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Preview: Paul Jacobs to open Stambaugh organ series with a solo recital on September 22

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by Daniel Hathaway

JACOBS-PaulAmerican organist Paul Jacobs will be featured in the opening recital of this season’s organ series at Stambaugh Auditorium in Youngstown. On Sunday, September 22 at 4 pm, Jacobs will offer an eclectic program on the E.M. Skinner organ, originally installed at Stambaugh in 1926 and recently and wonderfully restored to its original condition.

Jacobs deserves a place in the Guinness Book of Records for prodigious feats of organ playing, including an 18-hour marathon concert of Bach’s complete organ works in Pittsburgh in 2000 celebrating the composer’s 250th birthday, and eight cycles of the complete oeuvre of Olivier Messiaen in different American cities, each presented in a nine-hour, non-stop concert. And all of that from memory.

Jacobs is a celebrated performer but is equally dedicated to teaching. He joined the faculty at the Juilliard School in New York in 2003 in his mid-twenties, one of the youngest appointees in the history of that distinguished institution. As chairman and the sole member of the organ department, Jacobs is responsible for the nurture of the eight young organists in his studio. [Read more…]

Preview: Cleveland Orchestra Fridays @ 7 — a conversation with Eugene Friesen of Trio Globo about this week’s After-party

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by Mike Telin

Trio-Globo“I have increasingly come to value our extraordinary tradition of classical music that we have spent our lives listening to and being moved by,” cellist Eugene Friesen (left) told us by telephone. “The range of musical sophistication that we have been exposed to by listening to it and the range of human emotion that is expressed in it I think are deep treasure chests for us to draw upon as creators.”

On Friday, September 20, as part of the KeyBank Friday’s @ 7 series at Severance Hall, Eugene Friesen will be joined by Trio Globo colleagues Howard Levy and Glen Velez for an after-party performance of contemporary music that is rooted in jazz, classical, sacred music and global rhythms. The evening begins at 6:00 pm in Reinberger Chamber Music Hall with a pre-concert performance by pianist Gregory Wang with special guest Peter Takács. At 7:00, Fabio Luisi will lead The Cleveland Orchestra in performances of Schumann’s Spring Symphony and Beethoven’s Piano Concerto #5 (Emperor) featuring Hélène Grimaud.

“We really do come from very different musical backgrounds,” Friesen says of his Trio Globo colleagues, “but when I get together with Howard and Glenn I just feel this extraordinary loving respect that goes across our traditions and our various approaches.” [Read more…]

Preview: Cleveland Orchestra — Pianist Hélène Grimaud talks about Blossom, Beethoven — and Wolves

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by Mike Telin

GRIMAUD-HeleneThe allure of performing in a natural setting made a strong impression on French-born pianist Hélène Grimaud in 1990 when she made her United States debut in the Schumann concerto at Blossom with The Cleveland Orchestra under Jahja Ling. “I was always fascinated by the US before I first stepped foot here,” she told us in a telephone conversation, “but once I did at Blossom I was so taken by everything. I was utterly charmed. Of course that fact that The Cleveland Orchestra is so magnificent was a big part of that, but it was also the warm hearts of the people and the entire team. The whole experience was really a turning point for me and the great acoustics changed my mind completely about performing in open air venues.”

Grimaud now splits her time between New York and London. She will return to Cleveland this weekend to join conductor Fabio Luisi in three indoor performances — the opening concerts of the Severance Hall season — programs that include Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5 (“Emperor”). The performances will be something of a reunion for pianist and conductor. “I have worked with Luisi many times,” Grimaud said, “and we toured this concerto with the Staatskapelle Dresden. I am particularly happy that my return to Cleveland with be with a colleague like him.”

Interestingly enough, Grimaud only recently warmed to the fifth Beethoven concerto. “It’s funny because for quite some time I was sort of circumspect about it because #4 was such a close friend. [Read more…]

Preview: Cleveland Orchestra: guest conductor Fabio Luisi talks about Mahler, Schumann and working at The Met

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by Mike Telin

LUISI-FabioIn the middle of the season that saw his sudden elevation to principal conductor at the Metropolitan Opera in New York during the long indisposition of James Levine, Fabio Luisi made an impressive debut with The Cleveland Orchestra. He returns to open the Severance Hall season this weekend with three performances featuring Mahler and Schumann symphonies and Beethoven’s fifth piano concerto with Hélène Grimaud, an artist Luisi has known and worked with for many years.

