ClevelandClassical.com Header
Ad
Ad
Ad

Neos Dance Meets Symphony in Akron: a conversation with Robert Wesner

by

by Mike Telin

Neos-Dance-TheaterIf you’re looking for a different way to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, the Akron Symphony has the answer. On Friday, March 17 at 8:00 pm at E.J. Thomas Hall, Christopher Wilkins will lead the Orchestra in a program titled “Dance Meets Symphony.” The first half of the program will include Irish-themed works by Leroy Anderson as well as Manuel de Falla’s The Three-Cornered Hat.

The second half of the evening will mark the first mainstage collaboration between the ASO and Neos Dance Theatre. [Read more…]

Akron Symphony introduces a vivid Firebird with drum circle

by

by Daniel Hathaway

ASO-Alchemy-CWAkron Symphony Music Director Christopher Wilkins has continued his resourceful community engagement initiatives by inviting the young members of Akron’s Alchemy, Inc., founded by G. Kwame Scruggs, to undertake a study of the Russian Firebird myth. To begin the second half of the program on Friday evening, February 10 at E.J. Thomas Hall, a dozen Alchemy drummers set up a stirring groove before tag-team narrating an introduction to Stravinsky’s complete Firebird ballet, illustrated by musical examples from the Orchestra. [Read more…]

Akron Symphony: Christopher Wilkins talks about musical myths and legends

by

by Mike Telin

Wilkins-Christopher“The greatest music in The Firebird exists between what we hear in the suites,” Akron Symphony Music Director Christopher Wilkins said of Igor Stravinsky’s complete ballet score. “The horn is Prince Ivan, and during the solo horn passages in the full ballet you can hear him speaking. You can hear his dialogue with the princess and the little interjections from the Firebird who is swirling overhead.”

On Friday, February 10 at 8:00 pm, music inspired by myths and legends will take center stage at E.J. Thomas Hall when Christopher Wilkins leads the Akron Symphony Orchestra in a performance of Stravinsky’s groundbreaking ballet The Firebird.

The program will also include Carl Maria von Weber’s “Overture” to Der Freischütz — based on the German folk legend of the “free shooter” who has a contract with the devil — and the Suite No. 2 from Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloé, which recounts the love between a goat herder and a shepherdess. [Read more…]

Akron Symphony invites community friends into its “Home for the Holidays” concert

by

by Daniel Hathaway

gmschoir“Like families everywhere, the Akron Symphony celebrates the holiday season with our neighbors and friends,” music director Christopher Wilkins said in a press release about the Orchestra’s“Home for the Holidays” concert on Friday, December 9 at 7:30 pm at E.J. Thomas Hall. And in the case of the ASO, there are a lot of friends to include in the party.

Most American orchestras have established relationships with the wider community they serve, but Wilkins and his predecessors have gone well beyond “outreach” activities to include active participation by community groups in the Orchestra’s activities.

[Read more…]

Akron Symphony collaborates with Tuesday Musical and Sō Percussion (October 15)

by

by Daniel Hathaway

so-wine-bottlesAs Akron Symphony music director Christopher Wilkins put it in his speech to the audience in E.J. Thomas Hall on Saturday, October 15, the Orchestra’s program featured “not wasps, not birds, and not planets.” [Read more…]

Sō Percussion to join UA Percussion Ensemble and Akron Symphony in concerts this week

by

by Mike Telin

It’s all aboso-percussion-onstageut Sō Percussion in Akron this week. On Wednesday, October 12 at 7:00 pm in Guzzetta Recital Hall, Eric Cha-Beach, Josh Quillen, Adam Sliwinski, and Jason Treuting will team up with the University of Akron’s Percussion Ensemble for a performance of Steve Reich’s groundbreaking composition Drumming as part of Tuesday Musical’s FUZE series.

Then on Saturday, October 15 at 8:00 pm in E.J. Thomas Hall, Sō Percussion will join Christopher Wilkins and the Akron Symphony in Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang’s man made for percussion quartet and orchestra. The evening will also include Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Overture to The Wasps, Tan Dun’s Secret of Wind and Birds, and Gustav Holst’s The Planets. Lang and Wilkins will present the concert’s “Preview from the Podium” at 7:00 pm. [Read more…]

Sō Percussion to join Akron Symphony in David Lang’s man made on October 15

by

by Mike Telin

so-man-made-with-langOn Saturday, October 15 at 8:00 pm in E.J. Thomas Hall, Sō Percussion will join Christopher Wilkins and the Akron Symphony in Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang’s man made for percussion quartet and orchestra. Lang and Wilkins will present the concert’s “Preview from the Podium” at 7:00 pm. The concert is presented in collaboration with Tuesday Musical Association.

Written for Sō Percussion, man made was commissioned by London’s Barbican Center and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The ensemble premiered the work at the Barbican with the BBC Symphony in May of 2013. The American premiere was given in October of 2014 by Gustavo Dudamel and the LA Philharmonic. During the 22-minute piece, Eric Cha-Beach, Josh Quillen, Adam Sliwinski, and Jason Treuting will snap twigs and strike everything from wine bottles to a steel drum, a trap set, xylophones, and “found” instruments. View a trailer here. [Read more…]

Akron Symphony Opening Night with pianist Antonio Pompa-Baldi (Sept. 24)

by

by Daniel Hathaway

aso-092416Pianist Antonio Pompa-Baldi joined Christopher Wilkins and the Akron Symphony in E.J. Thomas Hall on Saturday, September 24 to open the orchestra’s new season with Rachmaninoff’s third concerto — a 40-minute adventure in Slavic lyricism laced through with enough physical challenges to tie a lesser pianist in knots. Pompa-Baldi played it with the fingers of a virtuoso, the soul of a poet, and the stamina of a marathon runner. [Read more…]

Akron Symphony to open its new season on September 24 with pianist Antonio Pompa-Baldi

by

by Mike Telin

pompa-baldi“Rachmaninoff’s Third Concerto is an amazing piece,” pianist Antonio Pompa-Baldi said during a recent telephone conversation. “It’s very difficult to express thoughts about such a work of art in a few words.” On Saturday, September 24 at 8:00 pm at Akron’s E.J. Thomas Hall, Pompa-Baldi will perform Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with the Akron Symphony under the direction of Christopher Wilkins. The season-opening concert will also include Edward Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance and Jean Sibelius’s Symphony No 5. [Read more…]

Akron Symphony & GroundWorks Dance collaborate in Orff’s Carmina Burana (May 7)

by

by Daniel Hathaway

ASO-Carmina-BuranaCarl Orff intended his immensely popular “Scenic Cantata” Carmina Burana to be a staged work with dancers rather than just a concert piece — the form in which we usually encounter it today. On Saturday, May 7 at E.J. Thomas Hall, the Akron Symphony and Chorus joined with David Shimotakahara’s GroundWorks Dance, Ballet Excel Ohio, the Dance Institute at the University of Akron, soprano Grace Kahl, tenor Timothy Culver, baritone Brian Keith Johnson, and the Cleveland Orchestra Children’s Choir in a performance that splendidly fulfilled the composer’s original vision. [Read more…]

Follow ClevelandClassical.com

Contact us