by Daniel Hathaway
ABOUT THAT MISSING PICCOLO CONCERTO:
Cleveland Orchestra piccoloist Mary Kay Fink — and her fans — were looking forward to the premiere last April of a concerto commissioned for her from composer Oded Zehavi, an event that was upended by the novel coronavirus. The Orchestra has now released audio of a chamber version of the work performed by the Cleveland Chamber Collective on March 1 at Disciples Christian Church (we reviewed the concert here). The performance is part of a video that includes a conversation about the creative process with Zehavi, Fink, and Cleveland Orchestra Chief Artistic Officer Mark Williams. Watch and listen here.
HAPPENING TODAY:
The third COVID-19 Benefit Concert presented by Music & Art at Trinity Cathedral goes live online in real time at 7 pm. Music by the “Three Bs” — Boulanger, Britten and Brahms involves organist Nicole Keller, countertenor John McElliott, tenor JR Fralick, pianist Todd Wilson, violinist Andrew Sords and pianist Elizabeth DeMio. Hornist Richard King is featured in Strauss’ First Concerto on Lunchtime with The Cleveland Orchestra, guest carilloneur Patrick Macoska gives a free lunchtime recital in University Circle, and the MET Opera continues its Bel Canto Favorites Week with Bellini’s I Puritani (featuring Anna Netrebko — who is said to be recovering nicely from COVID-19 in a Russian hospital).
INTERESTING READ:
The Harvard Crimson offers its readers a current undergraduate’s view of how many symphony orchestras are missing opportunities to draw young people into the classical music fold. Read chemistry major Leigh M. Wilson’s “Who Belongs at the Orchestra” here.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
On this date in 1818 (or perhaps on September 17), French composer Charles Gounod was born in Paris. Known today principally because of two of his twelve operas (Faust and Romeo et Juliette remain solidly in the repertory), he also wrote much religious music (he thought about becoming a priest). One of his most charming works is the Petite Symphonie for winds, viewable here in a 2017 performance by Camerata Pacifica at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California.
And on September 18, 1943, Austrian cellist and composer David Popper was born in Prague. Watch a slightly fuzzy video of his Requiem for three cellos and piano from the Cleveland Institute of Music in 2010 featuring Kathryn Brown, piano, with Matt Allen, Melissa Kraut and Alex Cox, celli. And for cellists, CIM graduate Joshua Roman took on the regimen of recording one of his Etudes every week for 40 weeks, “wherever Joshua and his laptop happen to be.” Here, he takes on Etude No. 4.