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FiveOne Experimental Orchestra to present “The Mashup Concert” at Bop Stop May 13

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by Mike Telin

FiveOneBopStopMashup (noun): A mixture or fusion of disparate elements. Mashup (music): A musical genre encompassing songs which consist entirely of parts of other songs.

On Friday, May 13 at 9:00 pm at the Bop Stop, 51XO (FiveOne Experimental Orchestra) will present “The Mashup Concert.” The program will feature mashups, overlays, and works that live somewhere in between the pop and classical worlds.

Musicians have been mashing things up for centuries in one way or another. Sometimes the desired outcome was to create a new musical style, while other times the purpose was to create comedy. Whatever the reason, creating mashups has never become passé.

Why? It’s fun. [Read more…]

CityMusic Cleveland: a conversation with violin soloist Tessa Lark

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by Mike Telin

LARK-Tessa“There are some challenging spots in the concerto, but it’s worth all of the effort. The melodies, as you would expect in Dvořák, are just sublime, the kind that never leave your ear,” violinist Tessa Lark said during an interview.

Beginning on Wednesday, May 11 at 7:30 pm at Mentor High School Performing Arts Center, CityMusic Cleveland Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Avner Dorman, will present the first of five area performances of Antonín Dvořák’s Violin Concerto featuring Tessa Lark. The program will also include Felix Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Overture, Op. 26 and the Symphony No. 3, ”Scottish.” Check our Concert Listings for times and locations of additional performances.

We caught up with the 2016 Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient by telephone in Danville, Illinois, where she was performing Brahms’s Violin Concerto with the Danville Symphony. [Read more…]

Singers Companye to feature contemporary works on May 15 concert in Fairlawn

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by Daniel Hathaway

Singers-CompanyeSingers Companye, the 40-voice chorus conducted by University of Akron emeritus professor Samuel Gordon, will cap off their 17th season with a program of contemporary choral music on Sunday, May 15 at 4:00 pm at Faith Lutheran Church in Fairlawn. The program includes music by Ola Gjeilo, Tarik O’Regan, Eric Whitacre, and Joan Szymko, accompanied by a string ensemble.

Gordon said in a recent telephone conversation that he started the ensemble at the encouragement of his former UA students. “I realized there were lots of teachers I had trained in the area, and they all had expressed an interest in continuing to sing, so we just started doing that. Now of the 40 people in the group, I would guess that 30 to 32 of them are teachers.” [Read more…]

Organist David Enlow to perform on Stambaugh Skinner May 15

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by Daniel Hathaway

Enlow-DavidOn Sunday, May 15 at 4:00 pm, New York organist David Enlow will play a recital on the restored E.M. Skinner instrument in Youngstown’s Stambaugh Auditorium. His program includes three of Antonín Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances, Op. 46, Louis Vierne’s “Naïades,” “Carillon de Westminster,” and “Adagio” from Symphonie No. 3, Frank Bridge’s Adagio, Percy Whitlock’s Fanfare, César Franck’s Chorale No. 1 in E, and Claude Debussy’s Petite Suite.

After his studies at The Juilliard School, the Canadian-born organist took a job as organist at the Church of the Resurrection in New York, where he’s now approaching his 15th anniversary as organist and choir master (and also serves as Dean of the New York Chapter of the American Guild of Organists). [Read more…]

Dover Quartet to make their CCMS debut on May 10 at Plymouth

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by Mike Telin

Dover-QuartetSince winning the grand prize and three special prizes at the  2013 Banff International String Quartet Competition, the Dover Quartet — Joel Link and Bryan Lee, violins, Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt, viola, and Camden Shaw, cello — have quickly risen to the forefront of young internationally touring string quartets. Their 2015-16 season includes more than 120 dates around the world, including debuts at Carnegie Hall, Yale University, the Lucerne Festival, and on the Lincoln Center Great Performers series.

On Tuesday, May 10 at 7:30 pm at Plymouth Church, the Dover Quartet will make their Cleveland Chamber Music Society debut with a program featuring works by Mieczysław Weinberg, Leoš Janáček, and Robert Schumann. A Pre-concert lecture by Francesca Brittan will begin at 6:30 pm. [Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra: a conversation with Brett Mitchell

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by Mike Telin

COYO-MitchellRecognized for his prodigious output of symphonic film scores during the 1930s and 40s, Viennese composer, conductor, and arranger Erich Wolfgang Korngold was well-known in Europe for his concert and chamber music, operas and stage works before arriving in Hollywood. After the end of World War II, the composer retired from film music in order to dedicate himself to writing music for the concert hall. One of the first works he penned was his Violin Concerto, which received its premiere on February 15, 1947 by Jascha Heifetz and the St. Louis Symphony.

