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Quire Cleveland: “Resonant Glory” at St. John’s Cathedral (May 15)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Of the three venues that Quire Cleveland’s artistic director Jay White chose for the ensemble’s “Music for Grand Spaces” trilogy, none fits the description quite so aptly as the Roman Catholic Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in downtown Cleveland. It was there that Quire opened its series of programs designed for churches with a resonant acoustic on Friday, May 13 with a splendid selection of pieces.

You wouldn’t expect that acoustic from a glance at the nave, which is wide and long, but not especially lofty. But when I guest conducted a local amateur choir and professional orchestra in Beethoven’s Mass in C there a few years back, during the first rehearsal we released the final chord of the “Gloria” and listened in astonishment for the next several seconds. The sound continued to roll down the space like the big wave that surfers dream about. [Read more…]

DIARY: Wednesday, May 18, 2022

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. Third FranckFest Brownbag Concert caps the Noontime Concert Series at Trinity Cathedral & WCLV broadcasts joint April 5 ChamberFest Cleveland & Cleveland Chamber Music Society collaboration

. British organist and choirmaster Simon Preston dies at 83

. Interesting read: Composer Brett Dean discusses his Hamlet chord

. Almanac: Froberger, Böhm, Pinza, Fischer-Dieskau make debuts while Mahler and Anderson exit.

TODAY’S EVENTS:

At 12:00 pm the Trinity Cathedral Brownbag Concert Series wraps up its season as well as its three-concert César FranckFest with music in celebration of the Belgian composer’s 200th birthday. Nicole Keller & Todd Wilson, organ, Mark Laseter, tenor & Pam Kelly, cello. Chorale in b minor (Keller), Panis angelicus, Pastorale, Sortie l’Organiste & Chorale in E. Trinity Cathedral, 2230 Euclid Ave., Cleveland. Freewill offering. Hybrid concert will also be livestreamed and archived. [Read more…]

DIARY: Monday, May 16, 2022

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. The latest episode of Not Your Grandmother’s Classical Music

. Tuesday Musical’s 2022 Scholarship Competition Final Round/Winners Concert (winners pictured)

. A new production of Anthony Davis’s opera “X” opens in Detroit

. Almanac: composer Richard Wilson born in Cleveland.

TODAY’S EVENTS:

At 2:00 pm  – Eric Charnofsky hosts the weekly radio broadcast Not Your Grandmother’s Classical Music. Today’s program includes the third symphony of David Diamond, Bright Sheng’s My Song for piano, Secret Ground for flute, clarinet, violin, and cello by Judith Shatin, George Enescu’s Violin Sonata No. 3, and Allegro di Concerto “Alla Mendelssohn” for double bass and piano by Giovanni Bottesini. WRUW, Case Western Reserve University. Click here to listen to the internet feed. [Read more…]

DIARY: Weekend, May 13 – 15, 2022  

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. The concert calendar has an expansive list of performances.

. Almanac: This weekend’s births include Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan, Otto Klemperer, and Claudio Monteverdi.

THIS WEEKEND’S EVENTS:

There appears to be something for everyone this weekend, which offers music from the very old to the very new played by chamber groups, choruses, orchestras, brass and percussion ensembles, and soloists. Check our Concert Listings page for details. [Read more…]

Apollo’s Fire: Mozart & the Chevalier at St. Raphael in Bay Village (May 8)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Turning thirty is a Big Deal for an individual, but no less significant a milestone for a musical ensemble. Just ask the musicians of Cleveland’s Baroque Orchestra, Apollo’s Fire, who marked that occasion with a trio of concerts last weekend led by its founder Jeannette Sorrell.

The middle show, on Saturday in Mandel Hall at Severance Music Center,  reflected the Orchestra’s stature as a group that can share a stage with distinguished ensembles in mainline venues. The programs on Friday and Sunday in churches in Akron and Bay Village took profit of Apollo’s Fire’s portability and its determination to bring music out to people where they are.

