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Akron Symphony brings out a crowd for Carmina Burana (May 9)

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by Peter Feher

For a moment during the Akron Symphony’s season-finale performance of Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, conductor Christopher Wilkins seemed to consider inviting the audience to sing along.

It would have been very much in keeping with the spirit shared throughout E.J. Thomas Hall on Saturday evening, May 9. The orchestra winningly combined local pride and popular classics to conclude the concert year, and as if on cue, the community turned out in enthusiastic response.

With Orff as the main offering, the Akron Symphony attracted its biggest audience for a classical program in a decade, according to the organization’s own tally.

Called on as choristers, any crowd could probably manage a passable imitation of the famous opening “O Fortuna” — those fateful clashing chords that set the wheel of Carmina Burana spinning. But someone listening attentively to the piece might be tempted to join in whenever a refrain starts up.

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Richard Goode returns to Schubert for Oberlin Artist Recital Series (Apr. 29)

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by Peter Feher

Life is too short to take the opening repeat in Franz Schubert’s Piano Sonata in B-flat, D. 960. The first movement — marked Molto moderato, or “very moderately” — already clocks in at around 15 minutes, even without hearing the entire exposition twice.

Of course, purists will play up those few transitional bars that Schubert crafted to lead back to the beginning, which would be cut in a straight-through performance. The composer’s overall conception is supposedly lost if the strict symmetry of sonata form isn’t upheld.

Such arguments are no match for pianist Richard Goode, who gave an authoritative account of the work — sans repeat — for the final concert of this season’s Oberlin Artist Recital Series. Goode offered an interpretation borne of age and experience, qualities that were in evidence throughout his solo program on Wednesday evening, April 29, in Finney Chapel.

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Pianist Marc-André Hamelin traces ‘thoughtful evolution’ of piano at Severance (May 5)

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by Peter Feher

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Franz Joseph Haydn was one of the first composers to recognize the untapped potential in a promising new keyboard instrument called the fortepiano, which, as the name suggested, could play both loud and soft.

By the time that Sergei Rachmaninoff was writing his most virtuosic piano works some 150 years later, he had exploited the full sweep of the instrument, from crashing bass chords to glassy high notes of exquisite fragility.

The technical breakthroughs made at the keyboard over this period can all too easily be taken for granted in the 21st century, with many of today’s leading soloists achieving correctness at the cost of artistic expression.

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CIM Opera Theater follows the fairy tale of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel (Mar. 27)

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by Peter Feher

Hansel and Gretel had something better than breadcrumbs to accompany their journey through the forest of Ilsenstein, whose enchanted scenery recently sprang to life on the Kulas Hall stage at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

Whether avoiding chores, wandering from home, or outsmarting the Gingerbread Witch, the siblings were guided in their moments of trouble by the enduring melodies and leitmotifs of composer Engelbert Humperdinck.

Nothing too bad could befall these characters, buoyed by folk songs one minute and heavenly orchestral tunes the next. Indeed, there were ample delights — and only the slightest bit of danger — to encounter in CIM Opera Theater’s production of Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel, presented with two student casts in two performances, March 27 and 29.

Darkness doesn’t play much of a role in the German libretto by Adelheid Wette, who in 1890 enlisted her brother Humperdinck to collaborate on a kid-friendly adaptation of the Brothers Grimm fairy tale. Gone are the trail of breadcrumbs and the selfish stepmother who starves her family. The children simply get lost in the woods after eating too many strawberries.

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Conductor Daniele Rustioni, organist Paul Jacobs bask in Mediterranean spirit with The Cleveland Orchestra (Apr. 2)

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by Peter Feher

CLEVELAND, Ohio — When the sun rises on the sea at the beginning of Claude Debussy’s La Mer, there’s no coastline or human civilization in sight. Dark, rumbling waves in the timpani and low strings have brightened to reveal the full orchestra in sublime, surging phrases. We could be anywhere on the wide-open ocean.

But listeners won’t be left adrift in Debussy’s score this weekend at Severance Music Center. The Cleveland Orchestra is embarking on a luxuriously charted course with Italian guest conductor Daniele Rustioni. Although mostly focused on French repertoire, the program basks in a broader Mediterranean spirit.

