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Preview: Classical Guitar Weekend: a conversation with Raphaella Smits

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by Daniel Hathaway

SMITS-RaphaellaBelgian guitarist Raphaella Smits will be making her fourth visit to Cleveland for this year’s Classical Guitar Weekend to play a solo recital in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music on Saturday, May 25 at 4:30 and to conduct a master class on Thursday, May 23 at 2:00 pm. A frequent visitor to our shores, Smits has made some 95 solo and educational appearances in the US during her distinguished career, which includes having been the first woman to win Spain’s prestigious Certamen Internacional de Guitarra Francisco Tarrega Competition.

We reached Raphaella Smits via Skype video conference at her home outside Antwerp. Of course I have to ask her first if she admires Rubens’s paintings.

Raphaella Smits: Yes of course. They are everywhere. We are living about ten minutes outside town and we’re lucky to have a really huge, beautiful garden. It’s spring and all the leaves and flowers are out.

Daniel Hathaway: I’ve been reading about how you got started on the guitar, but it would be fun for you to tell us that again in your own words! What first attracted you to the instrument?

RS: Why not! In the beginning I wasn’t attracted to it at all because I didn’t even know it existed. But I grew up with a lot of culture. [Read more…]

Preview: Classical Guitar Weekend: a conversation with American guitarist Colin Davin

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by Mike Telin

DAVIN-ColinHailed as “the real thing, a player with a virtuoso’s technique, a deeply expressive musicianship, and a probing imagination” by the American Record Guide, guitarist Colin Davin is quickly emerging as one of today’s most dynamic young artists. His recent recital appearances include Alice Tully Hall, the Metropolitan Museum of Art (on historic instruments from the museum’s collection), New York Philharmonic Ensembles at Merkin Hall, and venues in Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Austin, and Cleveland.

As an educator, Davin has taught at the Aspen Music Festival as the teaching assistant to Sharon Isbin, and in January 2013, he was a guest artist-faculty at the Afghanistan National Institute of Music in Kabul, Afghanistan.

On Friday, May 24 beginning at 8:00 pm in Mixon Hall, Colin Davin presents a recital featuring the music of J.S. Bach, Britten, Erin Rogers and Joan Tower. On Saturday, May 25 from 1:00 until 4:00, Mr. Davin will give a master class in CIM Studio 113.

We spoke to the Bay Village native by telephone from his home in New York and we began by asking him why he chose the two Bach sonatas for his Classical Guitar Weekend recital.

[Read more…]

Preview: Classical Guitar Weekend: a conversation with British guitarist Jonathan Leathwood

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by Mike Telin

here“Jonathan Leathwood is a genius,”writes Therese Wassily Sabaof Classical Guitar [UK]. One of the few guitarists to perform on six-string and ten-string guitars, Leathwood’s innovative programs are a mix of modern and traditional works. His recent recital appearances have taken him to Italy, the UK, Germany, Turkey, France, Belgium, Holland, and the United States. On Saturday, May 25 beginning at 8:00 pm in Mixon Hall, Jonathan Leathwood presents a recital featuring the works of J.S. Bach, de Falla, Gerhard, Goss, José, and Lindberg. Additionally Mr. Leathwood will give a master class on Friday, May 24 from 1:30 until 4:30 in CIM studio 113.

Equally noted as a teacher and writer on music, Jonathan Leathwood writes and lectures on a range of topics from Bach to Elliott Carter. In 2001 he conceived and edited Guitar Forum, a new scholarly journal for the classical guitar published in the United Kingdom by the European Guitar Teachers’ Association (EGTA UK). Currently he is a lecturer at the University of Denver. [Read more…]

Preview: Quire Cleveland invites Jameson Marvin to conduct a Palestrina Fest on May 25

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by Daniel Hathaway

MARVIN-JamesonQuire Cleveland will celebrate Memorial Day weekend with an all-Palestrina concert at Historic St. Peter’s Church in downtown Cleveland on Saturday evening, May 25. Quire’s founders, Ross W. Duffin and Beverly Simmons, have invited a distinguished choral specialist to guest conduct the professional ensemble for the occasion: Jameson Marvin, who retired last year after thirty-two years as director of choral activities at Harvard, including the Harvard Glee Club, the Harvard-Radcliffe Collegium Musicum and the Radcliffe Choral Society (Marvin’s last Cleveland appearance was with the Glee Club in March of 2010).