We spoke with Fabio Luisi by telephone earlier this month, just before his debut with the Czech Philharmonic in the Verdi Requiem. “I’m looking forward to my return to Cleveland,” he said at the beginning of our conversation. “The orchestra played so beautifully during my debut concert two seasons ago.”

The concerts on Thursday and Saturday evenings will feature Mahler’s fourth symphony. “I have a long relationship with Mahler’s music,” he said. “It’s something that touches my heart and soul. It is something very special to me.” When asked when he first discovered Mahler, he quickly responds, “I can tell you quite precisely. I was fifteen years old in Genoa, the town of my birth. I was a student and I went to a concert with my girlfriend of that time and it was Mahler’s Symphony #5. It was such a discovery for me because I had never heard a Mahler symphony before and this huge amount of sound and the differences of moods astonished me. And from then on I was a Mahler addict.” [Read more…]

Preview: Arts Renaissance Tremont — free concerts since 1991

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by Mike Telin

ART Trio TerzettoSince its founding in 1991 Arts Renaissance Tremont (ART) has been a cultural pillar in that now trendy West Side Cleveland Neighborhood. “When we began the series, Tremont was not as trendy or as popular as it is today,” remembers ART president Robert Schneider. “I remember Miracles being the place to go for pancakes so we were there long before the neighborhood became as popular as it is today.”

Under the tireless direction of Chris Haff- Paluck with assistance from a group of extremely dedicated board and volunteers, Arts Renaissance Tremont has somehow managed to remain true to the vision of keeping the concerts free of charge. “We operate solely on membership and freewill donations. There are no tickets involved and we try to make the programs accessible to everyone,” says Schneider. ART has also received financial support from Cuyahoga Arts and Culture (CAC Grants) the Neighborhood Connection and the Kulas Foundation. ART has also benefited greatly from the generous support of its performance venue, the acoustically beautiful Pilgrim Congregational Church.

Tremont resident and longtime ART concert attendee Lorraine Thwaite says she enjoys Arts Renaissance Tremont concerts because the performers are of world-class quality and the concerts are right in her neighborhood. [Read more…]

Preview: CIM’s Mixon Masters Series features composer-performers, beginning with Lera Auerbach on September 17

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by Mike Telin

AUERBACH-LeraThe Cleveland Institute of Music will take a different approach to its Mixon Masters Series this season. “Return of the Composer/Virtuoso” will bring performing composers to the Mixon stage in 2013-2014, beginning with Russian-born composer-pianist Lera Auerbach on Tuesday, September 17 at 8:00 pm. Auerbach will perform her 24 Preludes and Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition on her Cleveland debut recital.

The preludes are personally important to her. “I have always loved cycles of 24 preludes”, Auerbach said in a telephone conversation from Berlin. “I have studied and played many of them like Chopin, Scriabin and of course Bach. I always knew that one day I would be writing my own 24 preludes but I didn’t anticipate what would happen. I had such a great time writing the piece. It gave me a canvas to explore — there are so many possibilities. It was such a fantastic journey to take that when I finished writing the 24 preludes for piano I just couldn’t stop! I couldn’t believe it was over and there were no more preludes to write.”

As it turned out, Auerbach didn’t quit after those 24 but immediately began writing another two dozen for violin and piano. “But after I finished those I was still hungry for more so I decided to keep on going and I wrote 24 for cello and piano.” [Read more…]

Preview: Akron Symphony opens its season on September 15 — a conversation with assistant conductor/piano soloist Levi Hammer

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by Mike Telin

HAMMER-Levi“I love this concerto,” Levi Hammer says of Mozart’s 25th piano concerto. “I never played it and have always wanted to. It has the most gorgeous woodwind writing, especially in the second movement, and to me, it is like playing chamber music.”

On Sunday, September 15 beginning at 7:30 pm in E.J. Thomas Hall, the Akron Symphony Orchestra led by Maestro Christopher Wilkins, opens its 2013-2014 season with a concert featuring Brahms’s Symphony No. 1, American composer Ron Nelson’s Savannah River Holiday and Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 25.

