by Daniel Hathaway
HAPPENING TODAY:
We jumped the gun last Friday and announced two al fresco events a week early. Let’s try that again.
If the weather gods are smiling, at 6:30 pm today, Idle Twittering: a flock of flutes, will perform outdoors at the Streeter Arboretum in Wooster. George Pope, Jane Berkner, Kyra Kester, and Linda White, will bring along a collection of flutes of all shapes and sizes for an event sponsored by Ohio Regional Music Arts and Cultural Outreach (ORMACO). It’s free, but registration is recommended. There are rain plans in case the gods are being uncooperative.
And the Church of the Western Reserve will present a free outdoor concert by the a cappella group Zero to Sixty tonight at 7. Details in our Concert Listings.
Add to that today’s noontime Carillon Concert by Patrick Makoska in University Circle — “Ragtime Old and New” — and a 5:30 pm Patio Concert by folksinger and guitarist Sarah Goslee Reed and friends, live streamed from her home in Mount Vernon. Both of these events will be live streamed.
For details of all events, visit our Concert Listings.
INTERESTING READS:
On the eve of his 80th birthday on July 28, conductor Riccardo Muti spoke at length on a variety of topics with Aldo Cazzullo of Milan’s daily newspaper, Corriere della Sera. Read some highlights here (continued here).
And The Guardian recently caught up with German bass-baritone Thomas Quasthoff, who retired from singing classical music at the height of his career in 2012. He’s back, singing jazz. Read the article here.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
A year ago today, Jarrett Hoffman profiled Spanish Renaissance composer Tomas Luis de Victoria, “the most well-known composer in Spain during the 1500s, and considered one of the greatest composers of the 16th century as a whole — who died on this day in 1611 in Madrid.
“There’s been a revival of interest in Victoria’s work over the past hundred years, and his name is no stranger to the program booklets — and YouTube channels — of Northeast Ohio’s ensembles.
“His Christmas motet O magnum mysterium is quite popular: check out this live performance from Quire Cleveland at Trinity Cathedral in 2009, or this duo version from Mignarda’s 2016 album of Advent and Christmas music for lute and voice.
“The Requiem Mass Officium Defunctorum is considered by many to be Victoria’s masterpiece. Hear Contrapunctus Early Music sing that work’s “Taedet animam meam” during a live performance at Mary Queen of Peace in 2015.
And on this date in 1958, American composer, pianist, and multi-faceted musician Jean Hasse was born in Cleveland. After graduating from the Oberlin Conservatory in 1981 and pursuing graduate studies at Cleveland State University, she embarked on a career that seems emblematic of entrepreneurial 21st-century artists. In addition to composing for films, silent films, videos and special events, and new concert music pieces, she has managed and served as representative for music publishing houses and formed her own company, Visible Music, in 1987. She moved to England in 1994.
Hasse’s career and accomplishments can’t be summed up in a few sentences. Read her own account here, and click here to listen to a 2013 performance from the University of Bristol (where she has taught film composition and scoring) of her new score for the 1928 silent short The Fall of the House of Usher, based on Poe’s classic story.
And click here to hear how Hasse reacted musically to Ernst Servaes’ 1912 film Artheme Swallows his Clarinet (when a piano lands on his head), premiered at the Luton Library Theater in 2017.