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Oberlin Baroque Performance Institute marks anniversaries of Couperin & Charpentier

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by Daniel Hathaway

“We’ve always treated French music as something very special,” Kenneth Slowik, artistic director of the Oberlin Baroque Performance Institute, said in a telephone conversation. “It’s one of the two reigning styles in Baroque music that we have to come back to on a regular basis.”

BPI originally rotated annually between studies of the four main national schools of Baroque performance practice — English, German, Italian, and French — but now organizes its summer institutes more thematically. Currently in the second and final week of its 47th season, the BPI faculty is busy teaching the finer points of French Baroque style to 101 students of all ages and levels of accomplishment. “We try to instill in our students some sense of how we do what we do — and why — through teaching, lectures, and by example,” Slowik said.

Before they can assign those students to the weekly chamber groups in which much of the teaching takes place, the faculty have an immense puzzle to put together. “It’s always mysterious who’s going to show up,” Slowik said. “This year we have a raft of bassoonists. Some years we’re light in the flute department and some years it’s overflowing.” [Read more…]

Cryptogenic Infrastructure Fantasy: composer Sebastian Chang explains all

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by Mike Telin

Every composer has their own way of approaching their craft. “When I write a piece, whether it’s for orchestra or chamber ensemble, I want everybody to have a moment in the spotlight,” Sebastian Chang said during a telephone conversation. “Most of the time that works out great and results in something that is fun to play. But when Alex asked me to write a timpani part, that pretty much changed everything.”

On Saturday, June 30 at 7:30 pm at the Maltz Performing Arts Center, clarinetist Franklin Cohen, violinist Diana Cohen, timpanist Alexander Cohen, and pianist Roman Rabinovich will perform the world premiere of Chang’s Cryptogenic Infrastructure Fantasy (CIF) as part of ChamberFest Cleveland’s season finale. “Dawn of a Revolution” will also include Debussy’s Violin Sonata, and David Shimotakahara’s choreography of selections from Ligeti, Beethoven, Ravel, Pärt, Shostakovich, and Ginastera, performed by GroundWorks Dance Theater. Tickets are available online.

Chang, who serves as pianist and resident composer for the Louisville Orchestra, began writing CIF with a mission to correct an injustice that orchestral timpanists often experience. “They usually rest for 300 bars, then play a single note just to punctuate a big moment. They don’t get a lot of time in the spotlight and I wanted to fix that with this composition.”

[Read more…]

The End of Time: ChamberFest performers discuss Messiaen’s Quartet

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Drafted into the French army at the start of World War II, Olivier Messiaen soon found himself captured by the Germans and held at the prisoner-of-war camp known as Stalag VIII-A. There, a guard with a love of music provided the composer with the necessities of his craft — paper, pencils, erasers, and a quiet place to work — and he set about writing his Quatuor pour la fin du temps, which he and three fellow musician-prisoners would premiere in the camp’s Barrack 27.

You can’t overstate the contrast in time and place between that barrack at Stalag VIII-A in Görlitz, Germany, 1941, and Reinberger Chamber Hall at Severance Hall in Cleveland, Ohio, 2018. But perhaps the two settings will be linked by some small thread on Friday, June 29 at 7:30 pm, when Reinberger plays host to ChamberFest Cleveland’s concert titled “Behind Bars” — and four performers close out the evening by contending with those marks on paper that comprise Quartet for the End of Time.

Taking on that eight-movement work will be violinist Noah Bendix-Balgley, clarinetist Franklin Cohen, cellist Julie Albers, and pianist Roman Rabinovich. I reached the string players and pianist by phone and by email to talk about a few specific movements and how they plan to interpret the work as a whole. Selections from our separate conversations are presented here in a roundtable format.

[Read more…]

Love, diversity, unity:
ENCORE Chamber Music continues its third season

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by Jarrett Hoffman

For those who enjoy a touch of tradition — yet are troubled by how often pieces by the same cast of composers are performed — ENCORE Chamber Music’s third season, titled “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” should fit the bill.

“Our concert programs not only feature composers firmly set in the Western musical canon, but also celebrate music written and inspired by women, composers whose sexual orientation put their careers and their lives in jeopardy, and artists who struggled with their racial and religious identities,” ENCORE artistic director Jinjoo Cho said in an email.

“Comprised of music written by composers of diverse backgrounds, and dedicated to all the artists of past and present who have had to fight against societal bias, to me this season is a reminder that love is our most important virtue,” Cho continued. “Love holds us together even at the darkest moments of life, and I wanted to celebrate that.” [Read more…]

Kent/Blossom Music Festival to celebrate its 50th Anniversary

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by Daniel Hathaway

SepulvedaWith less than two weeks to go before students in the 50th Kent/Blossom Music Festival descend on the Kent State University campus for five weeks of rehearsals, master classes, and coachings, festival director Ricardo Sepulveda is close to solving the annual puzzle of scheduling daily activities for 43 students and 30 faculty members — mostly from The Cleveland Orchestra. “It keeps me up at night,” he said in a recent telephone conversation.

