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Violinist Tessa Lark awarded
Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship

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by Mike Telin

LARK-TessaOn Tuesday, February 20, the Borletti-Buitoni Trust announced that violinist Tessa Lark is a 2018 recipient of the coveted Borletti-Buitoni Fellowship. Lark is the only American among the young musicians from around the world who join BBT’s roster of Award and Fellowship winners.

Awards of £30,000 and Fellowships of £20,000 are provided for the advancement of their musical careers across a broad range of projects and requirements. The BBT team offers generous support, networking opportunities, and counsel to help the artists realize their long-held ambitions. Since 2003, BBT has provided support to 103 individuals and ensembles from over 30 countries.

“I’m just really excited and that’s about all I can say,” the affable Tessa Lark said by telephone. “They sent me an email right around Thanksgiving telling me I had won — it was quite a surprise.” The Fellowship adds to the violinist’s expanding stack of impressive awards, which include an Avery Fisher Career Grant and medals at the Naumburg International Violin Competition and the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis.

[Read more…]

Mantra Percussion to bring
Timber to Transformer Station

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by Jarrett Hoffman

mantra percussionHow do you describe the experience of hearing Michael Gordon’s Timber, the hour-long percussion sextet played on amplified slabs of wood? One word might be ‘transcendental.’

“Most times that we play this piece,” said Michael McCurdy, co-founder and artistic director of Mantra Percussion, “more than one person from the audience comes up afterwards and says, ‘It seemed like 20 or 30 minutes — I can’t believe that was an hour.’ People transcend their sense of time and place as they’re experiencing it.”

Mantra Percussion — who co-commissioned Timber and delivered its U.S. premiere in 2011 — will bring the piece to Transformer Station this Friday, February 23 at 7:30 pm, as part of the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Performing Arts Series. Click here to watch the ensemble perform the piece.

[Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus:
a conversation with Daniel Singer

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by Mike Telin

Singer-Daniel 2018“The members of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus are some of the best kids in their high school choral programs,” COYC acting director Daniel Singer said during a recent conversation. “When they come into this group they tear into learning new repertoire and tackle a professional masterwork like the Te Deum that is not dumbed down for kids in any way. They thrive on that challenge.”

On Sunday, February 25 at 7:00 pm in Severance Hall, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra and Youth Chorus will come together for performances of Dvořák’s Te Deum featuring soprano Marian Vogel and baritone Brian Keith Johnson, and Hanson’s Song of Democracy. The concert, under the direction of Vinay Parameswaran, will also include Sibelius’s Symphony No. 1. Tickets are available online.

Singer, who is in his seventh year as Director of Music at University School, said that somehow, Dvořák’s Te Deum has stayed off his musical radar. [Read more…]

Cleveland Classical Guitar Society
to present Les Frères Méduses
(“The Jellyfish Brothers”)

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Les Freres MedusesThere is a lot that’s unique about the guitar duo of Randall Avers and Benoît Albert, including their background and repertoire — and of course, their name: Les Frères Méduses. When I asked Avers — an Ohio native and Oberlin alum with connections to the University of Akron — to explain The Jellyfish Brothers, he called over to his duo partner for help telling the story. “Ben!”

Albert picked up another phone at Avers’ parents’ house in Massillon, where the two guitarists were staying before heading out for performances in Kentucky and Ohio. That tour includes a concert this Saturday, February 24 at 7:30 pm at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights on the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society’s International Series. There they’ll bring together Balkan folk music, classical music, two works of their own, and a free improvisation.

I asked again. Why The Jellyfish Brothers? “Oh,” Albert said, laughing. “It’s a long story.”

It begins in 2008 at the Akron Zoo — at a jellyfish exhibit.

[Read more…]

Roomful of Teeth to perform on the Oberlin Artist Recital Series: a conversation with Dashon Burton

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by Mike Telin

Burton_DashonBass-baritone Dashon Burton is no stranger to Northeast Ohio audiences — he has appeared with Franz Welser-Möst and The Cleveland Orchestra on three occasions over the last two seasons. This past fall Burton reprised his role as the Parson and Badger in Janáček’s Cunning Little Vixen and will return in May for Beethoven’s Ninth as part of the Orchestra’s Prometheus Project.

You can hear another side of the Oberlin alum’s vocal skills this week when he and his Roomful of Teeth colleagues perform on the Oberlin Artist Recital Series on Friday, February 16 at 8:00 pm in Finney Chapel. Tickets are available online.

“I’m so excited to be going back to Oberlin. It played a huge part in feeding my vast curiosity about what music can be,” Burton said during a telephone conversation. “Without the people in the TIMARA program and the composition and vocal departments, I wouldn’t be the professional that I am today. And I want everyone to come to the show and see what Roomful of Teeth is all about.”

