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Cleveland Women’s Orchestra: catching up with Jinjoo Cho

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by Daniel Hathaway

CHO-JinjooOn Sunday, May 1 at 3:30 pm, Robert Cronquist will lead the Cleveland Women’s Orchestra in its 81st anniversary concert at Severance Hall. The program will include Modest Mussorgsky’s Night on Bald Mountain, Zoltán Kodály’s “Intermezzo” from Háry Janós, Antonín Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8 in G, and Henri Wieniawski’s Violin Concerto No. 2 in d.

Not for the first time, the concert will feature violinist Jinjoo Cho, who first performed with CWO when she was in her teens. We caught up with the busy violinist on her cell phone while she was enjoying “a wonderful and rare morning off” walking her dog. We began by asking her how many times she’s appeared with the Women’s Orchestra. [Read more…]

CIM New Music Ensemble to feature music by Julius Eastman and guest composer Robert Paterson

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by Mike Telin

Paterson-RobertIf you’ve never heard a piece of music that features coffee grinders, blenders, cast iron skillets, cheese graters, and Pyrex glass bowls, you’ll have the chance this weekend. On Sunday, April 3 at 4:00 pm in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music, the CIM New Music Ensemble, under the direction of Keith Fitch, will perform guest composer Robert Paterson’s Star Crossing (1999), I See You (2014-15), and Hell’s Kitchen (2014), a work during which those kitchen appliances will take center stage. The afternoon will also include Julius Eastman’s 1973 classic, Stay On It. On Saturday, April 2 beginning at 1:30 in CIM’s room 113, Robert Paterson will present a lecture about his music. Both events are free and open to the public. [Read more…]

Ars Futura to perform Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire at CIM & LCCC

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by Mike Telin

Schoenberg-self-portrait-1910“I believe I am approaching a new way of expression,” composer Arnold Schoenberg wrote in his diary on March 12, 1912. The work Schoenberg is referring to is none other than his pioneering Pierrot Lunaire.

On Wednesday March 2 at 8:00 pm in CIM’s Mixon Hall, and Monday March 7 at 7:30 in Lorain County Community College’s Cirigliano Studio Theatre, the Cleveland-based new music ensemble Ars Futura will present Schoenberg’s melodrama. [Read more…]

CIM Opera to stage Hector Berlioz’s Béatrice et Bénédict February 24-27

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by Mike Telin & Daniel Hathaway

CIM_Beatrice_Benedict_1Directed by David Bamberger, CIM Opera Theater will present four performances of Hector Berlioz’s comic opera Béatrice et Bénédict in Kulas Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music beginning on Wednesday, February 24 at 7:30 pm and continuing through Saturday, February 27. An adaptation of William Shakespeare’s comedy Much Ado About Nothing, Berlioz conceived the piece as early as 1833, but completed it only in 1862 at the behest of a casino owner in Baden-Baden, Germany, where it was first performed at the Theater der Stadt in August of that year.

“It’s not performed that often, and most people only know it from the overture, which is such a great piece in itself,” conductor Harry Davidson said in a telephone conversation. “For the opera, Berlioz took out all the tragic elements that appear in the play — Héro being accused of adultery and her father disowning her — none of that is there. But it’s very stageworthy and the music is really quite delightful and charming.” [Read more…]

CIM New Music:
a conversation with Shulamit Ran
(second of two articles)

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by Mike Telin

RAN-Shulamit2From the time she was eight years old, Shulamit Ran aspired to be one thing: a composer. In an interview with the Chicago Reader the Israeli-born Pulitzer Prize-Winner recalled that she began to write melodies at the encouragement of her piano teacher.

“My teacher sent some of those melodies to a local radio station,” she says,  “and they ended up being performed on the radio by a children’s choir. It is a vivid recollection — I was eight at the time and away at summer camp; there we all were, the kids and myself, all sitting around a large radio listening to my music coming out of it. That was a revelation for me, because it was the first time that I had the sense my music could live outside of me. What I had made up now had its own, separate existence. It gave me such pleasure and it was a very special feeling, and I knew that I wanted to keep doing this. Although all kinds of other things have always interested me, I’ve never wanted to do anything else but compose ever since.”  

Next week, the Cleveland Institute of Music will play host to the celebrated composer during a three-day residency. [Read more…]

CIM New Music:
Keith Fitch talks about Shulamit Ran
(first of two articles)

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by Mike Telin

Ran-ShulamitNortheast Ohio audiences are in for a treat next week when the Cleveland Institute of Music plays host to celebrated composer Shulamit Ran for a three-day residency. On Tuesday, January 26 at 4:30 pm, the Pulitzer Prize-Winner will discuss her music in Studio 113. The event is free and open to the public. The following evening at 8:00 pm in Kulas Hall, guest conductor Steven Smith will lead the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra in a concert that will include Ran’s Legends and Violin Concerto featuring Laurie Smukler as soloist. The program will also include Charles Ives’ The Unanswered Question.

