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Director Dirk Garner fills us in on Baldwin Wallace’s 87th Bach Festival

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by Daniel Hathaway

Founded in 1932 by Albert Riemenschneider (probably best known today for his edition of Bach’s 371 harmonized chorales), the Baldwin Wallace Bach Festival turns a spry 87 years old this year. Festival director Dirk Garner continues to infuse the extended Festival weekend with new ideas. We chatted with him by phone to ask what’s new on the agenda for 2019.

“There are two or three changes this year. We’ve added a Thursday evening concert specifically to celebrate our new orchestra conductor, Soo Han. He’s just been here a year, but he’s making a big splash. He’s a wonderful musician, and the students love him.” That opening concert on Thursday, April 11 at 7:00 pm in Gamble Auditorium includes Leopold Stokowski’s arrangement of Bach’s Air on the G String from the third orchestral suite, Mozart’s Symphony No. 31 in D, and Christopher Theofanidis’ Rainbow Body.

“The Stokowski arrangement ties into what I think is so cool about this year’s Festival,” Garner said. “It shows the many faces of Bach in the 21st century. [Read more…]

Avital meets Avital at Cleveland Museum of Art

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Avi Avital remembers meeting Omer Avital — no relation — in the cafeteria at the Jerusalem Music Academy.

“We both had this look on our faces like, ‘What’s in that strange instrument case?’” Avi told me during a recent phone call. “He was with his oud, and I was with my mandolin.”

They started talking and discovered how much they had in common. “There’s the family name, for one thing,” Avi said. “We’re not blood-related, but it’s the DNA of our heritage — Avital is a name that is typical to Jewish Moroccan families.” Both Avi and Omer were born and raised in Israel, their parents having immigrated there from Morocco. “We connected very fast.”

[Read more…]

Tharaud to replace Anderszewski on Oberlin Artist Recital Series April 3

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by Daniel Hathaway

French pianist Alexandre Tharaud will step in on short notice for Piotr Anderszewski on the Oberlin Artist Recital Series this Wednesday evening, April 3 at 7:30 pm in Finney Chapel. Anderszewski has withdrawn from his current recital tour due to illness. Tickets for the cancelled recital will be honored at the door, and new ticket buyers can reserve online here.

On Wednesday, Tharaud will play J.S. Bach’s so-called Goldberg Variations, followed by a question and answer session moderated by Oberlin piano professor Robert Shannon. The popular title of the work refers to the tale — now regarded as spurious — of a harpsichordist named Goldberg who is supposed to have appealed to Bach for a work to entertain his insomniac patron during sleepless nights.

One of the only Bach works printed during his lifetime, the 1741 copper plate engraving by Nuremberg publisher Balthasar Schmid is titled “Keyboard Exercise, consisting of an ARIA with diverse variations for harpsichord with two manuals.” [Read more…]

Cleveland Women’s Orchestra 84th Anniversary at Severance Hall

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by Daniel Hathaway

Following the unexpected passing at the beginning of the season of its longtime conductor Robert Cronquist (left) — only the second person in its history to lead the ensemble — the Cleveland Women’s Orchestra found itself scrambling for podium leadership. Guest conductor John Thomas Dodson has stepped into that role for the ensemble’s 84th annual concert at Severance Hall on Sunday, April 7 at 3:30 pm, and violinist Jinjoo Cho will be the featured soloist.

Founded in 1935 by Cleveland Orchestra violinist Hyman Schandler at a time when symphony orchestras were the exclusive province of male musicians, the Cleveland ensemble is the oldest women’s orchestra in the United States. After Schandler’s death in 1990, Cronquist took over the podium in addition to his posts as music director of the Mansfield Symphony and the summertime Lakeside Festival Orchestra. During his tenure, he established an endowment to sustain the ensemble as it moved into the 21st century. [Read more…]

Clive Driskill-Smith & Joseph Gramley bring Organized Rhythm to Akron

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by Daniel Hathaway

The idea of forming an organ/percussion duo arose in 2003 after British organist Clive Driskill-Smith gave an “Organ Plus” concert at London’s Westminster Abbey, pairing organ with various solo instrumentalists including percussionist Colin Currie.

“Clive said he’d love to do that kind of program again,” his now duo partner Joseph Gramley recalled in a telephone conversation. “We happened to have the same concert management, so Clive went on the Phillip Truckenbrod website, saw my name, and cold-called me. He was living in Oxford at the time so we got together in Hartford during his next visit. We hit it off and decided to tour together.”

Driskill-Smith and Gramley will bring their Organized Rhythm duo to Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in Akron on Sunday, April 7 at 4:00 pm for a free concert of works by Aaron Copland and Gustav Holst they have arranged themselves, as well as original and commissioned pieces by Paul Creston, Jacob Rogers, and William Susman. [Read more…]

David Ellis brings together his two string orchestras

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by Jarrett Hoffman

When Cleveland native David Ellis decided to study cello as an undergraduate at Oberlin Conservatory, he had an inkling that conducting might be in his future. He also had a feeling he should wait on that pursuit.