The programming was festive, featuring an overture, a solo motet, and a symphony by the divine Mozart, and unusual for highlighting the work of a fascinating, under- unexplored composer who could handily win a sword fight against five attackers in the afternoon, then dust himself off and play chamber music at night. [Read more…]

DIARY: Wednesday, May 11, 2022

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. Hybrid concerts from Trinity Cathedral and the Maltz

. Guitar Festival and Stroud Competition go live at CIM

. One composer to be remembered, another best forgotten.

TODAY’S EVENTS:

Two series continue today. At Noon, Trinity Cathedral lights more of the 200 candles on Belgian composer César Franck’s birthday gateau, with performances of his Organ Chorale No. 3 by Nicole Keller and Prélude, Fugue et Variation by Josh Kraybill on the recently installed Skinner organ, as well as perhaps his best-known chamber work, the Violin Sonata, to be played by Andrew Sords and Elizabeth DeMio.

Tonight at 7:30 at the Maltz Performing Arts Center, PianoCleveland hosts pianist Jonathan Biss (pictured) in “The Mind of Beethoven,” an episode in its Listening Series that will zero in on the composer’s often puzzling late sonatas. [Read more…]

DIARY: Monday, May 9, 2022

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. Today’s concert listings page lists two events of note

. In the News: ENCORE Chamber Music announces summer events

. The Almanac: Buxtehude exits, Horowitz returns 

TODAY’S EVENTS:

At 2:00 pm Eric Charnofsky brings you the latest edition of his Radio Broadcast: Not Your Grandmother’s Classical Music on Program on WRUW FM 91.1. The program includes the Piano Sonata by Paul Dukas, Anton Webern’s Five Movements for String Quartet, the Sonata for solo violin by Béla Bartók transcribed for viola, and a sonata for flute and basso continuo by Jakob Friedrich Kleinknecht. Click here to listen to the internet feed.

At 7:30 pm at West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church, the Rocky River Chamber Music Society will present the Grigoryan Brothers Duo (Australia, pictured), Slava and Leonard Grigoryan, classical guitar.

[Read more…]

ChamberFest Cleveland & Cleveland Chamber Music Society at the Maltz (Apr. 5)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Having discovered surprisingly little overlap between their mailing lists, Cleveland’s two main purveyors of chamber music decided to bring their followers together on April 5 to enjoy a joint concert at the Maltz Performing Arts Center.

Although they tend the same vineyard, The Cleveland Chamber Music Society and ChamberFest Cleveland go about their mission differently. [Read more…]

DIARY: Weekend, May 6 – May 8, 2022 

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by Daniel Hathaway

IN THIS EDITION:

. An extensive list of concert choices

. In the News: Cleveland Orchestra tour and recording, Curtis Institute tries out an immersive orchestra concert experience

. Almanac: Composers George Perle and Victoria Bond celebrate birthdays and Johann Sebastian Bach meets Prussian King Frederick II in Potsdam

THIS WEEKEND’S EVENTS:

With Mother’s Day weekend upon us, there’s plenty of live music in the area to add a little something special to the celebration. Here are our choices of concerts that offer a diverse selection of ensembles and musical styles — and many are free. Check our Concert Listings page for details. [Read more…]

Thirty years with Apollo’s Fire: looking back — and forward — with Jeannette Sorrell

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by Daniel Hathaway

Cleveland’s Baroque Orchestra, Apollo’s Fire, will celebrate its 30th anniversary this weekend with three concerts: one in the 1930s splendor of Mandel Hall at Severance Music Center on Saturday, May 7 at 7:30 pm, flanked by programs in Akron and Bay Village on Friday and Sunday.

Founder Jeannette Sorrell will welcome soprano Sonya Headlam and violinist Francisco Fullana for music by Mozart — the Don Giovanni Overture, Exsultate, Jubilate, and the “Haffner” Symphony, No. 35 — nestled among two works by Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges: an aria from L’Amant anonyme and a violin concerto.

The venues symbolize the stature the period instrumental ensemble has attained in mainstream concert music, as well as its determination to bring performances out into the community. I reached Jeannette Sorrell for a Zoom conversation last week to gather her thoughts about the past three decades, and to muse about what lies ahead for an organization that started in a sheep barn on Cleveland’s East Side but now enjoys access to some of the world’s premiere performance spaces and summer festivals. (The sheep barn is still among them.) [Read more…]

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