This summer’s students (16 of whom are international, hailing from Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, Japan, and Colombia) will arrive on July 1 and begin their experience with a dinner for participants, faculty, donors, and host families who will house eight of the students. “Rehearsals, coachings, and lessons start right up the next day,” Sepulveda said.

Recruitment began in mid-winter. “I changed the process a bit, shortening it to end before the first of March. Instead of print, we did online promotion using the Violin Channel and Facebook, which allows us to reach people faster,” he said, noting that the Festival is now old enough that it’s fun to see students of former students applying. Once they settle in at Kent, there are busy days ahead. [Read more…]

The lutes are coming! — LuteFest-2018 at CWRU

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by Delaney Meyers

LRPpicThe Lute Society of America’s annual LuteFest draws people from all over the world, and is the largest early plucked instrument festival of its kind. From Sunday, June 24 through Friday, June 29 on the campus of Case Western Reserve University, LuteFest-2018! will present concerts by world-class faculty, and festival participants will take part in all kinds of workshops — they’ll learn about lute technique as well as the instrument’s history and repertoire

“One of the great things about this festival is that every participant gets private lessons with the faculty members,” Assistant Director Chris Wilke said during a recent telephone conversation. “It’s like going to a cello conference and getting a private lesson with Yo-Yo Ma.” Lessons are open to anyone who registers, regardless of their level or background with the instrument.

[Read more…]

Flutist Lorna McGhee to join ChamberFest for George Crumb’s Voice of the Whale

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by Jarrett Hoffman

lornamcgheeIn 1969, George Crumb heard the complex, otherworldly singing of the humpback whale — then a deeply endangered species — and was inspired to write Vox Balaenae (“Voice of the Whale”). A trio for flute, cello, and piano, all amplified, the work continues to fascinate audiences with its imitation of whale song, and the feeling it conjures of time standing still.

Taking the composer’s suggestion, ChamberFest Cleveland will cast a deep blue light over the stage of Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music on Thursday evening, June 21, when they present Crumb’s underwater epic as part of a 7:30 pm concert titled “A Turn in the Road.” The program will also include Dvořák’s Piano Trio No. 3 in f and the “Adagio” from Berg’s Chamber Concerto.

I recently spoke with Scottish-born Lorna McGhee, principal flute of the Pittsburgh Symphony and professor at Carnegie Mellon University. [Read more…]

ChamberFest’s “Forging New Paths” to highlight Rabinovich Brahms arrangement

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Rabinovich pc balazs borocz“When a father-in-law asks, it’s the law,” Roman Rabinovich said during a recent conversation. As fans of ChamberFest Cleveland know, that father-in-law is co-artistic director Franklin Cohen. His request? An arrangement of Brahms’ Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel to be performed at the Festival — and his son-in-law happily obliged.

Rabinovich’s nonet version of that solo piano work will receive its premiere on Saturday, June 23 at 7:30 pm in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music. And the web of connections in that program, titled “Forging New Paths,” is worth spending an evening on itself. There’s the Handel-to-Brahms thread: on one end of the program is the Baroque composer’s Trio Sonata in c, HWV 386a, while on the other end are Brahms’ Handel Variations — in their new clothes picked out by Rabinovich. And in between is Ligeti’s homage to Brahms: the Trio for Horn, Violin, and Piano — a rare instrumentation for which the big B also composed.

You’ll see Rabinovich at the harpsichord in the Handel sonata, but our conversation focused on his arrangement of the Brahms for flute, clarinet, horn, bassoon, string quartet, and double bass. [Read more…]

ChamberFest’s “A Free for All”: A conversation with bassist Nathan Farrington

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by Delaney Meyers

FarringtonChamberFest’s Tuesday, June 19 concert, “A Free for All,” will take place in the Crawford Rotunda at The Cleveland History Center, which houses the restored Euclid Beach Park Grand Carousel. Bassist Nathan Farrington says it will feature “a spectrum of pieces,” offering everyone at least one thing they can “dip their toes into.”

The unconventional program will include music by virtuoso fiddler and composer Mark O’Connor, a diverse set of old folk songs played by Farrington and clarinetist Franklin Cohen, Dvořák’s folk-inspired Songs My Mother Taught Me with soprano Amanda Powell. In a phone conversation, Farrington said he is most looking forward to playing one of the lesser known pieces on the program: Krzysztof Penderecki’s Duo Concertante for violin and bass, written in 2010 and inspired by the composer’s long-term friendship with violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter.
[Read more…]

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