by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

Beginning on Saturday at 2:30, The Hingetown Jazz Festival showcases both skilled veterans who have graced the stage for years as well as young and upcoming talents who are redefining the jazz landscape in Northeast Ohio. Support local businesses while immersing yourself in Cleveland’s rich jazz scene. Sponsored by the Local 4 Music Fund, this free festival takes place at Transformer Station, Bop Stop, and Jukebox. Click here for more information.

And on Saturday and Sunday at 7 pm, Cirque de la Symphonie joins the Akron Symphony Orchestra, Lucas Waldin, conductor, and vocalists Morgan James and Hugh Panaro at the Blossom Music Center. Read a preview article here. Tickets available online.

Elsewhere, Franz Welser-Möst and The Cleveland Orchestra continue their European Tour in Switzerland with a concert on Sunday at the Lucerne Festival that includes Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony and Robert Schumann’s Piano Concerto with Víkingur Ólafsson. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

At 6:30 this evening, the Canton Symphony’s Summer Serenades presents a brass quintet concert at Beach City Park.

Elsewhere, Franz Welser-Möst and The Cleveland Orchestra are spending a second day in Finland on their European tour, playing Prokofiev’s Second Symphony and Berlioz’ Symphonie fantastique at the Musiikkitalo Helsinki.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

On Wednesday, the Cleveland Institute of Music announced that beginning in September and continuing through November, students will present Museum Melodies, a new series of free noontime recitals on Thursdays and Fridays at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.

“The series, the first in a new array of CIM programming around Northeast Ohio, will highlight the piano but also feature other instruments. The series provides students real-world professional experience and represents a first-of-its-kind collaboration between CIM and the museum.” Read the press release here. [Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

There’s nothing on the local concert calendar this Wednesday, but should you find yourself in Finland, you can enjoy a concert by The Cleveland Orchestra at the Musiikkitalo Helsinki (pictured). Franz Welser-Möst conducts Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony, and Víkingur Ólafsson solos in Robert Schumann’s Piano Concerto.

If you’re interested in organs, the Helsinki hall recently installed the largest modern concert hall instrument in the world. Read about the Rieger organ here.

CONCERT UPDATES:

The Cleveland Orchestra has rescheduled the “Evening With John Legend”  concert that was canceled shortly after it began earlier this month. The new date is Sunday, September 22, at 7 pm, at Blossom Music Center, but without the Orchestra. Current ticket holders still have their seats reserved for the new date. Lawn tickets are still available for purchase on the event webpage.

Tuesday Musical writes that more than 700 tickets have already been sold for its October 22 Michael Feinstein tribute to Tony Bennett concert featuring the Carnegie Hall Big Band. Click here to purchase tickets for the event at Akron’s E.J. Thomas Hall. [Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

NEWS BRIEFS:

The Cleveland Institute of Music will make use of a number of alternative performing venues this season while its Kulas Hall is under renovation.

“CIM’s Mixon Hall will remain in active use but events typically held in Kulas Hall will take CIM musicians broadly into the community, to a variety of locations including Severance Music Center, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the Maltz Performing Arts Center, and local high schools. Of special note will be two opera productions at Cleveland’s historic Playhouse Square.” Read a press release here.

Meanwhile, in his blog, British journalist Norman Lebrecht has his ear to the ground on other developments at CIM. Read his Slipped Disc entry from Monday here.

Stephanie Havey joins the Voice Division of the Oberlin Conservatory, where she will teach and direct two fully-staged opera productions each academic year. Read more here.

The Thomas and Evon Cooper International Competition, produced ​annually by Oberlin College and Conservatory, will move to January when it returns ​in 2025, with the opening day on January 5 and competition rounds running through January 10.

[Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY: If you find yourself in Berlin today, you can catch a performance by The Cleveland Orchestra at the Berliner Philharmonie. Franz Welser-Möst conducts works by Allison Loggins-Hull, John Adams & Sergei Prokofiev. No performances are on the Northeast Ohio agenda today.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Apollo’s Fire will present two 70-minute Baroque Bistro concerts in September, on Thursday the 19th at 8 pm at BLUE Jazz+ in Akron, and on Sunday the 22nd at 12:30 at Music Box Supper Club in Cleveland. “Soprano Mira Fu-En Huang sings ballads of love and despair, while dueling violinists Alan Choo and Hanna Bingham join with friends on cello and lute.” [Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

Two items only!

On Friday evening at 7, the French harp-guitar duo of award-winning performers and composers Isabelle & Raphael Olivier will create a journey of soundscapes at Reithoffer’s Art, Spirits & Entertainment in Chagrin Falls.

