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Apollo’s Fire: “¡Hispania! A Voyage from Spain to the Americas” — a conversation with Sophia Burgos

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by Mike Telin

This week Apollo’s Fire will present “¡Hispania! A Voyage from Spain to the Americas.” Designed by Jeannette Sorrell, this new production features the music of Spanish composers Diego Ortiz, Gaspar Sanz, and Santiago de Murcia, blending virtuosity with lively dance rhythms. The ensemble of strings, plucked instruments, and percussion includes musicians from Mexico and Costa Rica, with flamenco guitarist Jeremías García and Puerto Rican soprano Sophia Burgos featured as soloists.

Performances are on Wednesday, March 20 at 7:30 pm at St. Bernard Catholic Church in Akron, Thursday the 21st at 7:30 at St. Rocco Parish, and Friday the 22nd at 7:30 and Saturday the 23rd at 8:00 at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church. A pre-concert conversation with guitarist Jeremías García begins one hour before each performance. Tickets are available online.

[Read more…]

Help Us Celebrate 15 Years!

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Now that our 15th anniversary season is in full swing, so are many great classical concerts in our area. Whether it’s orchestras, operas, chamber ensembles, or choirs, the team here at ClevelandClassical.com is continuing to work hard to bring you news, calendar listings, previews, reviews, and other coverage of the musical events you love.

To continue providing this valuable service, we’re counting on our readers for financial support. In order to reach our goal by the end of our fiscal year on June 30, we need to raise an additional $15,000 in donations from private individuals beyond our foundation support and advertising revenue.

Will you advocate for quality, non-profit arts journalism by contributing to our fundraiser? [Read more…]

CityMusic Cleveland: Laura Hamilton plays Four Seasons Recomposed

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by Mike Telin

Without a doubt, The Four Seasons — that group of four violin concertos by Antonio Vivaldi — is one of the most recognizable works in the classical music canon. And like many, composer Max Richter fell in love with it as a child, as he told NPR’s Audie Cornish in an interview.

“It’s beautiful, charming music with a great melody and wonderful colors. Then, later on, as I became more musically aware — literate, studied music and listened to a lot of music — I found it more difficult to love it. We hear it everywhere — when you’re on hold, you hear it in the shopping center, in advertising; it’s everywhere. For me, the record and the project are trying to reclaim the piece, to fall in love with it again.”

That project he’s referring to is his The Four Seasons Recomposed (after A. Vivaldi). On Thursday, March 14 at 7:30 pm at Fairmount Presbyterian Church, violinist Laura Hamilton (pictured) will join CityMusic Cleveland in Richter’s inventive re-imagining of Vivaldi’s masterpiece. Under the direction of guest conductor Annunziata Tomaro, the program, “Rediscovered Classics,” will also include Beethoven’s Symphony No. 2. The program will be repeated on Friday at 7:30 at Lakewood Congregational Church, Saturday at 7:30 at Shrine of St. Stanislaus, and Sunday at 4:00 at St. Noel Catholic Church. All performances are free.

[Read more…]

BlueWater Chamber Orchestra: a conversation with harpist Yolanda Kondonassis

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by Mike Telin

“I think everybody who plays an instrument has a piece that when they heard it for the first time, they said — this is what I want to do with my life because I want to play this piece as many times as I can,” harpist Yolanda Kondonassis said during a Zoom call.

On Saturday, March 16 at 7:30 pm at Church of the Covenant, Kondonassis will perform Ravel’s Introduction and Allegro with the BlueWater Chamber Orchestra. Under the direction of Daniel Meyer, the program will also include the world premiere of Takuma Itoh’s Kohola Sings for harp and chamber orchestra, Roland’s Suite by Lully, and selections of Fauré’s Incidental Music to Pelléas et Mélisande with soprano Amanda Powell. Tickets are pay-what-you-wish.

Kondonassis recalled hearing the Ravel live for the first time at the Cleveland Institute of Music while she was still in high school at the Interlochen Arts Academy. “My teacher at Interlochen brought me to Cleveland with her on spring break. She was a student of Alice Chalifoux — who would become my mentor and teacher. I stayed with Alice and would go with her to CIM when she taught. I happened to go to somebody’s degree recital and I remember hearing the Ravel in The Pavilion, where Mixon Hall is now, and thinking it was the most phenomenal ear candy I had ever experienced.”

[Read more…]

Cleveland Jazz Orchestra celebrates Rhapsody in Blue alongside more ‘20s music & four premieres

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by Jarrett Hoffman

The Cleveland Jazz Orchestra is taking an intriguing approach to the 100th anniversary of Rhapsody in Blue. This weekend’s program will feature the Gershwin classic alongside more music from the 1920s — not to mention four world premieres by Aidan Plank and Brad Wagner of the CJO, and Margi Griebling-Haigh and Ty Alan Emerson of the Cleveland Composers Guild.

