elgar.

Today’s events: Lunchtime concerts feature the CIM Guitar Studio at Trinity Cathedral and voice area students at Youngstown State. This evening, CIM students and faculty present a benefit concert for the Cleveland Kosher Food Pantry, and Oberlin faculty duo pianists Haewon Song and Robert Shannon play Schubert, Stravinsky, J.S. Bach, Saint-Saëns, and Liszt as part of a flood of recitals at the beginning of the spring semester. The evening ends with a retrospective of ChamberFest Cleveland performances on WCLV’s Cleveland Ovations. Details in our Concert Listings. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

Welcome to the federal holiday established in 1968 by Congress that wrapped Washington’s and Lincoln’s birthdays into Presidents Day.

Today’s events:

Two broadcasts (Erik Charnofsky’s Not Your Grandmother’s Classical Music, and Les Délices’ SalonEra Circa 1500) visit Presidents Day, Andrés Segovia, and the music world at the beginning of the 16th century. And a University of Akron percussion concert can be heard in-person or on the web. Go to our Concert Listings page for details.

Interesting Read:

The scene in Beethoven’s opera Fidelio when political prisoners are briefly let out of their dungeon into the sunlight and fresh air is one of the most moving moments in opera. New York’s Heartbeat Opera has updated the story. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

In this entry:

Weekend events:

Catch these final performances: Mahler & Ravel at Severance with Stéphane Denève, soprano Fatma Said and The Cleveland Orchestra, The Wedding March and Sunrise  from the Cleveland Silent Film Festival with the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, Handel’s Israel in Egypt from Apollo’s Fire, Six Micro Operas over two nights from BW and Cleveland Opera Theater, the re-emergence of Arts Renaissance Tremont with the Cavani Quartet and pianist Michelle Cann featuring music by Florence Price, plus Mexico City’s Cuarteto Latinoamericano (pictured) in Youngstown, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra with trumpeter Dasara Beta, Heights Chamber Orchestra, and jazz at the Fine Arts Association in Willoughby. Details in our Concert Listings.

Interesting Reads:

Critic Mark Swed considers the career of timpanist, percussionist and composer William Kraft, who died last week at the age of 98.

[Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

• Today’s events: the YSU flute studio, Duo Anime, Marginalized Composers at Oberlin, Classical Revolution Cleveland returns to the Happy Dog, CSU Composition Students, Buster Keaton Silent Film Classic Steamboat Bill, Jr. with Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, and the world premiere of Matthew Recio’s new opera The Puppy Episode

• More about the Cooper Competition, and the premiere of a Holocaust opera eighty years later

• A new book about the life of a professional percussionist and businessman with sage career advice for young musicians

• The Almanac: more information about John Corigliano and Healey Willan. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY: Happy Valentine’s Day, that feast day in the early Christian calendar that originally celebrated two martyrs, but through mysterious processes like the medieval tradition of courtly love, has transmogrified into a festival celebrating human love and passion — and has become a boon for the greeting card, chocolate, and flower industry. Eric Charnofsky promises some Valentine’s Day surprises on today’s Not Your Grandmother’s Classical Music. Click here to listen to the WRUW internet feed.

Sweetest Day, a related celebration that casts a wider net and has probably become a boon for dentists, was established in 1922 in Cleveland. That’s when a dozen candy companies conspired “to make the day a little sweeter for some of the city’s most vulnerable people” by distributing some 20,000 boxes of candy “to newsboys, orphans, old folks, and the poor.” [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

TODAY’S EVENTS:

The noon hour on Wednesday will feature Shaker Heights High School Chamber Orchestra on the Trinity Cathedral Brownbag Series (both in person and online), and Youngstown State faculty pianist Cicilia Yudha at the Butler Institute of Art. This evening, Cleveland Orchestra double bassist Scott Dixon joins pianist Alicja Basinska for a CIM Faculty Recital of music by J.S. Bach and Serge Koussevitzky (himself a bass player), including orchestral excerpts by Mozart, Beethoven, and Britten, and back to Youngstown, the Dana Ensemble will play fourteen selections from the mythical Great American Songbook arranged by Dave Morgan and featuring guest vocalist Evelyn Wright and trumpeter James Suggs. [Read more…]