“I was thinking that as great as it is, it’s tough being a young conductor,” Ellis said during a recent telephone conversation. “You’re thrust into a position that most people shouldn’t be in until much later. I felt like I needed a little more musical maturity before I could be comfortable on the podium.”

Eventually, that time came. Ellis returned to Oberlin to study in the master’s program in conducting, in addition to receiving a master’s in historical performance. Flash forward to the present, and we find Ellis directing two local string orchestras: Earth and Air, and the Camerata Chamber Orchestra at Case Western Reserve University. And for the first time, he’ll have the opportunity to unite those two ensembles under one roof.

[Read more…]

ChamberFest Cleveland announces Season Eight

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ChamberFest Cleveland, the celebrated summer music festival founded by Franklin Cohen, principal clarinet emeritus of The Cleveland Orchestra, and his daughter, Diana Cohen, concertmaster of The Calgary Philharmonic, returns to the Cleveland scene with Season 8, “Under the Influence.” The festival will take place from June 13 through June 29, 2019, at venues throughout Greater Cleveland, and will include nine concerts plus a special late-night electronic violin performance at The Wine Spot on Lee Road in Cleveland Heights.

Concerts kick off on Thursday, June 13 at 7:30 pm at Mixon Hall. ChamberFest will also make stops at Cleveland State University’s Drinko Hall, the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Gartner Auditorium, and Harkness Chapel on the campus of Case Western Reserve University.

ChamberFest will welcome back many favorite musicians in addition to Co-founders and Co-artistic Directors, Franklin and Diana Cohen. Yura Lee, Alexi Kenney, Oliver Herbert, Peter Wiley, Roman Rabinovich, Julie Albers, Amy Schwartz Moretti, and more will join new artists including Israeli Philharmonic principal oboe Dudu Carmel and Finnish pianist Juho Pohjonen. Four up-and-coming players will take part in ChamberFest’s “Rising Stars” program.

[Read more…]

M.U.S.i.C. hosts Spring Cabaret (Musical Upcoming Stars in the Classics)

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by Mike Telin

Providing performance opportunities for emerging musicians in Northeast Ohio is the driving principle behind M.U.S.i.C. (Musical Upcoming Stars in the Classics). Under the discerning guidance of artistic director Jodi Kanter, the organization finds venues, arranges concerts, and supplies printed programs, publicity and refreshments. They also pay their performers, most of whom are students at one of the area’s conservatories or schools of music.

On Sunday, April 7 at 3:30 pm in Orange Village Hall, M.U.S.i.C. will present its Classical Cabaret No. 22. “A Celebration of Spring” will feature violinists Maria Park and Alexandra Switala, cellists Chauncey Aceret, Alex Glaubitz, Benjamin Rogers, and Rebecca Shasberger, pianists Gastón Frydman, Arseniy Gusev, Alexander Kostritsa, Nikolay Pushkarev, and Amy Tan, double-bassist Henry Samuels, oboist Devin Hinzo, and vocalists Bryant Bush and Jung Eun Oh.

The program includes Beethoven’s “Scherzo” and “Rondo” (Spring Sonata), Mozart’s “Allegro vivace assai” (Spring Quartet) and “Per questa bella mano,” Piazzolla’s “Primavera,” Prokofiev’s “Spring Fairy” (Cinderella), excerpts from Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring for piano four hands, Ravel’s Bolero arranged for cello quartet, and songs by Mahler and Debussy. Tickets include food and beverages and are available online.

[Read more…]

Les Délices closes 10th Anniversary Season with The Elements

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by Mike Telin

Over the past ten years the music of Jean-Féry Rebel has become familiar to Les Délices audiences. The ensemble has performed several of the composer’s violin and trio sonatas, scenes from his opera L’Ulysse which highlighted the Odyssey-inspired program Myths & Allegories, and his early choreographed symphonies such as Caractères de la danse, which have become signature pieces for the group.

This week Les Délices will return to the music of Rebel when they present a program titled “The Elements” which is centered around Rebel’s 1737 masterpiece of the same name. The program also includes music of Rameau and the premiere of a new, nature-inspired piece for period instruments by Theo Chandler.

Concerts take place on Friday, April 5 at 7:30 pm at Akron’s Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Saturday the 6th at 8:00 pm at Lakewood Congregational Church, and Sunday the 7th at 4:00 pm in Herr Chapel at Plymouth Church. Tickets are available online. On Saturday beginning at 3:00 pm at the Bop Stop, Les Délices will present “Mother Nature Makes Music,” a free 45-minute program designed for children ages 5-12.

[Read more…]

CUSP: Tatsuya Nakatani and his Gong Orchestra

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Next up on the Cleveland Uncommon Sound Project’s concert series is an event that’s truly rare.

There is only one ensemble in the world made up of gongs played with bows, and that’s the Nakatani Gong Orchestra, which will give a free performance at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Ohio City on Saturday, March 30 at 8:00 pm.

The group was founded by Tatsuya Nakatani, who describes the project on his website as nomadic. That’s because for each performance, he loads up his van with instrument stands, bows and gongs — now seventeen of them — and heads out on the road. Where are the players, you might ask?

[Read more…]

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