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Apollo’s Fire and Alan Choo find riches in “Palace of Versailles” (Mar. 6)

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by Peter Feher

In 1715, the French composer Jean-Féry Rebel had the shrewd idea of combining the most popular Baroque dances of his day into a single crowd-pleasing piece. Les Caractères de la Danse was a hit with Parisian audiences, thanks in large part to the thrill that accompanies recognition.

Modern listeners can surely relate, even if they might struggle to tell a minuet from a musette or a gigue from a gavotte. Take Rebel’s concept, but swap in the music and moves of “Y.M.C.A.” or “Kung Fu Fighting,” and you have “Evolution of Dance,” one of the first viral videos in internet history.

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Leonkoro Quartet traces lineage in Cleveland Chamber Music Society debut (Mar. 3)

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by Peter Feher

Out of Vienna is the title of the Leonkoro Quartet’s latest album, but that phrase could easily stand in for all of the ensemble’s recent performances.

Never mind the specialized focus of the recording, which centers on Second Viennese School composers Alban Berg and Anton Webern. In a program of entirely standard repertoire — Haydn, Beethoven, and Felix Mendelssohn were on the bill for the Quartet’s Cleveland debut — the influence of a certain city proved just as inescapable.

Of course, classical music in the 21st century thrives on cosmopolitanism. The young Leonkoros are based in Berlin, having formed at conservatory there in 2019, and they’ve cultivated utmost cohesion and top-level technique. Worldwide attention came after they swept London’s Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition in 2022.

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World premiere of “La Diosa” leads Les Délices to Latin America (Feb. 28)

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By Peter Feher

There’s something sacred about the female voice. And while the title of “La Divina” has already been claimed, today’s sopranos might still aspire to a similar status — “La Diosa,” perhaps.

That’s the self-assertion made early on in Soy La Diosa (“I Am the Goddess”), a prophetic new piece by composer Gilda Lyons. The work’s soloist delivers this phrase after detailing, in alternate Spanish and English lyrics, the various guises her spirit can take: “messenger,” “creator,” “warrior,” “protector,” “shadow,” and “song.” Naturally, such shape-shifting calls for a comparable array of vocal techniques, everything from whoops to whispers to full-throated high notes.

Only a confident performer could embody these powerfully clashing roles, and soprano Estelí Gomez was in her element singing the world premiere of Lyons’ score on Saturday, February 28, at the Heights Theater. If the afternoon felt vaguely out of time and place — with the period instrumentalists of Les Délices not just accompanying but commissioning this contemporary endeavor — then ethereal aims accomplished.

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Taplin Quartet journeys to Heights Arts and beyond for debut (Feb. 8)

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by Peter Feher

The Taplin Quartet, Cleveland’s newest chamber ensemble, gave its first local performance this month — and at the same time traveled to Europe, Asia, and Oceania. In fact, the group’s world tour brought along the entire audience at Dunham Tavern in Midtown on Sunday afternoon, February 8.

“From East to West,” the Quartet’s debut program — presented as part of Heights Arts’ Close Encounters concert series — took listeners on a musical trek across three continents while never straying too far from home.

It helped to be embarking with four familiar guides. Violinists Katherine Bormann and Zhan Shu, violist Gareth Zehngut, and cellist Martha Baldwin are all Cleveland Orchestra members, and together as the Taplin, they have the advantage of a shared starting point.

The skills essential for great orchestral playing — rhythmic precision, interpretive clarity, and a quick ability to adapt — were also what kept the Quartet confidently on course during Sunday’s performance.

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Manacorda, Cleveland Orchestra magic leaves nothing ‘Unfinished’ at Severance (Feb. 5)

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by Peter Feher
This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Classical musicians have exhausted just about every attempt to complete Franz Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony in the two centuries since the composer’s death at age 31.

But the Cleveland Orchestra doesn’t give in easily to creative despair. With guest conductor Antonello Manacorda, the ensemble has fashioned an effective, elegant substitute for the “missing” movements of Schubert’s score.

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