by Daniel Hathaway
TODAY’S ENTRIES:
. Charnofsky plays music your grandma wouldn’t know about from 2 to 4 on WRUW, ChamberFest encores on WCLV at 8
. Cooper violin competition announces contestants for August in Oberlin, a new job for CMA’s Tom Welsh in Knoxville
. Anniversaries of outdoor concert series on both coasts
ON TODAY:
From 2 pm to 4 pm Eric Charnofsky’s “Not Your Grandmother’s Classical Music” features Paul Creston’s Choreografic Suite, Johanna Beyer’s Clusters for piano, Daniel Kessner Dances for Clarinet and Guitar, and music by Arvo Pärt, Felipe Perez Santiago, and Thomas Tomkins. Click here to listen to the internet feed from WRUW at Case Western Reserve University.
NEWS BRIEFS:
The eleventh annual Thomas and Evon Cooper International Competition will take place between August 15-19, 2022, on the campus of Oberlin College and Conservatory (read the press release here). This year’s competition is for violinists, 13-18. Here are the participants:
- Sameer Agrawal, 17, Chicago, Illinois, United States
- Calvin Alexander, 17, Shreveport, Louisi ana, United States
- Esme Arias-Kim, 16, Hoffman Estates, Illinois, United States
- Bianca Ciubancan, 16, Chicago, Illinois, United States
- Brandon Du, 18, Ellicott City, Maryland, United States
- Maxwell Fairman, 18, Cincinnati, Ohio, United States
- Audrey Goodner, 16, Reston, Virginia, United States
- Dániel Hodos, 17, Budapest, Hungary
- Kento Hong, 16, Edgemont, New York, United States
- Seohyun Kim, 13, Seoul, South Korea
- John Lee, 17, Vernon Hills, Illinois, United States
- John Matters, 18, Bethesda, Maryland, United States
- Katelyn Moon, 17, Hackensack, New Jersey, United States
- Jonathan Okseniuk, 16, Mesa, Arizona, United States
- Bobby Boogyeom Park, 16, Bayside, New York, United States
- Anna Stube, 16, Calgary, Canada
- Francis Tsai, 16, Phenix City, Alabama, United States
- Chunyi (Grace) Zhou, 16, Irvine, California, United States
Thomas Welsh, director of performing arts at the Cleveland Museum of Art, has been named Managing Director of Big Ears, the new music festival in Knoxville, Tennessee. The appointment was announced on Monday morning. Read the Big Ears press release here.
INTERESTING READ:
After studies at the Oberlin Conservatory, tenor Limmie Pulliam became disenchanted with his burgeoning singing career and decided to take a hiatus. That lasted a dozen years until 2022, when, despite a bout with COVID and the death of his father, he brilliantly reappeared to sing the title role of Otello with Franz Welser-Möst and The Cleveland Orchestra. Read the Musical America feature by Zachary Lewis here.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
Prominent outdoor concert series on both the east and west coasts made their debuts on July 11.
The Boston Pops, the celebrated orchestra made up of Boston Symphony musicians minus principal players, started out as the Boston Promenade Orchestra, which played its first concert indoors on July 11, 1885 at the old Boston Music Hall, then moved under Arthur Fiedler’s reign to the Charles River basin when the orchestra discovered a bequest they’d never cashed in. Watch a video detailing the history of the Hatch Shell.
On July 11, 1940, a young Leonard Bernstein made his conducting debut with the Pops at that open-air Esplanade shell on the Charles River, leading Wagner’s Prelude to Act I of Die Meistersinger.
These days, most of the orchestra concerts are played by the Boston Landmarks Orchestra under the baton of Akron Symphony music director Christopher Wilkins, who succeeded Charles Ansbacher in 2010. Wilkins has said, “To me, a perfect concert is one that appeals to people of different backgrounds who have never been together before, creating a joyful and meaningful shared new experience.”
That was also the philosophy behind the Hollywood Bowl, which held the opening concert by its resident orchestra on July 11, 1922 under the baton of Alfred Hertz.
A podcast covers the first century of performances in this iconic structure (originally intended to be replaced every year with a new shell!) And an episode of CBS Sunday Morning features a conversation with the LA Philharmonic’s Gustavo Dudamel.
