by Mike Telin
Creativity is more than just being different. Anybody can play weird; that’s easy. What’s hard is to be as simple as Bach. Making the simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.— Charles Mingus
IN TODAY’S ISSUE:
• Concerts by Carillonneur George Leggiero, pianist Caroline Oltmanns, the Krantz/Carlock/Lefebvre trio, The Cleveland Orchestra, Oberlin Contemporary Music Ensemble, and Les Délices.
• Ian Pomerantz says that it’s time to talk about antisemitism in the early music field.
• The Cleveland Cello Society has rescheduled their annual fundraiser, i Cellisti, And Valery Gergiev will not conduct the Vienna Philharmonic in concerts at Carnegie Hall.
• Almanac: the births of Dame Myra Hess (pictured) and Maryanne Amacher. [Read more…]
When the Oberlin Conservatory’s Richard Hawkins was asked to curate a concert for the Rocky River Chamber Music Society, he knew right away that it was an opportunity to program works that would include his Oberlin Conservatory faculty friends. “It’s always nice to present chamber music for winds and strings that people might not know,” the clarinetist said during a telephone conversation.
During the pandemic, the anxiety caused by an unknown future and the longing to return to normal have been beautifully expressed by thousands of people around the globe who participated in the Global Vaccine Poem project. Lines from these poems served as the inspiration for British composer Cecilia McDowall’s On the Air (Dear Vaccine).
It was historical performance practice at its best this past Wednesday when the Cleveland Silent Film Festival presented a screening of the 1928 Buster Keaton classic comedy Steamboat Bill, Jr. at Oberlin’s historic Apollo Theater. Accompanied by the brilliant Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra, the evening captured the allure of the “Golden Age” of film.
Think of works for trumpet and orchestra, and two pieces immediately come to mind. “When I tell someone that I’m playing a concerto, they always say — are you playing Haydn or Hummel?” Dasara Beta said during a recent telephone conversation. “This is a pretty popular piece for trumpet players, but if you don’t play the trumpet, you might not know it.”
HAPPENING TODAY:
Until recently, only a select few would have recognized the name John Stepan Zamecnik (1872–1953)
When we think of film composers, the names Miklós Rózsa, John Williams, and Randy Newman immediately come to mind. But who were the important composers from the silent era?
If you’re bummed that Punxsutawney Phil has predicted six more weeks of winter, you can shed those cold weather blues on Tuesday, February 8 at 7:30 pm in E.J. Thomas Hall, when Tuesday Musical presents celebrated violinist Joshua Bell and acclaimed soprano Larisa Martinez.
“When I was growing up in rural Mississippi my mother was very good about taking me to Jackson or New Orleans to see whatever the new, big art exhibition was,” composer and keyboardist