ClevelandClassical.com Header
Ad

Cleveland Orchestra in Dvořák’s Stabat Mater: a conversation with bass soloist Eric Owens

by

by Mike Telin

OWENS-EricIn a promotional video, Cleveland Orchestra Music Director Franz Welser-Möst explains that Antonín Dvořák’s Stabat Mater is “the composer’s personal reflections after having just lost a child.” (Click here to watch the video: the Dvořák starts at 2:52.)

On Thursday, May 26 at 7:30 pm and Saturday, May 28 at 8:00 at Severance Hall, The Cleveland Orchestra and Cleveland Orchestra Chorus, under the direction of Welser-Möst, will conclude their 2015-2016 season with the Czech composer’s setting of an emotional medieval poem that sums up the thoughts of Mary standing at the foot of the cross when Jesus is crucified. The performances will feature vocal soloists Erin Wall, soprano, Jennifer Johnston, mezzo-soprano, Norbert Ernst, tenor, and Eric Owens, bass.

The Orchestra has extended a special $25 ticket offer for readers of ClevelandClassical.com for this week’s concerts. Purchase tickets here using promo code 26082. [Read more…]

Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival: catching up with baritone Edwin Crossley-Mercer

by

by Daniel Hathaway

Crossley-Mercer-RecitalBritish baritone Edwin Crossley-Mercer sang a brilliant recital in March of 2013 as an off-year event of the biennial Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival. He returns to Berea this week to give a recital with pianist Jason Paul Peterson on Tuesday, May 24 at 8:00 pm, and to coach some of the week-long Art Song Festival’s ten singer-pianist teams in master classes on Wednesday, May 25.

Crossley-Mercer was “discovered” by Art Song Festival artistic director George Vassos through YouTube videos. The baritone spoke with us three years ago for a pre-concert interview while preparing to sing the role of Don Giovanni in Dijon. We reached him by Skype at his home in France’s Auvergne region to catch up on his recent activities and talk about his Tuesday recital. [Read more…]

Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival: a conversation with Susan Graham

by

by Daniel Hathaway

GrahamOne of the most versatile mezzo-sopranos in the business, Susan Graham will visit the Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival for a recital with pianist Bradley Moore on Thursday evening, May 26 in Gamble Auditorium. The recital will interleave songs from Robert Schumann’s Frauenliebe und -leben with pieces by other composers ranging from Grieg, Strauss, and Tchaikovsky to Ravel, Poulenc, and Granados.

“It’s a fantastic program,” Graham said in a recent telephone conversation from San Francisco, where she was singing Berlioz’s La Mort de Cléopâtre with Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony. [Read more…]

Modern Snare Drum Competition moves from Atlanta to Cleveland

by

by Mike Telin

Sherwood-TomThere are competitions for everything, so why not one for snare drummers? When the Atlanta Symphony’s principal percussionist Tom Sherwood took a job with The Cleveland Orchestra, he brought his Modern Snare Drum Competition along with him.

The 2016 edition will get underway with preliminary rounds beginning at 9:00 am on Friday, May 27 in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music. On Saturday, May 28 beginning at 10:00 am, the competition will move to Gartner Auditorium at the Cleveland Museum of Art. The final round is scheduled to begin at 1:30 pm. All sessions are free and open to the public. [Read more…]

McCalmont’s List 1: Johann Strauss II — The Blue Danube (1867)

by

by Neil McCalmont

STRAUSS-IIGenre: Waltz
Scoring: Orchestra
Era: High Romantic
Duration: c. 10 minutes
Will you recognize it? You’ll probably start whistling along.
Recommended Recordings: the Vienna Philharmonic, either with Carlos Kleiber or Willi Boskovsky

Composer: Johann Strauss II (1825-1899): Strauss explicitly disobeyed his father’s orders never to be a musician. In fact, dear old dad unintentionally founded a dynasty of musicians, as all three of his sons went against his wishes and became composers. [Read more…]

McCalmont’s List: A compendium of classical music aimed at first-time listeners and the classical music curious

by

by Neil McCalmont

BerliozEditor’s Note: this week we’ll begin serializing Neil McCalmont’s fourteen-article series designed to introduce first-time or curious listeners to the classical music genre. The series continues through August. Enjoy and share!

Wherever you have heard classical music — on the radio, in a Bugs Bunny cartoon, or through the piano lessons you may or may not have suffered through as a child — it probably grabbed your attention. It may have been as simple as a pleasant melody or a catchy rhythm, or it may have conjured up an important memory. [Read more…]

Ryan Anthony “Cancer Blows” benefit at Severance

by

AnthonysInspired by their 2015 “Cancer Blows” benefit concert in conjunction with the Dallas Symphony, which raised nearly $1 million for research into the blood cancer multiple myeloma, trumpeter Ryan Anthony and his wife, Niki, are planning a benefit concert in Cleveland on Friday, May 20 at 7:00 pm in Severance Hall.

100% of the proceeds will go to the Ryan Anthony Foundation, which Ryan and Niki established in 2014 to support research into multiple myeloma.

[Read more…]

Romantics and Moderns: the Dover Quartet at the Cleveland Chamber Music Society (May 10)

by

by Nicholas Jones

Dover-QuartetThe Cleveland Chamber Music Society presented the Dover Quartet on Tuesday, May 10 in the final concert of its 2015-16 season at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights. The program ranged from the mid-19th century to the mid-20th century, unified by a Romantic palette that perfectly matched the expressive playing of this distinguished young ensemble. [Read more…]

BlueWater Chamber Orchestra at Plymouth Church (May 14)

by

by Robert Rollin

VOGEL-MarianLast Saturday evening, May 14, as its final subscription concert of the season, the BlueWater Chamber Orchestra presented a lively and interesting program at the beautiful Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights. Guest conductor Raphael Jiménez replaced artistic director Carlton R. Woods, who was indisposed. [Read more…]

Quire Cleveland: music historian Kerry McCarthy talks about “England’s Phoenix,” William Byrd

by

by Daniel Hathaway

McCarthy-KerryThis weekend, Ross W. Duffin will lead the professional singers of Quire Cleveland in two concerts celebrating the sacred music of English Renaissance composer William Byrd (1540-1623). The programs — on Saturday, May 21 at 7:30 pm in St. Bernard’s Church in Akron, and on Sunday, May 22 at 4:00 pm in Historic St. Peter’s Church in downtown Cleveland — will include a selection of Byrd’s English and Latin motets interspersed between movements of his Mass for Five Voices.

Byrd has always puzzled historians. Considered by many to be the greatest English composer of his era, he skillfully navigated the troubled religious currents of the time, remaining staunchly Roman Catholic during the several waves of the Protestant Reformation. Others lost their heads while Byrd survived — and thrived, first as organist of Lincoln Cathedral, then as a member of the Chapel Royal, where he enjoyed close connections with the Protestant courts of both Elizabeth I and James I while clandestinely writing Latin music for private households and chapels. [Read more…]

Follow ClevelandClassical.com

Contact us