[Read more…]

Genre-blending Africa→West Percussion Trio to perform at Baldwin Wallace on Friday

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by Jarrett Hoffman

africa west“In reality — in the wild — musics interact,” said Josh Ryan of Africa→West Percussion Trio. “Sometimes we play folkloric music, sometimes we play what sounds like experimental concert music, and sometimes we play a mix of the two. That’s just the reality of being a 21st-century person and percussionist, and it’s really fun.”

On Friday, February 16 at 7:00 pm at Baldwin Wallace Conservatory’s Gamble Auditorium, the Africa→West Percussion Trio (Ryan Korb and brothers Jamie and Josh Ryan) will present a program of original works and arrangements, with influences ranging from Ghanaian and Cuban music to jazz, classical, and pop. The group is a longtime ensemble-in-residence at BW, and their fourth CD, Loud Fossil, was released in 2016.

[Read more…]

Roomful of Teeth to perform on the Oberlin Artist Recital Series

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by Mike Telin

ROOMFULL-OF-TEETH“It’s amazing how professional choral singing has changed in the past 10 to 15 years,” Gregory Ristow, director of vocal ensembles at the Oberlin Conservatory, said during a recent conversation. “And the singers in Roomful of Teeth are the perfect model for our students because their careers are multi-faceted.”

On Friday, February 16 at 8:00 pm in Finney Chapel, the Oberlin Artist Recital Series will present Roomful of Teeth under the direction of Brad Wells. The program will include Caroline Shaw’s Partita for 8 Voices, Missy Mazzoli’s Vesper Sparrow, Judd Greenstein’s Run Away, and Toby Twining’s Dumas’ Riposte. The Grammy Award-winning ensemble will be joined by the Oberlin College Choir for William Brittelle’s Psychedelics and Merrill Garbus’ Quizassa. Tickets are available online.

[Read more…]

Baldwin Wallace to host “Bach on Screen” February 18

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by Mike Telin

Bach on ScreenJohann Sebastian Bach’s music seems to have penetrated every corner of Western culture. Baldwin Wallace’s Bach on Screen Conference will devote a whole day on Sunday, February 18 to the subject in four sessions in the Chamber Music Hall of the BW Conservatory.

At 9:00 am, the topic is “From Silent Films to Video Games,” followed at 11:15 am by “Bach’s Sacred Music in New Contexts.” After lunch, a 2:00 pm session takes up “Bach in Unexpected Places,” and the day ends with the interesting question, “Genius or Villain?” at 4:15 pm.

[Read more…]

Musicians from soundSCAPE to perform at Oberlin Conservatory: a conversation with composer Jesse Jones

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by Mike Telin

JesseJonesEach summer since 2005, the composition and performance exchange soundSCAPE has attracted composers and performers from around the world for two weeks of concerts, lectures, master classes, and workshops. “The Festival is in a beautiful location near the Alps in Northern Italy,” Oberlin faculty composer Jesse Jones said during a recent conversation. “They’ve commissioned many pieces over the years, so it’s a great place for composers to go. It was an honor for me to be the Festival’s composer-in-residence in 2015.”

On Sunday, February 18 at 8:00 pm in Oberlin Conservatory’s Warner Concert Hall, musicians from soundSCAPE — soprano Tony Arnold, percussionist Aiyun Huang, violinist Mark Fewer, flutist Lisa Cella, and pianist Thomas Rosenkranz — will present a free concert of music by composers who have long supported the work of the Festival. The program will include Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon’s Flores del Viento III, Christopher Adler’s 010 machine states, Chris Paul Harman’s Partita for Solo Violin, and Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez’ Kikai no Mori and Chance Forest Interludes.

[Read more…]

Oberlin plans four-concert Historical Performance WinterFest

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by Daniel Hathaway

FlandersRecorderQuartetThe Oberlin Conservatory will present a four-concert Historical Performance WinterFest this month, including performances by the Flanders Recorder Quartet, lutenist Nigel North, the Oberlin Baroque Ensemble, and faculty harpsichordist Mark Edwards. Baroque flute professor Michael Lynn, who has organized the events, said, “They should all be excellent concerts, and the price can’t be beat — free!” The festival includes two public master classes as well as the performances.

HP WinterFest begins on Tuesday, February 20 with an 8:00 pm performance by the Flanders Recorder Quartet in Fairchild Chapel, a stop on the ensemble’s 30th Anniversary Farewell Tour. Founded in Belgium in 1987 and comprising Bart Spanhove, Paul Van Loey, Tom Beets, and Joris Van Goethem, the Quartet began touring following their success at the 1990 Musica Antiqua Competition in Bruges. After a career that has included more than 1,800 concerts in 42 countries, the ensemble has decided to disband at the end of 2018. [Read more…]

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