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Cleveland Orchestra & Pennsylvania Ballet to perform George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker

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by Mike Telin

penn-ballet-nutcrackerLike many great works of art, the first performance of Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker at the Mariinsky Theatre in Saint Petersburg on December 18, 1892, was met with less than enthusiastic responses from audiences and critics. Describing the battle scene, Russian critic Alexandre Benois wrote, “One can not understand anything. Disorderly pushing about from corner to corner and running backwards and forwards — quite amateurish.”

Alexander Dumas’ libretto was criticized by some for being unfaithful to its source, E.T.A. Hoffmann’s tale The Nutcracker and the Mouse King. Some critics questioned the ballet’s prominent use of children, while others referred to the party scene as “ponderous” and to the Grand Pas de Deux as “insipid.” [Read more…]

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

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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…]

Cleveland POPS Orchestra pays homage to the film music of
John Williams

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by Daniel Hathaway

john-williamsThe music of the prolific film composer John Williams was a staple of Carl Topilow’s programming long before he launched the Cleveland POPS Orchestra. “We were doing Star Wars medleys in the late ‘70s with the Denver Symphony — now the Colorado Symphony,” the conductor said in a telephone conversation from Pittsburgh, where he was guest-conducting the Carnegie-Mellon Symphony.

“Among everything else, the fact that he can write music as diverse as Schindler’s List and Home Alone — and everything in between — is just incredible. Whether it’s adventure or comedy, or JFK, or Born on the Fourth of July, there’s just a gamut of emotions. Probably the only non-movie piece I’ve ever conducted of his was his Tuba Concerto.” [Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra & Cleveland Orchestra Chorus: Holiday Festival Concert at Severance Hall (Dec. 19)

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by Daniel Hathaway

TCO XmasThe eighth of ten concerts featuring The Cleveland Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra Chorus, and Youth Chorus on Saturday evening, December 19 showed no apparent signs of holiday fatigue or repetitive music syndrome. To the obvious delight of a full house, Robert Porco led a wide variety of holiday selections in arrangements by such practiced hands as William Walton, Robert Shaw, Robert Russell Bennett, and John Rutter. The two-hour concert also featured original pieces by Eric Whitacre, Pyotr Tchaikovsky, George Frideric Handel, and Leroy Anderson — and a visit from the Man in the Red Suit. [Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra: Mahler’s third at Severance Hall (October 1)

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by Daniel Hathaway

TCO&COCIf The Cleveland Orchestra’s recent performance of Gustav Mahler’s third symphony were a restaurant, it would deserve the maximum three stars in the Michelin Guide (“exceptional…worth a special journey”). Franz Welser-Möst, the Orchestra, two of its choruses, and mezzo-soprano Kelley O’Connor took a captivated audience on a 95-minute journey into Mahler’s magic world on Thursday evening, October 5, the first of a pair of performances that weekend at Severance Hall, and an experience audiences in Paris and Vienna can look forward to during the Orchestra’s October tour. [Read more…]

Review: Cleveland Orchestra & Choruses with Franz Welser-Möst & Rudolf Buchbinder (March 6)

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by Guytano Parks

BuchbinderSpringtime was heralded in at Severance Hall last Thursday evening when music director Franz Welser-Möst led The Cleveland Orchestra, soprano Kate Royal, mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, tenor John Tessier and The Cleveland Orchestra Chorus and Children’s Chorus (prepared by Robert Porco and Ann Usher) in Benjamin Britten’s Spring Symphony. Earlier on the program came Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini with Austrian pianist Rudolf Buchbinder, Sibelius’s Lemminkainen’s Return, and Ryan Wigglesworth’s Locke’s Theatre.

Welser-Möstled a bold and sweeping account of the Sibelius (No. 4, from Legends, Op. 22) to begin the program. Emphasizing the dark, serious nature of its opening bars, he coaxed expressive, colorful sounds from the orchestra, full of rhythmic vigor and effective dynamic contrasts.

Buchbinder played Rachmaninoff’s popular Rhapsody in a straightforward manner, but still full of interest and excitement. [Read more…]

Preview: “Mother and Child” at the Cleveland Museum of Art, Saturday, December 14

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by Mike Telin

CMA-Virgin-and-ChildInspired by imagery of the Virgin and Child in the Cleveland Museum of Art’s medieval collection, Mother and Child, a progressive choral event, invites audiences to experience a stunning intersection of the aural and the visual in three different museum spaces on Saturday, December 14. Performers will include Quire Cleveland, led by Ross Duffin, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth and Children’s Choruses, directed by Lisa Wong, and the sopranos and altos of Trinity Cathedral Choir with brass and organ conducted by Todd Wilson.

At 2:00 pm in the Reid Gallery, Quire Cleveland will begin with a work from the 15th century, There is no rose, followed by Josquin des Prez’s Ave Maria, which Duffin describes as one of the composer’s iconic works. The performance continues with an extended piece in carol form from the Court of Henry VIII, Quid petis, o fili? byRichard Pygott. “It’s about Mary speaking to her child,” says Duffin. “It’s an intimate, imagined conversation and very appropriate to the Mother and Child theme.” A Spanish Christmas piece from the 16th Century, E la don don, was printed in Venice in 1556 in the Cancionero de Upsala and survives in only one copy. Duffin says it’s a lively piece that will feature solos by Quire’s male singers. [Read more…]

Review: Cleveland Orchestra: Bach and Orff with Walters and Feddeck (April 11)

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by Daniel Hathaway

WALTERS-RobertPatrons who packed the four sold-out houses last weekend at Severance Hall came to hear Carl Orff’s spirited medieval cantata Carmina Burana, but they were also treated to the bonus of an elegant curtain-raiser in Johann Sebastian Bach’s Concerto in A for oboe d’amore and strings with Robert Walters on the solo line.

Bach — that great recycler — turned several wind concertos from his days as court composer at Köthen into harpsichord concertos for his coffee house concerts with the Leipzig University Collegium Musicum between 1729 and 1741. Though the originals have been lost, they can be reconstructed by clever musicologists, as an uncredited arranger did for BWV 1055.

James Feddeck, stepping in for Franz Welser-Möst last weekend, led a string section pared down to eight first violins, six seconds, five violas, four cellos and two double basses, creating an admirable balance between soloist and orchestra [Read more…]

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