The Quire Cleveland invitation came about through personal connections, he told us in a phone call from his home in Lexington, MA. “Ross and Bev’s son David sang with the Collegium when he was at Harvard. They came to several concerts and really liked what we were doing, especially with Renaissance polyphony. Interestingly, I had met Bev at workshops I offered in the White Mountains of New Hampshire in the summer of 1979 and 1980. The fact that Ross and Bev went to Stanford the same time I did means that we see things similarly, though they’ve gone much more in depth into musicological areas and I into performance areas. When they came to Cambridge, I would see Ross after concerts and he told me about Quire Cleveland and invited me to come and conduct the group at some convenient time.” [Read more…]

Preview: Manfred Honeck conducts The Cleveland Orchestra in its four-concert season finale this weekend

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by Mike Telin

HONECK-ManfredThis weekend The Cleveland Orchestra concludes its 2012-13 Severance Hall season with four concerts beginning on Thursday, May 23 and running through Sunday afternoon, May 26. The performances, under the direction of Manfred Honeck in his Cleveland Orchestra debut, include Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3 featuring the German-born, London-based pianist, Lars Vogt, and the Cleveland premiere of Swedish composer Rolf Martinsson’s Open Mind. This series also includes a popular KeyBank Friday@7 series concert with a pre-concert performance by saxophonist Bobby Selvaggio and a post-concert party featuring the Brooklyn, N.Y. based funk band MOKAAD.

Austrian-born conductor Manfred Honeck attended the Academy of Music in Vienna studying violin and viola, and spent more then ten years as a member of the Vienna Philharmonic and the Vienna State Opera Orchestra. Following his decision to pursue a conducting path, Honeck has held positions at the Zurich Opera House, MDR Symphony Orchestra Leipzig, Norwegian National Opera, Staatsoper Stuttgart and the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. Honeck also served as principal guest conductor of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra from 2008 to 2011, a position he will resume from 2013 to 2016. In North America, Manfred Honeck is most well known as music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony, a post he was appointed to in 2007. [Read more…]

Preview: Akron Baroque: ten minutes with Amber and Maximilian Dimoff

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by Daniel Hathaway

DimoffsOn Thursday, May 16 at 7:30 pm, Akron Baroque plays its final concert of the season at First Congregational Church, extending its reach into the classical area with works by Joseph and Michael Haydn and Johann Christian Bach, but honoring its Prime Directive with a concerto for violin and double bass by Antonio Vivaldi with Amber and Maximilian Dimoff as soloists. Amber is in her third year with Akron Baroque and plays regularly in the first violin section of the Akron Symphony as well as with Cleveland Pops and Cleveland Chamber Symphony. Max is principal bass with The Cleveland Orchestra, but has appeared more than once as an electric bassist in contemporary works with his orchestra colleagues.

The Dimoffs are a musical family. Their daughter, Isabel, plays cello in the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra and Contemporary Youth Orchestra and just won the senior division in the Cleveland Cello Society’s Scholarship Auditions. Their son, Xavier, plays saxophone in CYO and is studying jazz. Though father and daughter premiered a new concerto together with CYO earlier this season, Max and Amber haven’t often had the opportunity to perform together as a duo. [Read more…]

Preview: Ars Futura to perform at Survival Kit Gallery on Friday, May 17

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by Mike Telin

Ars-Futura-Wang-HallmanThe recently-formed new music ensemble Ars Futura describe themselves as a forward-thinking, mixed-chamber, new music ensemble dedicated to commissioning, performing and popularizing new works. The group’s mission is to insure the continuation of their art form by steadily adding to the repertoire and exposing audiences to the great artists who are composing today. “Our first season is dedicated to the Cleveland connection,” says pianist Shuai Wang who co-founded the group with flutist Madeline Lucas. “I have a great respect for musicians in Cleveland,” Wang adds, “and this season all of the compositions we performed were by Ohio composers.”