At the piano in the Gershwin will be the Orchestra’s own Jackie Warren. At the podium will be Cleveland Pops Orchestra music director Carl Topilow. And joining the CJO will be string players from the Cleveland Pops, BlueWater Chamber Orchestra, CityMusic Cleveland, and Case Western Reserve University.

Performances take place Friday, March 15 at 7:30 pm at the Maltz Performing Arts Center and Saturday, March 16 at 8:00 pm at BLU Jazz+. [Read more…]

Tuesday Musical: Kyiv Virtuosi Symphony Orchestra Tour of Peace

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by Mike Telin

This week the Kyiv Virtuosi Symphony Orchestra will embark on its first North American tour. Under the direction of Dmitry Yablonsky, the “Tour of Peace” will stop in Akron for a performance at 7:30 pm on Tuesday, March 12 at E.J. Thomas Hall.  Presented by Tuesday Musical, the program will include music by Myroslav Skoryk, Ignaz Moscheles, Felix Mendelssohn, Baruch Berliner, and Ludwig van Beethoven. Tickets are available online.

Born in Moscow to a musical family, Dmitry Yablonsky was accepted into the Central Music School for gifted children at the age of six, where the cello became his instrument of choice. “I have to thank my mother, who took me out of the Soviet Union in the 70s,” Yablonsky said during an interview. Growing up in New York City, he went on to study cello at the Juilliard School of Music. During graduate school at Yale University he studied conducting with OttoWerner Muller.

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Oberlin Opera Theater: The Dark Side of Orpheus

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by Stephanie Manning

Reposted courtesy of Oberlin College and Conservatory

The myth of Orpheus and Eurydice has appeared in art for centuries, in everything from books, to paintings, to music. So why do we keep telling it? That question weighed on Stephanie Havey’s mind as the stage director began planning for Oberlin Opera Theater’s production of L’Orfeo.

“There’s something very relatable in that doubt that Orpheus has,” Havey says about the bard’s quest to rescue his wife from the underworld. “That fear of losing his loved one, and also doubting himself—I think these themes are all very universal.”

Written at the turn of the 17th century, Claudio Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo is one of the earliest examples of opera as an art form. But it’s not the only operatic take on Orpheus. Havey, Oberlin’s visiting assistant professor of opera theater for 2023-24, has directed the versions by Gluck and Offenbach at other points in her career. But she says Monteverdi’s has a distinct perspective on the dark side to Orpheus’ musical power.

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Cleveland Chamber Music Society Welcomes The Dover Quartet

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by Mike Telin

Part of the Cleveland Chamber Music Society’s mission is to present ensembles who are at the beginning of their careers. “We’re always looking at young ensembles that have gotten management and have won chamber music competitions,” Steve Somach, the head of CCMS’s program committee said in an interview with this publication.

One example is The Dover Quartet, who, after having won the grand prize and three special prizes at the 2013 Banff International String Quartet Competition, made their debut on the series in May of 2016. On Tuesday, March 12 at 7:30 pm at Plymouth Church, The Dovers — Joel Link and Bryan Lee (violins), Julianne Lee (viola), and Camden Shaw (cello) — will make their fourth appearance on the Chamber Music Society’s series with a program of music by Joaquín Turina, Leoš Janáček, and Franz Schubert. Tickets are available online. [Read more…]

No Exit’s surrealist journey continues: “Piano Dada with Shuai Wang”

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by Max Newman

“One of the things about surrealism: it’s not a style, it’s a set of ideas. You have ideas and concepts that have never gone out of style,” No Exit artistic director Tim Beyer said during a recent telephone conversation.

This week the ensemble continues their season-long, multifaceted exploration and celebration of surrealism. “Piano Dada with Shuai Wang” features music originally presented at the Festival Dada in 1920 and Soirée du Coeur à Barbe in 1923, including Marcel Duchamp’s Erratum Musical, Francis Picabia’s La Nourrice Americaine (fast and slow versions), and Elt Mesens’ Drie Composities Voor Klavier as well as an ensemble rendition of Erratum Musical and a new piece by Luke Rinderknecht. [Read more…]

Les Délices to present live premiere of “Song of Orpheus”

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by Mike Telin

Prior to Les Délices’ premiere of “Song of Orpheus” in a video format in October of 2021, bass-baritone and composer Jonathan Woody told this publication that he was excited when the ensemble’s artistic director, Debra Nagy, asked him to compose a new work for the program. “She asked if I would write something for their traditional forces of oboe, violin, gamba, and harpsichord. I loved that because as a singer, so often people ask me to compose vocal works. To get to write something that doesn’t have a vocal part was a fun challenge for me.” 

This week Les Délices will present the live premiere of “Song of Orpheus,” a program of musical works inspired by the Orpheus myth. [Read more…]

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