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Fourth time’s the charm: Blue Streak celebrates CIM

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Any graph tracking cases of coronavirus is a looping one: up, down, up, down. So if the timing is just unlucky enough, the same program could potentially be postponed once, twice, thrice…

That hypothetical has been a reality for the Blue Streak Ensemble. The group aimed to celebrate the Cleveland Institute of Music’s centennial in 2020 with a set of three programs that would include, in part, music by composers connected to CIM. But new variants, new spikes, and rescheduled student recitals have meant cycling through one date after another.

So composer and Blue Streak director Margaret Brouwer had a proclamation to make during our recent conversation on Zoom. “We’re giving these concerts no matter what!” she said with a laugh. “Even if we have to stand in the street and play.”

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The Cleveland Orchestra: Honoring Black Composers

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by Jarrett Hoffman

It was disappointing in January when The Cleveland Orchestra’s Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Concert had to be postponed due to a surge in COVID. But there’s good news, and it’s two-fold.

First, time has passed, and the rescheduled date is not far away: early next month. Second, the concert’s companion program, “Honoring Black Composers,” has found a new setting of its own, or rather three new settings. A very good thing, because the first date, an hour-long program on May 24 at Karamu House, has already sold out.

That still leaves you with two options. On Friday, May 27 at 6:30 pm and Saturday, May 28 at 7:00 pm, the program will move to Reinberger Chamber Hall at Severance, albeit in a slightly different form: a half-hour concert of music by Brian R. Nabors, Dolores White, George Walker, Melika Fitzhugh, H. Leslie Adams, and William Grant Still.

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DIARY: Tuesday, May 17, 2022

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by Jarrett Hoffman

IN THIS EDITION:

•Oberlin Conservatory students performing on campus and off

•The Eurovision Song Contest, the winning group from Ukraine (pictured), and the flute-like folk instruments heard in their performance

•A woodwind-themed almanac: flutist Marcel Moyse, oboist John de Lancie, and Christopher Rouse’s Clarinet Concerto

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DIARY: Thursday, May 12, 2022

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by Jarrett Hoffman

IN THIS EDITION:

•Today’s schedule: Cleveland Orchestra, Oberlin Performance & Improvisation, and Youngstown Symphony

•A job opening at BW, English National Opera treating long COVID, and a profile of three South Asian early-music vocalists including Sherezade Panthaki

•Almanac: imagining a joint-birthday party for Giovanni Viotti, Jules Massenet, Gabriel Fauré, and Wu Fei, speculating over who would get along and who wouldn’t, at least until dessert

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Cleveland Classical Guitar Society: William Kanengiser’s “Global Guitar”

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by Jarrett Hoffman

“I’ve always thought of the guitar as a universal instrument,” William Kanengiser said during a recent interview. “Every musical culture has some relative of the guitar, so it’s well-suited for evoking those different cultures.”

On Saturday, May 14 at 7:30 pm at Plymouth Church, Kanengiser will conclude the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society’s 2021-2022 International Series with a program titled “Global Guitar.” Tickets are available here.

One important element in the program is Kanengiser’s ongoing Diaspora Project, in which he commissions new works dedicated to groups of people who have left their ancestral homelands behind. That project will be represented by three pieces on Saturday, including a premiere by Andrea Clearfield.

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DIARY: Tuesday, May 10, 2022

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by Jarrett Hoffman

IN THIS EDITION:

•Baritone Edward Vogel and pianist Alex Lenhart at Church of the Covenant at noon

•News: Re:Sound tickets on sale, Guitar Society students in podcast music, the Black Orchestral Network addresses American orchestras, and Raven Chacon (pictured) wins the Pulitzer Prize

•Almanac: Max Steiner and King Kong

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DIARY: Thursday, May 5, 2022

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by Jarrett Hoffman

IN THIS EDITION:

•Today: the Sonny Rollins Jazz Ensemble outside at the Allen

•News: the purchase of the Variety Theatre, local singer bows out of American Idol after reaching the Top 10, the genesis of Mazel Tov Cocktail Party, and a change at Tafelmusik

•Almanac: the opening of Carnegie Hall, and 100 years later the premiere of Joan Tower’s Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman No. 3 — at Carnegie

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Theater + Music: The Cleveland Orchestra explores “The Chevalier”

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Concluding this season’s Family Concert Series, The Cleveland Orchestra will use both theater and music to shine a spotlight on the singular figure of Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges — composer, violinist, conductor, fencer, colonel, and abolitionist.

On Saturday, May 7 at 11:00 am at Mandel Hall, conductor Vinay Parameswaran and the Orchestra will be joined by guest violinist Brendon Elliott and four actors in a play-turned-concert-production titled “The Chevalier.” Written and directed by Bill Barclay, the show examines Bologne’s friendships with Mozart, Marie Antoinette, and Alexander Dumas, as well as his little-known contributions to the anti-slavery movement in France. Tickets are available here.

“Joseph Bologne is a tremendously important figure,” Parameswaran said during a recent telephone conversation, while also noting that the composer’s music is not particularly well known. “When people say that he was brilliant, that certainly comes through in these pieces that we’re playing.”

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DIARY: Tuesday, May 3, 2022

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by Jarrett Hoffman

IN THIS EDITION:

•Trumpet and organ at Church of the Covenant this afternoon, and Takács Quartet with a guest at the Cleveland Chamber Music Society tonight

•News: the Final Round / Winners Concert for the Tuesday Musical Scholarship Competition, and The Cleveland Orchestra’s MLK Celebration and Honoring Black Composers program

•Heinrich Biber, using the company card to jet off for a new job, so to speak

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DIARY: Thursday, April 28, 2022

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by Jarrett Hoffman

IN THIS EDITION:

•Les Délices’ The White Cat on digital, Cleveland Orchestra with MTT and cellist Gautier Capuçon, and No Exit with cimbalom player Chester Englander

•Tim Cutler found safe, bonuses for young professionals from Nu Deco and TMA, and two Cleveland Orchestra staffing updates

•Almanac: Michael Daugherty and János Starker

[Read more…]

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