by Daniel Hathaway
THIS WEEKEND:
There are 20+ events to choose from this weekend (some with more than one performance). Good luck choosing among them!
Friday: The Baldwin Wallace Symphony Orchestra and Symphonic Wind Ensemble (6 pm in Gamble Auditorium), Wit’s Folly (Carl Maria von Weber on historical clarinets, 7 pm, the Bath Church), The Cleveland Orchestra (Marvel Studios’ Black Panther in Concert, 7:30 at Severance), Renovare Music (7:30 at City Church), Cleveland Jazz Orchestra (big band jazz, 7:30 at the Maltz), The Oblivion Project (pictured, Piazzolla, 7:30 at the Art Museum), and Baldwin Wallace Opera (Offenbach, 8 pm at the Kleist Center).
Saturday: Baldwin Wallace Opera (Offenbach, 3 pm at the Kleist Center), Stars in the Classics (4 pm at Church of the Western Reserve), Wit’s Folly (Carl Maria von Weber on historical clarinets, 7 pm, Praxis Fiber Workshop), Akron Symphony (Bologne, Mozart, Montgomery & Beethoven, 7:30 at E.J. Thomas), The Cleveland Orchestra (Marvel Studios’ Black Panther in Concert, 8 pm at Severance), and Baldwin Wallace Opera (Offenbach, 8 pm at the Kleist Center).
Sunday: The Oblivion Project (Piazzolla, 2 pm at Akron-Summit Public Library), She Roars (chamber music by living female composers, 2 pm at The Bop Stop), Choral Arts Cleveland & Wind Quintet (premiere of a Mickey McGroarty piece, 3 pm at Disciples Church), Baldwin Wallace Opera (Offenbach, 3 pm at the Kleist Center), Cleveland Women’s Orchestra 90th Anniversary Concert (3:30 at Severance), Heights Chamber Orchestra (3:30 at Fairmount Presbyterian), and Organist James O’Donnell (formerly of Westminster Abbey, 4 pm at St. Paul’s, Cleveland Hts.)
See our Concert Listings for more information about these and other events.
WEEKEND ALMANAC:
Friday, March 28:
On this date in 1881, Modest Moussorgsky died at the age of 42 following a drinking binge, and pianist-composer Sergei Rachmaninoff died in 1943 in California, shortly after becoming a U.S. Citizen.
It’s a toss up whether Mussorgsky’s Night on Bald Mountain or Pictures at an Exhibition is more popular. Check out the original piano version of Pictures played by Evgeny Kissin at the Chorégies d’Orange in France in 2002, or by Sviatoslav Richter in 1956, live in Prague.
Certainly the most popular orchestration of Pictures is the one made by Maurice Ravel in 1922, although there are many others. Cleveland Orchestra Music Study Group lecturer Dr. Rose T. Breckenridge talks about the Ravel version here.
Rachmaninoff made personal appearances in Cleveland during his American tours from 1923 to 1942, performing his concertos and the Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini. The composer-pianist’s fame inspired Mike Telin to make a trip to the Cleveland Orchestra archives to learn what kind of P.R the Orchestra used to promote his visits, and to imagine what Rachmaninoff might have done with today’s social media resources. Click here to read “Keeping in touch with your fans then and now: what would Rachmaninoff post on Facebook?”
And to revisit a special Rachmaninoff moment in Cleveland, go here to replay Spanish pianist Martin García García’s final round performance of the Third Concerto, which sealed the deal for his gold medal at the Cleveland International Piano Competition in 2021. Jahja Ling conducts The Cleveland Orchestra.
Saturday, March 29 — by Jarrett Hoffman:
March 29 was the date of Beethoven’s first public concert appearance, as well as, in a delightful coincidence, his funeral.
Both events took place in Vienna. The concert was at the Burgtheater in 1795 and featured his Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-flat — actually written before his Concerto No. 1 in C.
But the ordering of pieces can be such a strange topic. Instead, let’s talk about the ordering of Beethoven’s burials.
His funeral was held in 1827 at a cemetery in the district of Währinger, with many thousands of people in attendance, and such composers as Franz Schubert, Carl Czerny, and Johann Hummel participating in the ceremony. Naturally, that was his first time being buried. And oh, how we all remember our first.
