by Mike Telin
Think of works for trumpet and orchestra, and two pieces immediately come to mind. “When I tell someone that I’m playing a concerto, they always say — are you playing Haydn or Hummel?” Dasara Beta said during a recent telephone conversation. “This is a pretty popular piece for trumpet players, but if you don’t play the trumpet, you might not know it.”
On Sunday, February 20 at 3:00 pm at Severance Music Center, Beta will perform Alexander Arutunian’s Trumpet Concerto with the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra. Under the direction of Vinay Parameswaran, the program will also include Jennifer Higdon’s Blue Cathedral and Manuel de Falla’s Suites No. 1 & 2 from El Sombrero de Tres Picos (Three-Cornered Hat). Tickets are available online.
2021 was a good year for the Rocky River High School senior. In addition to winning the COYO concerto competition, Beta was also the First Prize winner of the High School Division of the World Trumpet Society’s Daniel Patrylak Memorial Orchestral Competition as well as a member of the National Youth Orchestra of the United States.
After a long hiatus, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra is back in full swing. “I’m so excited,” COYO music director Vinay Parameswaran said during a recent telephone conversation. “I couldn’t wait to be back in our beautiful hall with the young musicians — we’ve all been waiting for this for way too long.”
It came as no surprise that the March 1 Severance Hall concert by the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra Youth Chorus was an excellent affair. Leading fine performances of music mostly off the beaten track, conductor Vinay Parameswaran helped prove that gloomy predictions of classical music performance fading into oblivion are misplaced. The audience was large and enthusiastic — I suspect with many rightfully proud family members.
From June 12 through June 19 The Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra will make a seven day, four concert tour to Europe under the direction of Vinay Parameswaran. 
