by Daniel Hathaway
ON TODAY’S AGENDA:
The free, Noon Advent Series at the Church of the Covenant continues today with an organ recital by Adam Chlebek, an Oberlin organ major and music director of Lakewood’s St. James Church. Both organs will be featured in music by Nicolaus Bruhns, Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, and Olivier Latry.
Tonight at 7:30 pm, the Cleveland Chamber Music Society presents The Cavani Quartet in its next-to-last performance in its Beyond Beethoven series. This event, a free, community concert at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights, features Beethoven’s Op. 95 and Op. 127 string quartets, and the “beyond” work is Osvaldo Golijov’s Tenebrae. (Photo: an earlier performance at the Music Settlement).
And in case you haven’t already heard, don’t go to the Akron Civic tonight — the Tuesday Musical performance by Rodney Marsalis and Philadelphia Big Brass has been cancelled.
INTERESTING READ:
Israeli-born cellist and conductor Amit Peled is featured in a Baltimore Sun article about The Mount Vernon Virtuosi, his chamber orchestra, and his vision of free classical music for all. (Peled was named music director of CityMusic Cleveland in 2019, when the organization was still presenting chamber orchestra concerts.) Read the article here.
CHANGES OF VENUE:
Two events previously scheduled at the Cleveland Institute of Music have been moved to other venues. The Cleveland Art Song Festival’s Winter Minifestival, including a recital on December 10 by countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo and pianist Bryan Wagorn, and master classes with Wagorn on the 9th, and Costanzo on the 11th, will now be held in Drinko Hall at Cleveland State University, same dates and times.
And a joint concert by Margaret Brouwer’s Blue Streak Ensemble and Burning River Baroque scheduled at CIM on December 15 will now take place at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Cleveland Heights.
NEWS BRIEFS:
The San Francisco Conservatory of Music announced today that applications are now being received for the second annual Emerging Black Composers Project. Esa-Pekka Salonen will lead the San Francisco Symphony in the first performance of a new work commissioned from the winner of the Project, who will also receive a $15,000 cash award. Read a press release here.
TODAY’S ALMANAC:
Today we celebrate two inaugurations and a premiere that took place on December 7 in classical music history.
On this date in 1842, the precursor of the New York Philharmonic played its first concert in the Apollo Rooms at 410 Broadway. The Philharmonic Society of New York opened the evening with “Beethoven’s Grand Symphony in c minor,” and in a typical mid-19th century format, went on to a scene from Weber’s Oberon, a Hummel Quintette, the Overture to Oberon, a duet from Rossini’s Armida, a scene from Fidelio, an “Aria Bravura” from Mozart’s Belmont and Constantia (aka The Abduction from the Seraglio), and a “New Overture in D” by Kalliwoda. View the printed program here on the NY Phil’s comprehensive archives website.
And on another shore, on this date in 1898 the Paris Opera-Comique extended its long history by opening its third theater named Salle Favart. (Building No. 2 had been destroyed in a fire on May 25, 1887 that killed 84 of its patrons.) As time went on, the distinctions between serious and comic opera in Paris eroded, and the Opera-Comique was responsible for producing such titles as Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande in 1902, and Ravel’s L’heure espagnole in 1911.
Speaking of premieres, on this date in 1939, Artur Rodzinski led the first performance of William Walton’s Violin Concerto with Jascha Heifetz and the Cleveland Orchestra. Listen here to a later, live performance conducted by George Szell in 1968 with Zino Francescatti as soloist.
