Guest artist changes at Severance Hall

January 16, 2018 by Daniel Hathaway

The Cleveland Orchestra has announced that Christian Van Horn will replace Thomas Hampson as baritone soloist in its performances of Haydn’s oratorio The Seasons on Thursday, January 18 and Saturday, January 20 at Severance Hall and on Wednesday, January 24 at Carnegie Hall in New York. Hampson has been advised by his physician to cancel his appearances due to illness. Van Horn joins soprano Golda Schultz, tenor Maximilian Schmitt and the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus under the direction of music director Franz Welser-Möst.

Former Daniel R. Lewis Composer Fellow Matthias Pintscher will lead the Orchestra’s concerts on February 22, 23 and 24 featuring pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet. The all-Ravel program includes the Suite from Mother Goose, the Piano Concerto for the Left Hand, and the complete ballet music for Daphnis and Chloé.

About Daniel Hathaway

Daniel Hathaway founded ClevelandClassical.com in September, 2008, after a thirty-one year tenure as music director of Cleveland’s Trinity Cathedral, where he founded the Wednesday Noon Brownbag Concert Series and Trinity Chamber Orchestra. A graduate of Harvard College and the Episcopal Divinity School, he also studied historical musicology at Princeton and Harvard Universities. Before coming to Cleveland in 1977, he served as head of humanities at the Sunset Hill School in Kansas City and as head of arts at Groton School in Massachusetts. In Cleveland, he has served on the music staff of Cleveland Opera, Great Lakes Theater Festival, and the faculty of Laurel School. As an organist, Hathaway has played recitals in the U.S., England, France, Germany, and Austria. He team-teaches Music Journalism at Oberlin College and Conservatory and is a member of the Music Critics Association of North America.

Oberlin Conservatory convincingly tells Omar’s story (Dec. 8)

by Stephanie Manning

The Cleveland premiere of Rhiannon Giddens’ and Michael Abels’ Pultizer Prize-winning opera Omar on December 8 at the Maltz Performing Arts Center proved that concert productions of opera can succeed without sets, elaborate costumes and extensive staging. Indeed, the Oberlin Conservatory presentation offered more than enough to keep the audience in the crowded house enthralled.

The Opera, which was also presented at Oberlin’s Finney Chapel two days earlier, is based on the 1831 autobiography of Muslim scholar Omar ibn Said, the only such work written by an enslaved person during their enslavement, and the only such document written in Arabic.

Rhiannon Giddens’ brilliant libretto chronicles the life of ibn Said, beginning in present-day Senegal and following him through his capture, journey via the Middle Passage, and enslavement in North and South Carolina. [Read on…]

Kirill Gerstein is captivating on piano as Cleveland Orchestra recital series continues (Dec. 4)

by Daniel Hathaway

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — There’s no dearth of first-class piano performances to enjoy in Northeast Ohio, but Kirill Gerstein’s contribution to the collective wealth Wednesday night was extraordinary both in concept and execution.

Playing as part of the Cleveland Orchestra’s ongoing recital series at Severance Music Center, Gerstein wove an overarching narrative from the 21 little masked ball portraits in Robert Schumann’s “Carnaval.” Then he helped composer Francisco Coll blow up the idea of the waltz in two striking, brand new pieces written for Gerstein and joined Maurice Ravel in redefining that most civilized of dances in a cataclysmic performance of “La valse.”

[Read on…]

Cleveland Orchestra delivers a stirring night of Shostakovich, Mozart and Chopin with Heras-Casado and Ax (Dec. 5)

by Peter Feher

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — It’s fitting that conductor Pablo Heras-Casado should be leading The Cleveland Orchestra this week in Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 10 — the work of a mid-career composer who was looking to make a major statement.

A decade ago, Heras-Casado was regularly touted as a possible candidate for a music directorship at a top U.S. orchestra. Although some of the heat has died down since — the 47-year-old Spaniard is currently between posts and sticking to guest-conducting gigs — he started to get the furnace roaring again at Severance Music Center on Thursday, Dec. 5.

[Read on…]

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