And on Sunday at 7, Tony DeSare and the Blossom Band present “Sinatra and Beyond” at Blossom Music Center. Read a preview interview with DeSare here. 

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

The Music Settlement’s Kawai piano sale this weekend has been moved to the Kawai Piano Gallery in Beachwood’s Pinecrest Shopping Center. “The selection includes baby grands, studio grands, upright pianos, consoles, and performance level electronic digital pianos. Additional factory-crated new pianos will also be available. These instruments will be offered to the public at significantly reduced prices. Pianos have also been professionally maintained, and most include the original 10-year manufacturer’s warranty.” [Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Tonight at 6:30 the Canton Symphony’s Summer Serenades presents a brass Quintet at the North Canton Civic Center.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Master Singers Chorale of Northeast Ohio invites interested singers to its first weekly rehearsal on Monday, September 9 at 7 pm at First Christian Church of Stow, following a 6 pm Meet & Greet with its new artistic director Marc Weagraff. The Chorale will be preparing Schubert’s Mass in E-flat for a concert in December.

INTERESTING READS:

Writing for the New York Times, Allan Kozinn reports the death on August 12 of composer Harold Meltzer. “His music, which was performed by many prominent ensembles, mixed melodic themes and rich textures with the sharp-edged angularity of modernism.” [Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Summit Choral Society invites singers to register for its 35th season. Click here for information about singing opportunities for adults and children.

The opening concert of the University of Akron’s Kulas Concert Series will be performed by Youngstown State University piano professor Caroline Oltmanns and German violinist Julia Kuhn (pictured), who is artistic director for the St. Blasius Early Music Summer Concert Series in Kaufbeuren. They will play Beethoven’s two last sonatas — No 9 in A, op. 47 (the “Kreutzer”) and No. 10 in G, op. 96 — on Sunday, September 8 at 3 pm in Guzzetta Recital Hall.

Members of Cleveland Chamber Choir will perform at Re:Source Cleveland’s annual fundraiser, RE:AP the Benefit 2024, which supports Cleveland’s newcomer communities. The event will take place on September 28 at the Re:Source home office on the Urban Community School Campus, and will include music, performances, awards, and an array of international cuisine by local chefs and restaurateurs.

BlueWater Chamber Orchestra, Daniel Meyer, artistic director, will celebrate its fifteenth season with concerts in various neighborhood venues throughout greater Cleveland, beginning with “Threads of Time, Struggle, and Hope,” to be presented October 5 and October 6 at the Church of the Covenant in Cleveland and St. Noel Church in Willoughby. [Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Tonight at 7, the West Shore Chorale will hold its 2024 Summer Sing at Rocky River Memorial Hall. All are welcome to sing through Beethoven’s Mass in C with Chorale members. Scores will be provided.

IN THE NEWS: 

On Monday afternoon, Cleveland.com reported that after 30 years on the job, “Victoria Bussert (pictured), the program director at Baldwin Wallace’s acclaimed Music Theatre program, is leaving the university at the end of the 2024-25 academic year to head up Oberlin College’s new Music Theater program, officials at both institutions announced on Monday.”

Susan Van Vorst, Dean of the Baldwin Wallace Conservatory, told cleveland.com “she was shocked when informed of Bussert’s decision…Bussert’s departure begins a period of transition for the Baldwin Wallace program as music director Matthew Webb and acting/directing professor Laura Welsh Berg are headed to Oberlin, too.” [Read more…]

by  Daniel Hathaway

HONORED:

Youngstown State University Dana School of Music has announced that its student Ryan Lamb has won the gold medal at the highly competitive Leonard Falcone International Euphonium and Tuba Festival, held from August 9-12 at the Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp in Twin Lake, Michigan. Read the press release here.

INTERESTING READS:

The New York Times has published a story by Pam Belluck about cellist Joshua Roman (pictured) and his continuing struggle to recover from Long Covid. A native of Oklahoma City, Roman studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music with Richard Aaron and Desmond Hoebig, and was appointed principal cello of the Seattle Symphony at the age of 22.

Princeton University musicology professor Simon Morrison challenges long-standing notions about Pyotr Tchaikovsky in his Guardian article, Tchaikovsky was not tragic but had a Monty Python sense of humor.

“His biography has been shamefully distorted by scholars — almost in a way you could say is homophobic — because they represent him as a tortured gay man who was unhappy in his life and his love, and his music is thus reduced to the sound of suffering.

“But he wasn’t any of those things. He was successful, had a lot of love from family and friends, wealth, boyfriends, girlfriends. He really had quite a fabulous life.” [Read more…]