On Friday, May 17 beginning at 7:00 pm at Survival Kit Gallery, located on the 3rd floor of 78th Street Studios in the Gordon Square Arts District, Ars Futura — Shuai Wang and Hyunsoo Kim, piano, Madeline Lucas, flute, Jinjoo Cho, violin and Carlos Javier, cello — present the final performance of the group’s inaugural season. The concert features the music of Keith Fitch, Marshall Griffith, Eric Charnofsky, Tim Mauthe and Joseph Hallman. (Pictured above: Wang and Hallman). [Read more…]

Preview: Contemporary Youth Orchestra: Rock the Orchestra — a conversation with guest artist Bootsy Collins

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by Mike Telin

COLLINS-BootsyAlthough the word “Funk” may not be used on a daily basis during orchestra rehearsals and concerts, this week is all about “Funk” as the Contemporary Youth Orchestra under the direction of Liza Grossman joins forces with legendary bassist Bootsy Collins.

On Friday, May 17 beginning at 7:30 pm in Cleveland State University’s Waetjen Auditorium, CYO under the direction of Liza Grossman and Bootsy Collins perform 14 songs from his own discography in Psychotic Bump School. The performance is the 2013 edition of CYO’s annual Rock the Orchestra concert.

Beginning tonight (Tuesday, May 14) at 6:00 pm, also in Waetjen Auditorium, CYO in co-operation with the Bootsy Collins Foundation presents WIND ME UP!(an exclusive, behind the scenes view of our collaboration), a benefit for the Bootsy Collins Foundation and Cleveland Metropolitan School District International School. (Check our concert listings for details).

“Tonight and Friday’s concert are all about supporting the kids” says Patti Collins, the Foundation’s president who, along with her husband, created the foundation. [Read more…]

Preview: Michael Lynn and friends to hold benefit for Cleveland Clinic liver transplant program at Gartner Auditorium May 11

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by Daniel Hathaway

LYNN-Michael“I call this Life 2.0 or ‘Michael is back!’” exclaimed Oberlin Conservatory Baroque Flute and Recorder Professor Michael Lynn during his miraculous recovery from debilitating liver disease following an organ transplant at the Cleveland Clinic earlier this year.

Lynn, who has taught at Oberlin for 36 years and served as its associate dean for technology and facilities and curator of musical instruments, received a diagnosis of liver disease eight years ago and was placed on a transplant waiting list. Because his “numbers” were so good at that point, his wait would turn out to be a long one. But after he developed encephalopathy and diabetes and had to take a medical leave from Oberlin, the situation soon became critical.

Last October 2nd he got “the call” and suddenly found himself the recipient of a donor liver. Things quickly went straight uphill for him. “The good stuff happened very quickly after the transplant”, he told us on his cell phone from his back yard in Oberlin. “The liver disease had the ‘side effect’ of sending toxins — mainly ammonia — to my brain and that caused all sorts of problems including not being able to perform for almost four years. What was amazing is that I could already tell in the hospital that I was going to be able to play again because my brain knew how and my coordination was coming back. When I got back home I was pretty beat up, but I immediately started noodling around on the recorder and that showed me I could play just fine. Since then I’ve played four concerts and it was totally easy.” [Read more…]

Preview: Cleveland Orchestra Family Concert — a chat with guest conductor Michael Butterman

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by Mike Telin

BUTTERMAN-MichaelIf you’re looking for a fun way to spend the afternoon on a family outing with Mom this weekend what could be better taking in a Cleveland Orchestra Family Concert? On Sunday, May 12 beginning at 2:00 pm conductor Michael Butterman makes a return visit to Severance Hall with his own program titled Fables, Fantasies and Folklore.

During the concert, audience members will be invited to create their own musical story. “It’s really just an exploration of narrative and music, [basically] how composers develop a sense of character, setting and plot,” says Maestro Butterman.

Recognized for his commitment to creative artistry, innovative programming, and audience and community engagement, Michael Butterman serves as music director for both the Boulder Philharmonic and the Shreveport Symphony and is resident conductor of the Jacksonville Symphony. And for thirteen seasons he has held the position as Principal Conductor for Education and Outreach for the Rochester Philharmonic, the first position of its kind in the United States.

Butterman created Fables, Fantasies and Folklore in Rochester and he describes the concert as something that works very well for elementary age kids who are thinking about their own creative writing, and studying English language arts. But, he points out, “we are also doing it on Mother’s Day which is about parents and kids having a good time. [Read more…]

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