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Cleveland Pops and LEGACY: Broadway on the Severance stage (Feb. 1)

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by Stephanie Manning

Cleveland is no stranger to welcoming Broadway talent, with Playhouse Square regularly hosting national tours of award-winning musicals. But on February 1, it felt like Broadway came to Severance Music Center instead.

The vocal quartet LEGACY teamed up with the Cleveland Pops Orchestra to present “Music of Motown,” a high-energy evening that was memorable in the best way. “Tonight is about having a really good time,” LEGACY founder Justin Reynolds promised the packed crowd — and the two groups certainly delivered. [Read more…]

Tri-C Classical Piano Series: Roman Rabinovich (Jan. 26)

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by Peter Feher

The resplendent sound of a symphonic brass section filled the Tri-C Metro Auditorium on Sunday afternoon, Jan. 26. Never mind that there was only a single piano onstage.

Listening to Modest Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition in its original solo piano version from 1874, you can’t help but hear the orchestration that Maurice Ravel would supply for the work some 50 years later. Ravel wasn’t the first musician to arrange the suite, but the way he approached the various movements — from the stately opening Promenade to the crashing finale of “The Great Gate of Kiev” — has forever reshaped the piece.

It was fitting, then, that pianist Roman Rabinovich devoted some time to the French composer before performing Mussorgsky’s score on Sunday. On the first half of his recital for the Tri-C Classical Piano Series, Rabinovich played Ravel’s Sonatine, along with three other works that creatively connected with Pictures at an Exhibition. The result was a deeper artistic experience of Mussorgsky on the second half.

[Read more…]

Oberlin Opera’s Ada Lovelace is as free as a bird (Jan. 26)

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by Stephanie Manning

Ada Lovelace’s “infinite energy” was more mental than physical. Lovelace, a 19th-century English mathematician, was chronically ill for most of her life — yet her agile mind worked magic on numbers, paving the way for important scientific discoveries.

That dichotomy is a cornerstone of The Infinite Energy of Ada Lovelace, composer Kamala Sankaram and librettist Rob Handel’s opera about the brilliant woman often considered the first computer programmer. Oberlin Opera Theater presented a simple but effective staging on January 26, directed by Cara Consilvio. [Read more…]

Cleveland Jazz Orchestra and Musical Theater Project (Jan. 25)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

Many things about George and Ira Gershwin’s 1930 show Girl Crazy set it apart — the cast of future superstars (Ginger Rogers and Ethel Merman), the creativity of the Gershwin brothers, the artistry of orchestrator Robert Russell Bennett — all distinguishing it as a landmark musical. But in the Cleveland Jazz Orchestra and The Musical Theater Project’s ninth annual collaboration on Saturday, January 25 at the Maltz, the songs were the stars.

Though the weather outside was frightful, your heart would have to have been frozen solid not to be affected by songs like “I Got Rhythm,” “Embraceable You,” “Bidin’ My Time,” “But Not For Me,” and “Boy! What Love Has Done to Me” — songs memorable, charming, and tender, that set Girl Crazy apart as one of Broadway’s most endearing scores.

[Read more…]

Pahud and Bax perform magnificently for Cleveland Chamber Music Society (Jan. 21)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

At the latest Cleveland Chamber Music Society’s concert at Disciples Church on Tuesday evening January 21, flutist Emmanuel Pahud and pianist Alessio Bax, performed magnificently, but also made quite an impression on the young audience, perhaps for years to come.

Pahud, the longtime principal flutist of the Berlin Philharmonic and something of a rock star in the flute world, received a Beatles-like reception from the many flute students in attendance. There were shrieks of excitement and standing ovations, and at intermission an extended period of selfie-taking and high fives with the star.

Established and new works by J.S. Bach and Nicolas Bacri were featured, as well as transcriptions of violin pieces by Mozart, Clara Schumann, and César Franck by Pahud. [Read more…]

Akron Symphony: “Autochthonous”-ly American (Jan. 18)

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by Stephanie Manning

The subtitle of William Grant Still’s Symphony No. 4, “Autochthonous,” made for a little vocabulary lesson at the Akron Symphony last weekend.

Meaning “indigenous, or belonging to a particular place by birth or origin,” the composer used the word to describe a distinctly American composition — one including not only African American musical styles, but also those from a variety of American cultures. The Akron Symphony’s January 18 concert was this celebration of our country’s music writ large. [Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Collective: Music of America VII (Jan. 12)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

In a program titled Music of America VII held on Sunday, January 12 at Disciples Christian Church in Cleveland Heights, the Cleveland Chamber Collective presented a concert of attractive and varied new music, inspired by sounds from around the globe —  India to Buenos Aires and Bali to Manhattan.

At two and a half hours, the program might have stood a trimming, but it would be hard to know what to cut — the works and performances by familiar and rising Cleveland professionals were uniformly splendid. Director Ty Alan Emerson served as gracious host as well as stagehand and impresario.

In Reena Esmail’s Blaze, a duo for violin (Emily Cornelius) and tabla (Dylan Moffitt) much of the intensity came from Cornelius’s relationship to Moffitt’s exact playing — we were drawn in by the quietness of Moffitt’s tabla and by Cornelius’s attention to it. The two drifted in and out of sync, with the violinist both captive to and rebelling against the insistent rhythm, even while she conjured enigmatic extremes of darkness and ecstasy.
[Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra celebrates Coretta Scott King in uplifting and joyful MLK concert (Jan. 19)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

This article was originally posted on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Coretta Scott King, the wife of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was the focus and inspiration for The Cleveland Orchestra’s 45th Martin Luther King, Jr. Celebration Concert, held at Severance Music Center on Sunday, January 19.

Outstanding performances by conductor Daniel Reith and The Cleveland Orchestra, soprano soloist Laquita Mitchell, conductor Dr. William Henry Caldwell and the Martin Luther King Celebration Choir, and graceful narration by Aseelah Shareef helped to cast refreshing new light on the great Civil Rights leader, author, wife, and mother.

[Read more…]

Conductor Elim Chan and Cleveland Orchestra thrill with impressive performances of Lutosławski and Brahms concertos (Jan. 16)

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by Stephanie Manning

This article was originally posted on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — “Witold Lutosławski Week” has come early this year, and what a treat it is.

When the Polish composer visited Cleveland in 1988, Mayor George Voinovich designated February 29 through March 6 “Witold Lutosławski Week” in his honor. And this week, The Cleveland Orchestra is revisiting his music at Severance Music Center. On Thursday, January 16, conductor Elim Chan led the ensemble in ambitious concertos by Lutosławski and Brahms, joined by violinist Augustin Hadelich.

[Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra dazzles with French music, a tribute to Coltrane and Gershwin’s An American in Paris (Jan. 9)

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by Daniel Hathaway

This article was originally posted on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — You might think that an orchestra that excels in the Austro-German repertoire could prove to be the wrong tool for the special demands of French music. But think again.

On Thursday evening, January 9, at Severance Music Center, guest conductor Stéphane Denève and The Cleveland Orchestra gave elegant, witty, and transparent accounts of works by Darius Milhaud and Francis Poulenc, worked with  soloist Steven Banks in Guillaume Connesson’s wildly virtuosic saxophone concerto honoring John Coltrane, and explored George Gershwin’s ebullient An American in Paris from the point of view of a Frenchman on the podium. [Read more…]

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