by Daniel Hathaway
TODAY’S EVENTS:
Friday’s postponed CIM Orchestra Concert led by JoAnn Faletta reappears on Saturday at 7, and on both days, The Cleveland Orchestra features conductor John Adams (pictured) and pianist Jeremy Denk (Saturday at 8, Sunday at 3), and New Music Guild performances in Youngstown with duo pianists Roman Rudnytsky and Ben Malkevitch, violinist Gwyneth Rollin, and composer and pianist Robert Rollin are scheduled for 4 pm on Saturday and 3 pm on Sunday.
NEWS BRIEFS:
The Cleveland Museum of Art has released dates and details of its performing arts events for the spring. Events include the Philadelphia-based chamber choir The Crossing with guest organist Scott Dettra, Indian classical music by tabla virtuoso Zakir Hussain, contemporary African music by Fatoumata Diawara, a concert by Chinese sheng virtuoso Wu Wei and a recital on the organ in Gartner Auditorium by Nicole Keller. There’s also a performance in the Atrium of an elaborate work by Serbian composer Aleksandra Vrebalov inspired by the museum’s 15th century Icon of the Mother of God and Infant Christ (Virgin Eleousa). Read the press release here.
Cleveland Chamber Choir, Scott MacPherson, artistic director, has sent details about its February concerts, Cecilia and Her World: Music of Cecilia McDowall, which will bring the British composer to town for two free performances on February 26 (Amasa Stone Chapel at CWRU) & 27 (Waetjen Auditorium at CSU). Download the press release here.
The Cleveland Institute of Music has announced that violinist Jennifer Koh will receive an honorary doctorate and speak at its 94th Commencement Ceremony on May 14. Read more here.
On Friday, The Catalyst Quartet and pianist Michelle Cann released the second CD in its UNCOVERED series on the Azica label, featuring four premiere recordings of the half-dozen known chamber works by Florence B. Price. Read the press release here.
WEEKEND ALMANAC:
We’ll choose two anniversaries to call out this weekend: the debut of Giuseppi Verdi’s Otello at La Scala in Milan on February 5, 1887, and the passing of German-American musicologist, radio host, and pianist Karl Haas in Royal Oak, Michigan on February 6, 2005.
Although Verdi was keen to adapt Shakespeare’s theater works to the opera stage, it took a decade’s worth of cajoling and some outright trickery on the part of his publisher and musical colleagues — including Arrigo Boito — to bring him out of retirement to write Otello. The Cleveland Orchestra will conclude its current season with performances of the work on May 21, 26, and 29 led by Franz Welser-Möst, with Michael König, tenor (Otello), Tamara Wilson, soprano (Desdemona), Christopher Maltman, baritone (Iago), Jennifer Johnson Cano, mezzo-soprano (Emilia), Pene Pati, tenor (Cassio), Owen McCausland, tenor (Roderigo), Raymond Aceto, bass (Lodovico), and Kidon Choi, baritone (Montano), and including the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus and Children’s Chorus.
There will be much more advance publicity from Severance to come, but in the meantime, enjoy insights into Otello from tenor Jonas Kaufmann and conductor Antonio Pappano streamed live in June, 2017 from London’s Royal Opera House.
Longtime followers of WCLV FM will remember Karl Haas’s “Adventures in Good Music,” which originated on WRJ in Detroit in 1959, began appearing on the Cleveland station in 1970, and was eventually syndicated to a national and then global audience.
Haas’s resonant greeting, “Hello, everyone,” and his live performance of the slow movement of Beethoven’s “Pathétique” Sonata as title music for each episode gained him the largest audience of any classical music radio show in the world until 2003, two years before his passing. WCLV continued its syndication of previous shows for another four years before broadcasting the final episode on June 29, 2007.
Karl Haas’s programs are restricted by copyright, although YouTube offers one episode broadcast by WOSU-FM in Columbus, Ohio in January of 1983 where he pays tribute to Artur Rubinstein and includes an interview with the pianist some two decades earlier. Click here to listen.
To close with a bit of silliness, the sweet of tooth might enjoy knowing that Saturday is World Nutella Day, Ice Cream for Breakfast Day, and National Chocolate Fondue Day as well. Those whose taste runs to the savory side may look forward to celebrating National Yorkshire Pudding Day on Sunday, although that would require investing in what the Brits call a “joint” of beef. Bon appetit!