In 1863, he was moved from an oaken coffin to a metal one, all the better to preserve him. That exhumation and reburial were paid for by the Musikverein, as was the study of his body. Head to the website of the Beethoven-Haus in Bonn for a series of photographs and drawings of his skull, as examined on that occasion. Multiple angles included!
And in 1888, after that cemetery had been shut down, later to be turned into a park — pray for any child that has ever run around screaming on those grounds — the remains were transferred to the Vienna Central Cemetery, where they, well, remain. (Above: his grave in that cemetery.)
Here’s a piece that can aptly serve as a tribute on this anniversary, although it was written for another one. Karen Tanaka’s At the Grave of Beethoven was commissioned by the Brodsky Quartet for the bicentennial of Beethoven’s Op. 18 in 2001. One quartet in particular from that set served as inspiration for Tanaka, who currently teaches composition at CalArts. As she writes in the program notes,
Opus 18, No. 3 is probably the most gentle and lyrical work in the set. I feel the pure spirit and ardent hope of young Beethoven in it. The first movement of At the grave of Beethoven was inspired by the first four bars of Opus 18, No. 3. These four bars were developed and interpreted in a contemporary manner, reflecting the tension and anxiety of our life today.
The second movement is made of chains of modulations. When I was writing this movement in the spring of 1999, the news from Kosovo was reported on TV every day. I was shocked and horrified by this civil war, and it influenced my writing unconsciously. Along with each modulation, I had images of lotus flowers growing and blooming, in the hope of serenity and peace.
Follow the links above to listen to a recording of the piece by the Brodsky Quartet.
Sunday, March 30:
Compiling the Almanac portion of the Daily Diary begins with a search for noteworthy events that happened on the date in question in classical music history. Sometimes there’s a mighty list of composers, conductors, and artists to sift through, and on other occasions like today, March 30, there’s next to nothing of import to write about — except the founding of Boston’s Handel and Haydn Society in 1815.
Or so our usual go-to source for historical dates told us. Wanting to be accurate and thorough, we always check out dates before setting electrons in motion and choosing music to celebrate milestones.
So we were surprised to read on bach-cantatas.com that “The Handel and Haydn Society was founded as an oratorio society in Boston on April 20, 1815, by Gottlieb Graupner, Thomas Smith Webb, Amasa Winchester, and Matthew S. Parker, a group of Boston merchants and musicians who were eager to improve the performance of choral music in a city that, at the time, offered very little music of any kind.”
Pressing the search further, we learned from a New York Times article marking the 200th anniversary of the Society, that “The society was born from the peace festivities after news reached Boston of the end of the War of 1812, when musicians presented highlights from “The Creation” and Handel’s “Messiah.” After newspaper correspondents wrote of a need to hear more European works, a group of 44 amateur choristers and instrumentalists formed the Handel and Haydn Society, on April 13, 1815.”
Then there’s this notice from the City of Boston: “The exhibition The Handel and Haydn Society: Bringing Music to Life for 200 Years opens at the Boston Public Library’s Central Library in Copley Square in the Cheverus Room on Tuesday, March 24, and runs through Saturday, September 5….The opening date of the exhibition coincides with the 200th anniversary of H+H’s founding and “Handel and Haydn Society Day” in the City of Boston.”
Well, if you’re over 200 years old, what do those few days’ difference matter? We’ll just pretend it’s H+H’s 210th Birthday and list some interesting facts about the organization.
- The Society, the oldest continuously performing organization in the U.S., made its debut on Christmas Night of 1815, when a chorus of 90 men and 10 women sang at King’s Chapel.
- The Society saw the first American edition of Handel’s Messiah into print in 1816, and gave the U.S. premiere of the work in 1818, followed by Haydn’s The Creation in 1819.
- The organization sought to commission a work from Beethoven around 1823, but the project never came to fruition.
- Fast forwarding, Handel and Haydn underwent a sea change in the 20th century when it began adopting historically informed performance practices under Thomas Dunn at the behest of Boston Globe critic Michael Steinberg, and Christopher Hogwood transformed it into a professional chorus and period instrument ensemble beginning in 1986.
Check our H+H’s COV-19 Era Messiah for Our Time (Part I and Hallelujah Chorus), led by Ian Watson, to see how a 200+ year old organization adapts to new realities. There are 183 other videos on the organization’s YouTube channel to enjoy as well.