“Shulamit is fantastic in every way,” Keith Fitch, who heads the Composition Department and holds the Vincent K. and Edith H. Smith Chair in Composition at the Cleveland Institute of Music, said during a recent telephone conversation. “She’s had such a long and distinguished career as a composer, teacher, and advocate for new music. She’s so good with students, and she’s a great mentor and role model.” Ran recently retired from academia, having taught at the University of Chicago since 1973.

“I’ve always admired Shulamit’s music so much. Not only is it beautifully crafted, it’s also emotionally powerful, and so engaging. There’s this fearless quality to her music that I really love.” [Read more…]

Musical life after the holidays:
a cornucopia of January concerts

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by Daniel Hathaway

Bronfman-FWM-TCONow that winter has finally arrived and the excitement of the holidays has subsided, it’s tempting to burrow in and hibernate for a few weeks. But there’s plenty to do during January. Let’s have a look at some of what the month has to offer, beginning with orchestra concerts.

Franz Welser-Möst and The Cleveland Orchestra are back at work early in the month with a round of all-Beethoven concerts from January 7-9 featuring pianist Yefim Bronfman (left) in the third piano concerto, and Bronfman and the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus in the Choral Fantasy. Soprano Barbara Hannigan will be featured in the U.S. premiere of Hans Abrahamsen’s let me tell you on January 14 and 15, sharing a program with Dmitri Shostakovich’s fourth symphony. On Saturday the 16th, Robert Porco will lead the annual Martin Luther King Jr Celebration, followed by a Severance Hall Open House on Monday the 17th from 12 Noon to 5 pm. Community ensemble performances will be bracketed by the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus (12:30) and Youth Orchestra (4:15). The Cleveland Philharmonic will host its own MLK Observance at Tri-C Metro Auditorium on Sunday, January 17. [Read more…]

CIM Violins of Hope concert with the Cavani Quartet and friends (Dec. 4)

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by Robert Rollin

Cavani-QuartetLast Friday evening, December 4, the Cavani String Quartet (Annie Fullard and Mari Sato, violins, Kirsten Docter, viola, and Merry Peckham, cello) — who serve as Artists-in-Residence at the Cleveland Institute of Music — presented a stellar concert of Czech music in Kulas Hall as the final event of the CIM Violins of Hope concert series. [Read more…]

Cavani Quartet to present December 4 Violins of Hope concert in CIM’s Mixon Hall

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by Mike Telin

SCHULHOFF-ErwinComposer Erwin Schulhoff, who perished in the Holocaust, wrote in his 1919 avant-garde music manifesto: The idea of revolution in art has evolved for decades…This is particularly true in music, because this art form is the liveliest, and as a result reflects the revolution most strongly and deeply — the complete escape from imperialistic tonality and rhythm, the climb to an ecstatic change for the better.

“I love that quote,” violinist Annie Fullard said during a telephone conversation. “It’s so upsetting that Schulhoff’s life was cut short.” On Friday, December 4 at 8:00 pm in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music, the Cavani Quartet (Annie Fullard and Mari Sato, violins, Kirsten Docter, viola, and Merry Peckham, cello) will perform two pieces by Schulhoff — Divertimento for String Quartet, Op. 14 and String Sextet — as part of a CIM Violins of Hope Faculty Recital. [Read more…]

CIM celebrates Sibelius centennial with St. Paul’s concert November 22

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by Mike Telin

SibeliusWith December 8 marking the 150th anniversary of the birth of Finnish composer Jean Sibelius, many celebrations are being held in his honor. On Sunday, November 22 at 4:00 pm at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Cleveland Institute of Music faculty, alumni, and students will observe the occasion with a Jean Sibelius 150th Anniversary Concert.

Performers will include soprano Emily Stauch, violinists Mari Sato, Kimia Ghaderi, James Thompson, and Virginia Wolf Lewis, violist Jessica Pasternak, cellist Carlyn Kessler, and pianists Linda Jones and Sean Schulze.

“I grew up in a family with a lot of classical music playing in the house, including Sibelius, who was one of my parents’ favorite composers,” said Emily Stauch, who spearheaded the concert. “My mother would even clean the house while listening to Sibelius.” [Read more…]

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