by Timothy Robson
Cellist Jeffrey Zeigler’s April 26 recital at Transformer Station, sponsored by the Cleveland Museum of Art, typified his performances: variety and virtuosity aplenty — something for everyone willing to open their ears. Zeigler falls into that category of “super-performer” whose technique is seemingly unlimited, and who can make the most thorny contemporary music sound approachable, however austere and dissonant. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
To cap off its 25th anniversary season, Jeannette Sorrell and Cleveland’s Baroque Orchestra, Apollo’s Fire, made a big leap across historical and stylistic boundaries into the early Romantic music of Beethoven. In the second of four performances on Friday evening, April 28 at the Cleveland Museum of Art, Sorrell fielded an orchestra of 49 players (huge by AF standards) and joined forces with violinist Noah Bendix-Balgley (making his period instrument debut) to lead a spirited foray into music premiered in the first decade of the 19th century. [Read more…]
by Mike Telin
Last night, Friday, April 28 at Masonic Auditorium, Cleveland Opera Theater scored a win with its latest mainstage production, Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro. Directed by Scott Skiba, the exceptionally strong cast performed with solid vocal prowess and comedic flair, making for an enjoyable musical as well as theatrical experience. [Read more…]
by Robert Rollin
On Saturday night, April 8, The Cleveland Opera gave an outstanding performance of Mozart’s Don Giovanni at First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights. Despite the venue’s awkward acoustics and lack of a pit for the sizeable orchestra, conductor Grzegorz Nowak led a well-balanced performance that allowed the singers to be heard clearly. The opera flowed beautifully through its many intricate arias, recitatives, and ensembles, and all eight leads were in fine voice. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
You can count on Les Délices, Cleveland’s French Baroque specialists, to curate inspired programs and perform them with consummate skill. “Fated Lovers,” featuring cantatas by Louis-Nicolas Clérambault and Jean-Philippe Rameau, continued that tradition on Sunday afternoon, April 9 in Herr Chapel at Plymouth Church. The tragic stories of Hero and Leander, Pyramus and Thisbe, and Hippolyte and Aricie inspired gorgeous music expressively sung by soprano Clara Rottsolk and tenor Jason McStoots, supported by the instrumentalists of Les Délices. [Read more…]
by Timothy Robson
This past weekend, as the culmination of a three-decade labor of love, Cleveland scholar, professor, and conductor Ross Duffin conducted his reconstruction of 15th-century English composer Richard Davy’s St. Matthew Passion. Performances were given in Akron and Cleveland by Duffin’s own Quire Cleveland with Jeffrey Strauss and Owen McIntosh as the soloists. I heard the Sunday afternoon performance on April 9 at Historic St. Peter’s Church in downtown Cleveland. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Among the more persistent bits of misinformation about Johann Sebastian Bach is the notion that the Cantor of Leipzig was completely forgotten soon after his death in 1750, his antiquated musical style disdained by a younger, cooler generation of composers — including his sons. In fact, Bach’s legacy never completely died out. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Like a commuter ferry, The Cleveland Orchestra took on more passengers as it went along through the Thursday, April 6 concert featuring pianist Mitsuko Uchida. First, twenty-four string players and four winds came onboard for Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 12, then the winds disembarked and more string players appeared on deck for a Mendelssohn string symphony. Finally, nine winds joined that larger body of strings for Mozart’s 20th Piano Concerto. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Last heard in Cleveland in September as one-third of the Montrose Piano Trio, pianist Jon Kimura Parker returned for a solo recital on Sunday, April 9 in Gartner Auditorium of the Cleveland Museum of Art. His unusual, brilliantly played program, “Passion and Pictures,” concluded the tenth season of Tri-C’s Classical Piano Series. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Chinese-born guitarist Xuefei Yang’s program on Saturday, March 25 at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights paralleled the life cycle of a flower — budding at the beginning with a lute suite by Johann Sebastian Bach, opening up its petals in pieces by Niccolò Paganini and Xu Changjun, then coming into full, fragrant bloom with a set of Brazilian tunes by Heitor Villa-Lobos, Dilermando Reis, Antônio Carlos Jobim, and Aníbal Augusto Sardinha. [Read more…]