On Sunday, May 8 at 3:00 pm at Severance Hall, Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra competition winner Jieming Tang will perform Korngold’s virtuosic concerto as part of the concluding concert of COYO’s 30th-anniversary season. Under the direction of music director Brett Mitchell, the program will also include Adam Schoenberg’s Finding Rothko, and Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances. [Read more…]

Pianist Orli Shaham to perform at CityMusic Cleveland benefit

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by Mike Telin

SHAHAM-Orli“What a genius this guy was,” pianist Orli Shaham said about Mozart and his Piano Concerto No. 12 in A, K. 414. “He just could not run out of ideas. In all of the traditional places in this piece where you would expect a certain theme to show up, he always puts in a different theme — it could be based on the same premise, but somehow it sounds new. For any other composer, just one theme would have been enough to make the entire piece.”

On Friday, May 6 at 6:30 pm at Shaker Heights Country Club, CityMusic Cleveland Chamber Orchestra will hold a benefit con cert under the direction of Avner Dorman. The program will feature Orli Shaham in a performance Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 12, as well as Dorman’s After Brahms — 3 Intermezzos for Piano. [Read more…]

Jahja Ling reminisces on the 30th Anniversary of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra

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by Mike Telin

JahjaLingYouth orchestras have long provided the inspiration for young musicians to decide whether to make music their career goal. Sometimes they’ve had an important impact on conductors, as well. Such is the case with Jahja Ling, who founded two notable youth orchestras during his career: those of The Cleveland Orchestra and the San Francisco Symphony.

On Sunday, May 8 at 3:00 pm at Severance Hall, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra will present the concluding concert of its 30th-anniversary season under the direction of current music director Brett Mitchell. The program will include Adam Schoenberg’s Finding Rothko, Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances, and Erich Korngold’s Violin Concerto, featuring COYO concerto competition winner Jieming Tang. [Read more…]

Les Délices to present
“Concertos Comiques”

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by Mike Telin

CorretteFinding ways to circumvent rules has always been a popular pastime. It has also often inspired creative genius. When Louis XIV put a stranglehold on entertainments such as opera and theater by enforcing rules designed to secure official monopolies, non-court composers and playwrights countered with Fair Theaters (Théâtre de la Foire), low-cost performances on the outskirts of Paris. The satirical plots regularly mocked the pretentiousness of the bourgeois by featuring servants who were far more intelligent than their bosses, or by poking fun at old men who chased after young girls.

On Saturday, May 7 at 8:00 pm at the Bop Stop and Sunday, May 8 at 4:00 pm at Plymouth Church, Les Délices will present Concertos Comiques. The program will include works by Michel Corrette, Francesco Corbetta, Joseph Bodin de Boismortier, and Jean-Joseph Mouret, performed by Debra Nagy (oboe), Julie Andrijeski and Scott Metcalfe (violins), Josh Lee (viola da gamba), and Simon Martyn-Ellis (theorbo and baroque guitar). [Read more…]

Cleveland International Piano Competition to welcome 35 contestants in August 2016

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by Daniel Hathaway

CIPC-Medalists-081013It’s the time of year when lots of young people have been eagerly watching their mailboxes — or inboxes — to see whether they’ve been admitted to the college of their choice.

This year, the same has been true for the nearly 330 pianists, ages 18-30, who applied to compete in the 2016 Cleveland International Piano Competition, to be held from July 24 through August 7. Of those hopefuls, 35 recently received the “fat” letter inviting them to Cleveland — an acceptance rate of 10.6%, which is roughly equivalent to that of last year’s admissions to Dartmouth, Duke, or Vanderbilt.

The successful candidates emerged a few weeks ago after a marathon, three-day session of video viewing by a selection jury made up of Kathryn Brown and Paul Schenly (Cleveland Institute of Music), Lei Weng (University of Colorado), Caroline Oltmanns (Youngstown State University), and CIPC president and CEO Pierre van der Westhuizen. The 35 who were invited have now formally accepted. [Read more…]

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