by Stephanie Manning
The long, rich history of string quartet music leaves today’s ensembles with plenty of classic works to explore. The Poiesis Quartet knows such standard repertoire well — their performances of Béla Bartók’s String Quartet No. 5 helped earn them their win at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, which skyrocketed the group’s career in 2023.
But you’re more likely to find the Cincinnati-based ensemble playing something new. So when Poiesis was offered the opportunity to perform seven different string quartets by members of the Cleveland Composers Guild, of course they said yes.
That concert on Sunday, March 16 — which will be held in Cleveland State University’s Drinko Hall at 3:00 pm — features both premieres and other contemporary selections from the local composers. [Read more…]
On a sun-drenched fall afternoon, Sunday, October 20, a lucky few got to hear five new organ pieces masterfully brought to life by five remarkable organists at Lake Erie College. If the music wasn’t conceived for this particular organ — the Skinner opus 647 — it surely benefited from it, not to mention from the architecturally splendid setting of Helen Rockwell Morley Hall.
The Cleveland Composers Guild found an ideal partner in the Factory Seconds Brass Trio (Jack Sutte, trumpet, Richard King, horn, and Rick Stout, trombone), who, along with other performers, assembled a recital program of the first order at Rocky River’s West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church on Sunday, April 21.
When the Cleveland Composers Guild added the requirement of writing a vocal piece to its collegiate composition contest in 2019 and generated only a single entry — impressive as that piece was — the idea was born for dedicating an entire year to vocal music.
Although it is often said that you cannot put new wine in old bottles — or wineskins, on Friday, March 25 at 7:30 pm in Kulas Music Hall at Baldwin Wallace University, the 
It’s good for composers to try writing outside their comfort zone, but some members of the Cleveland Composers Guild are challenging themselves to scale new heights by learning to write for the carillon.
When the