by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Two of Cleveland’s distinguished pianists will be featured in events today. At noon, Antonio Pompa-Baldi will play in the Atrium of the Cleveland Museum of Art, and tonight at 7:30, faculty pianist Sergei Babyan will solo in Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with guest conductor Sarah Hicks and the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra in Mandel Hall at Severance Music Center. Also on the program, Boulanger’s D’un matin du printemps & Stravinsky’s The Firebird Suite (1919).

Also today at noon, organist Noah Duckwall will play works by Francisco Correa de Arauxo, Girolamo Frescobaldi, Matthias Weckmann, J.S.Bach & Dieterich Buxtehude at the Church of the Covenant. Click here for the live stream.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Cleveland Orchestra violinist Jessica Lee is leaving the ensemble to take up a position as full time chair of the violin department at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Read a press release here.

“Rhiannon Giddens, the genre-defying singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist who trained as an operatic soprano at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, will deliver the keynote address for Oberlin College and Conservatory’s Commencement ceremony honoring the Class of 2024 on Monday, May 27. She will also be awarded an Honorary Doctor of Music degree.” Read a press release here.

The Canton Symphony has announced the opening of part-time positions on its administrative staff for marketing & development assistant and personnel manager. Read more here. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

Many events to enjoy on Saturday —

The Canton Symphony and Canton Youth Symphony play side-by-side (3 pm, Umstattd Hall), leading up to Sunday’s presentation of the St. John Passion, the Baldwin Wallace Bach Festival presents works the Cantor of Leipzig composed in 1724, (7 pm in Gamble Auditorium), Brazilian guitarist Badi Assad performs for the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society (7:30 at the Maltz), violinist Steven Greenman solos with the Firelands Symphony and Chorus (7:30 at Sawmill Creek), Les Délices presents “Seasons Transformed” (7:30 at Disciples Center), and conductor Klaus Mäkelä and cellist Sol Gabetta join The Cleveland Orchestra and Chorus (8 pm at Severance — read our Plain Dealer review of Thursday’s concert here).

And more on Sunday —

Dirk Garner will lead the Baldwin Wallace Bach Festival forces (pictured) in J.S. Bach’s St. John Passion with Margaret Carpenter Haigh as the Evangelist & Tyler Duncan as Jesus (2 pm in Gamble Auditorium), pianist Evgeny Kissin & baritone Matthias Goerne collaborate in Schumann & Brahms (3 pm at Severance), Heights Arts presents “Close Encounters” with piano trios (3 pm at a Shaker Hts. villa), Music at Bath hosts world percussionist Dan Shiller (4 pm at Bath Church), Les Délices wraps up its “Seasons Transformed” series (4 pm at West Shore Church), Halida Dinova plays “Great Piano Miniatures” (4 pm at St. James, Lakewood), [CANCELLED] Kent State pianist Andrew Le plays a faculty recital (5 pm in Ludwig Recital Hall), and participants in CIM’s Advanced Piano Trio Program perform on the Music from the Western Reserve series (5 pm in Christ Church, Hudson). [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Friday’s calendar is loaded!

The Cleveland Orchestra plays an 11 am matinee with conductor Klaus Mäkelä and cello soloist Sol Gabetta, Lake View Cemetery honors Adella Prentiss Hughes with clarinet quintets at 6pm, the 92nd Baldwin Wallace Bach Festival begins with a concert by ACRONYM (pictured) at 7:30, the Cleveland Art Museum presents Aleksandra Vrebalov’s evening-length work Antennae, inspired by an icon in its collection, Les Délices takes its “Seasons Transformed” to Akron Civic Theater at 7:30, Oberlin Orchestra and Jazz Ensemble mix Shostakovich’s 9th Symphony with a concerto for Cello and Jazz Band at 7:30, and Cleveland Pops Orchestra brings Broadway to Severance Center at 8 pm. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Tonight at 7:30, during the first week of his two-week Cleveland Orchestra residency, 28-year-old Finnish conductor Klaus Mäkelä will lead a pair of iconic 20th-century British works: William Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast (with baritone Thomas Hampson and the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus) and Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto (with soloist Sol Gabetta) in a program to be repeated Friday at 11 and Saturday at 8.

You can preview the Walton here in a performance by the Leeds Festival Chorus with the BBC Symphony Chorus and Orchestra conducted by Andrew Davis. (At 23:31, baritone Sir Willard White dramatically announces the fateful writing on the wall of the Babylonian king’s banqueting hall and the chorus responds with its famous outcry).

