By Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

At noon, organists Jonathan Moyer & Oziah Wales will play a Halloween program at the Church of the Covenant in University Circle. You can watch via livestream. For details, visit our Concert Listings.

Or enjoy a private, 3 hour and 52 minute concert of Halloween selections curated by the folks at Spotify.

INTERESTING READS:

About yesterday’s N.Y. Times review:

The online review of Apollo’s Singers’ performance of Handel’s Israel in Egypt with the New York Philharmonic under the baton of Jeannette Sorrell that we referenced in Monday’s Diary appeared in the paper’s print edition today. One small detail was still missing: any reference to Cleveland! [Read more…]

By Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

On Saturday at 5pm, the University of Michigan Men’s Glee Club, Mark Stover, director, will join the Brass Choir from Firestone Community Learning Center, Akron in a concert at St. Paul’s Lutheran in Massillon.

Sunday will feature four orchestra concerts. The Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra will don costumes for a “Halloween Spooktacular” at Severance Music Center at 2 pm (pictured), the same hour when more than 40 musicians of The Cleveland Orchestra and friends will begin playing A Day of Music for Israel at Temple Tifereth Israel (music continues until 8 pm).

At 3:30 pm, Domenico Boyagian will lead the Suburban Symphony in music from the British Isles at Beechwood High School Auditorium, and at 4 pm, Steven Smith and Cleveland Chamber Symphony will perform Marta Ptaszyńska’s Flute Concerto with Sean Gabriel, Charles Ives’ Set for Theatre Orchestra, and Christopher Auerbach-Brown’s Constellation No. 6 – The Cicadas in Gamble Auditorium at Baldwin Wallace.

Also on Sunday at 4, members of BlueWater Chamber Orchestra (Andrea Belding & Nancy Patterson, violins, James Rhodes, viola & Kent Collier, cello), will play Arriaga, Gershwin & Mendelssohn at St. Noel in Willoughby Hills. [Read more…]

By Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

On Friday at 12:15 noon, Sheryl Modlin, who usually plays the carillon at the Church of the Saviour in Cleveland Heights, will present a program of spooky music on the McGaffin Tower bells in University Circle. You can enjoy it in person, or online.

Also on Friday, Baldwin Wallace Opera will stage Handel’s Giulio Cesare at 8pm in the Helen Theatre in Playhouse Square.

And at midnight between Friday and Saturday in Finney Chapel, Oberlin organ majors will present the annual Halloween Edition of their celebrated Friday Night Organ Pump.

For details, visit our Concert Listings. [Read more…]

By Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

At 7:30 pm, the Oberlin Sinfonietta, Timothy Weiss, conducting, with faculty cellist Darrett Adkins (pictured), play Chen Yi’s Duo Ye for chamber orchestra and Philip Cashian’s Concerto for Cello and Strings in Warner Concert Hall. There’s a free webcast as well.

For details, visit our Concert Listings.

TODAY’S ALMANAC:

The prolific keyboard composer Domenico Scarlatti was born in Naples on this date in 1685, the son of composer Alessandro Scarlatti, and the third eminent member of the Class of ‘85 that includes Handel and J.S. Bach. Scarlatti spent most of his career in Spain churning out some of the most imaginative keyboard music of the period — his 555 Sonatas, which have become favorite program starters for keyboardists ranging from Liszt to Horowitz to Hamelin. [Read more…]

By Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

Saturday’s events begin at 7 with Baldwin Wallace Bach Festival’s mashup of Bach & Bartok with pianists Zarina Melik-Stepanova & Alexandra Nguyen & Jamie Ryan & Josh Ryan, percussion, in Gamble Auditorium.

Marking the 25th anniversary of Matthew Shepard’s murder in Wyoming, on Saturday at 7 Avon Lake UCC, Gregory Ristow will conduct the first of two performances by Cleveland Chamber Choir & Lakewood High School Chamber Choir of Craig Hella Johnson’s affecting modern oratorio, Considering Matthew Shepard. The program will be repeated on Sunday at 4 at Trinity Cathedral (rehearsal pictured above).

Also on Saturday, at 7:30, organist Robert Mollard will join Christopher Wilkins and the Akron Symphony for Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson’s Worship, Ottorino Respighi’s Church Windows & Camille Saint-Saëns Organ Symphony at. E.J. Thomas Hall.

On Saturday at 8 pm, Jeannette Sorrell will lead Apollo’s Fire in a one-night-only performance of Handel’s Israel in Egypt with Amanda Forsythe & Sonya Headlam, sopranos, Cody Bowers, countertenor, Jacob Perry, tenor, Edward Vogel, baritone, and Apollo’s Singers in Kulas Hall at CIM.

Saturday wraps up with “A Night in Hollywood,” an 8 pm concert by Cleveland Pops Orchestra, Carl Topilow, conducting, at Severance Music Center.

There’s more to Easter Island than its iconic statues, as pianist Mahani Teave will prove in her 2 pm recital on Sunday on the Tri-C Classical Piano Series at the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Island native will perform works from her debut album, Rapa Nui Odyssey.

And there’s more keyboard music on Sunday: At 4 pm, organist Daniel Colaner will play a solo recital at the Shrine of St. Stanislaus, and at 5 pm, pianist Zsolt Bognár will perform on the Music From the Western Reserve series at Christ Church, Hudson. [Read more…]

By Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Tonight at 7:30, The Cleveland Orchestra Chorus will host composer and conductor Eric Whitacre (pictured), with cellist Mingyao Zhao & pianist Daniel Overly in a Severance Music Center performance of Reena Esmail’s When the Violin and Whitacre’s The Sacred Veil.

Across East Boulevard, but also at 7:30, JoAnn Falletta will guest conduct the CIM Orchestra, with Micah Kroeker, trombone, in Brian Raphael Nabors’ Upon Daybreak, Ferdinand David’s Concertino for Trombone, and Sergei Prokofiev’s Suite from Romeo and Juliet in Kulas Hall.

And across town at 8 at Convivium 33 Gallery, Cleveland Uncommon Sound Project will present Dutch composer, vocalist, poet and visual artist Jaap Blonk.

For details, visit our Concert Listings.

INTERESTING READS:

New York Times critic Zachary Woolfe sums up the character and career of the Emerson String Quartet on the eve of their final performances at Alice Tully Hall. Read “After 47 Years, the Emerson Quartet Has One More Weekend” here.

According to a 2023 report on racial, ethnic and gender diversity prepared by the League of American Orchestras, Black musicians account for just 2.4 percent of orchestra members in the United States.

But not at the Gateways Music Festival, which this week will celebrate the 30th anniversary of an initiative established in 1993 by Juilliard-trained pianist Armenta Hummings Dumisani. [Read more…]