Levi Hammer, who is also the Akron Symphony’s assistant conductor as well as music director of the Akron Youth Symphony, says that he sees his career following the long tradition of conductors who have ascended to the orchestral podium through the piano. “You think about Karajan, Bernstein, Levine, Barenboim, Muti and Eschenbach and even Szell and Reiner: they were all fantastic pianists and they all continued to play even though they were essentially conductors. Nowadays we have the likes of Asher Fisch, Antonio Pappano and Robert Spano, who are all conductors but still remain very active as pianists. It is important to me that I follow this tradition and I am following it quite consciously.” [Read more…]

Preview: Back-to-School Concerts feature faculty & visiting performers and a composition contest

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by Daniel Hathaway & Mike Telin

STRAUSS-MichaelEven before the Labor Day weekend, many of Northeast Ohio’s universities, colleges and conservatories were already up and running. Because students have only just moved in, concerts at the beginning of the term usually feature faculty recitals and performances by visiting ensembles, and there are several of them scheduled for the early days of September.

The first faculty event at the Oberlin Conservatory this fall will feature violist Michael Strauss (left) and his colleagues Alexa Still, flute, and pianists Monique Duphil and James Howsmon in Dmitri Shostakovich’s Viola Sonata, op. 147, Maurice Duruflé’s 1928 Prélude, Récitatif, et Variations for Flute, Viola, and Piano, Op. 3, and Paul Hindemith’s Viola Sonata, op. 11, no. 4, in a free concert in Kulas Recital Hall at the Oberlin Conservatory on Saturday, September 7 at 8.

“The staff discussed who would perform the first recital of the semester”, Strauss told us by phone. “I said, yeah, I can do that. I’m sure that many of the faculty would have been fine with the slot, it’s just that no one had made the move.”

Now in his second year as associate professor of viola and chamber music, Strauss admits that opening with Shostakovich’s last work is a little risky. “It’s quite a dark piece and it is a big test in keeping your wits about you. I started looking at music that would fit and I thought of going heavy and then lightening up.” [Read more…]

Preview: Cleveland Orchestra at Blossom:
two “Pixar in Concert” evenings —
a conversation with conductor Richard Kaufman

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by Mike Telin

Kaufman,-Richard---by-Eric-Stoner“I’ve been very blessed,” conductor Richard Kaufman says of his impressive musical career — most of which he has devoted to conducting and supervising music for film and television productions, as well as performing film and classical music in concert halls and on recordings. On Saturday, August 31, and Sunday, September 1, at Blossom Music Center, Richard Kaufman will lead The Cleveland Orchestra in Pixar in Concert. The production includes musical selections from A Bug’s Life, Brave, Cars and Cars 2, Finding Nemo, Monsters, Inc., Toy Story, Toy Story 2 and 3, Ratatouille, Up, and WALL·E along with video clips of each film. Both concerts will be followed by fireworks, weather permitting.

“I was part of the team that created the show at Disney and this weekend’s program is a montage of the 13 Pixar films’ music.” Kaufman points out that performing live to animation is not an easy task. “I have to say that I have played violin for many film scores but I think that playing for animation is by far the most challenging. In animation everything moves very quickly: you have to be able to turn on a dime. In the studio all the musicians use click-tracks but this weekend only part of the orchestra will be using click-tracks. And the fact that The Cleveland Orchestra is going to be playing this music on two summer evenings at Blossom is truly wonderful. It’s like all of the planets have aligned.” [Read more…]

Preview: Cleveland Orchestra at Blossom — a conversation with pianist Martin Helmchen

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by Mike Telin

Helmchen“Every time I play this piece I always see this incredible personality that Beethoven must have been,” German pianist Martin Helmchen says of Beethoven’s first piano concerto. “Writing a concerto like this for his debut on the Viennese stage as a pianist and a composer, and to be so daring and so original is really one of the most extraordinary things in music history.”

On Saturday, August 24, Martin Helmchen will make his Cleveland Orchestra debut at Blossom Music Center performing Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 under the direction of conductor David Afkham. The Concerto also includes Schubert’s Symphony in C major (The Great)and Beethoven’s Overture to Coriolan

Known as a performer possessing a “highly virtuosic yet unpretentious style,” Helmchen first gained international attention after winning the 2001 Clara Haskil Competition. His recent concerto debuts include performances with the Berlin Philharmonic and Herbert Blomstedt, the Vienna Philharmonic and Valery Gergiev, the London Philharmonic with Vladimir Jurowski and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Andris Nelsons. In 2011 he made his Tanglewood Festival debut with the Boston Symphony and Christoph von Dohnányi. And what are his thoughts about this week’s Cleveland Orchestra debut? “It’s so very exciting,” Helmchen told us by telephone from Berlin. “It’s one of the things that I when I look at my calendar it is a little bit unbelievable — it’s such a great opportunity.” [Read more…]

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