Also at 7:30 tonight, Timothy Weiss will lead the Oberlin Contemporary Music Ensemble in George Crumb’s Black Angels, Jerry Achtermann’s It Sneaks Up On You (world premiere), and Christopher Theofanidis’ If Falling is a Leaf & Artemis (2023 revision) in Warner Concert Hall or via live stream..

TODAY’S ALMANAC:

Hang on tight – April 11 was a busy day in the annals of classical music. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

In a follow-up to Monday’s spectacular solar event, at noon today at the Church of the Covenant, organist Jonathan W. Moyer will present “Total Eclipse: Music inspired by the theme of light and darkness.” Click here for the live stream.

And tonight at 7:30, CIM Perspectives will host oboist Titus Underwood & pianist in Mixon Hall, and Cleveland Chamber Music Society will present tenor Matthew Polenzani & pianist Julius Drake (pictured) at Disciples Church.

INTERESTING READ:

New milestone in concert stats. The Violin Channel reports that “In January 2023, pianist Yuja Wang completed an unprecedented Rachmaninoff marathon — in which she played all four Rachmaninoff concerti, as well as the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, in a single performance. She was joined by The Philadelphia Orchestra and conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

Saturday’s agenda includes three orchestra concerts: the Akron Symphony (7:30 at E.J. Thomas with trumpet soloist Mary Elizabeth Bowden, pictured), Firelands Symphony & Chorale with the Heidelberg Concert Choir (7:30 at Trinity UCC in Tiffin), and The Cleveland Orchestra with guest conductor John Adams, organist James McVinnie & saxophonist Timothy McAllister (8 pm at Severance Center), as well as a Cleveland Uncommon Sound Project program by Binary Canary (8 pm at Convivium 33 Gallery).

On Sunday, CIM repeats its Pocket Full of Operas (3 pm in Mixon Hall), Euclid Symphony features Young Artists Competition winner, pianist Louis Wang (3 pm at Shore Cultural Center), the Suburban Symphony hosts duo-pianists Antonio Pompa-Baldi and Emanuela Friscioni (3:30 pm at the Maltz), Firelands Symphony repeats its Saturday program (4 pm at St. Mary’s, Sandusky), and Oberlin Conservatory anticipates Monday’s solar event with a world premiere and other works with an eclipse theme (7:30 in Warner Concert Hall).

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Under the headline “Chicago Symphony Picks You Know Who,” Musical America wrote on Friday, “In what may have been the worst-kept secret about the world’s youngest, most oversubscribed music director, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra announced 28-year-old Finnish conductor Klaus Mäkelä as successor to Riccardo Muti.”

[Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

The Cleveland Orchestra: Out of this World. Daniel Reith leads “a fun-filled concert of intergalactic proportions” (7:30 at Severance Center), CIM’s Pocket Full of Operas features four 15-minute chamber operas composed by CIM composition students, performed by CIM Opera Theater and New Music Ensemble (7:30 in Mixon Hall), and Raphael Jiménez conducts Oberlin Chamber Orchestra in Rossini, Nielsen — with clarinetist Juan Pedro Espinosa Monteros — & Ginastera.

PROGRAM UPDATE:

The Cleveland Orchestra announced on Thursday that pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet will replace Yuja Wang in its concerts on April 18, 19, and 20, to be led by guest conductor Klaus Mäkelä. Thibaudet will be featured in Gershwin’s Concerto in F. Milhaud’s Le Boeuf sur le toit will open the program. The second half, featuring Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, remains unchanged. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Tonight at 7:30, composer John Adams conducts The Cleveland Orchestra with organist James McVinnie and saxophonist Timothy McAllister in Gabriella Smith’s Breathing Forests, Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, and his own City Noir.

At the same hour at The Auricle in Canton, the Canton Symphony’s Divergent Sounds Series hosts Alla Bora, the band specializing in near-extinct Italian folk music, and in Warner Concert Hall, conductor Timothy Weiss, violinist Hannah Hurwitz, baritone Timothy LeFebvre, and the Oberlin Sinfonietta launch Oberlin Conservatory’s “Oclipse” series, anticipating next Monday’s solar event.

INTERESTING READ:

Van Magazine, the European weekly online journal simultaneously published in English and German, is taking Easter Week off, but offers reprints of some of its popular articles, including Benjamin Poore’s February 22 piece, “Inhabiting the Curve: How assistant conductors keep orchestras running.” [Read more…]