by Stephanie Manning
HAPPENING TODAY:
It’s a slow Monday, with nothing on the calendar. But don’t be fooled — the rest of the week has plenty in store.
Season opening concerts from The Cleveland Orchestra, CIM, Oberlin, and the Akron Symphony await, plus more. For details, visit our Concert Listings.
NEWS BRIEFS:
Composer Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate (pictured, above) has announced his 2024-25 season, which includes the first opera composed entirely in an American Indian language. Loksi’ Shaali’ (“Shell Shaker”) will receive its world premiere in October from the Oklahoma City Philharmonic and Canterbury Voices. Tate is a 2022 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he earned a Masters in piano performance and composition.
And more news with a CIM connection: the Canton Symphony Orchestra announced current CIM composition student Alexander Moiseev as the group’s next Composer Fellow. Moiseev will write a new work to be premiered by the Canton Youth Symphony Advanced Orchestra in May 2025.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
Speaking of composers — Nadia Boulanger, born on this day in 1887, influenced an entire generation of them. As well as being a composer herself, her list of students included luminaries like Aaron Copland, Philip Glass, and Astor Piazzolla.
Boulanger stepped back from writing music after the untimely death of her younger sister Lili. However, she would go on to program and share both her and her sister’s music in concert throughout her life. Enjoy this performance of her Fantaisie pour piano et orchestre on YouTube, and check out the Boulanger Initiative for more resources about women in music.
On this day in 1966, the Metropolitan Opera opened its doors at the company’s new opera house at Lincoln Center. Fitting for the occasion, the Met kicked off the season with a world premiere — Samuel Barber’s Antony and Cleopatra, starring soprano Leontyne Price. Librettist, designer, and director Franco Zefferelli staged an extravagant production, but technical issues, “gaudy” costuming, and an overall clash between Zeffirelli and Barber’s artistic visions resulted in a rocky start for the Met’s new era.
As one of the first international Black opera stars, Price (pictured left with co-star Justino Díaz) unquestionably felt the pressure from the poor reception. As Peter G. Davis wrote in The New York Times in 2009:
“At the Juilliard performance of the revised version in 1975, a fan asked her what it was like to encounter the opera again. ‘Honey,’ she reportedly replied, ‘when I heard the first notes, I broke out into a cold sweat.’”
