ClevelandClassical.com Header
Ad
Ad
Ad

Preview: Les Délices — Jason McStoots to play Pierre Jélyotte in “The Leading Man”

by

by Mike Telin

McStoots-Jason-BEMF-OrfeoInspired by one of the 18th century’s most famous tenors, Pierre Jélyotte, Les Délices’s new program The Leading Man includes operatic excerpts of musical heroism, absurdist comedy, and ravishing beautythat were central to Jélyotte’s repertoire. In her program notes, Les Délices’s founder and director Debra Nagy writes: “Jelyotte appears to have cultivated nothing but admirers. [His] contemporaries remarked on his range, volume, and the velveteen beauty of his tone. … He had only to sing, and those who listened were intoxicated. All the women went mad.”

On Saturday, May 3, beginning at 8:00 pm at William Busta Gallery and in Herr Chapel at Plymouth Church on Sunday, May 4 beginning at 4:00pm (a pre-concert lecture by Dr. Georgia Cowart begins at 3pm), Les Délices performs a program of operatic excerpts by Lully, Boismortier, Leclair, and Rameau. The concerts features the unique voice and dynamic stage presence of tenor Jason McStoots.

“I’ve wanted to do a program that features a tenor for some time,” Debra Nagy told us by telephone. “In particular I wanted to focus this program with Jason on the career of Jélyotte because Jason is also a fabulous comic actor. He has a very expressive face. [Read more…]

Review: Les Délices — Conversations galantes at Tregoning & Co. (February 1)

by

by Daniel Hathaway

Les-Delices-3Les Délices, the Cleveland early music ensemble that devotes itself to resurrecting treasures from the French Baroque, designed its mid-winter program, Conversations galantes, around the idea of musical conversation as that social art was practiced in the salons of eighteenth-century Paris.

Alas, there were fewer voices in last weekend’s discussions than originally planned. Nagy had lined up a program of quartets, but a sudden illness reduced the group to oboe, violin and harpsichord and the playlist had to be changed accordingly. Happily, the repartée in the altered program was probably no less eloquent. In music by Rameau, Leclair, François Couperin and Forqueret, Debra Nagy, Julie Andrijeski and Michael Sponseller provided plenty of engaging wit and delicious colloquy to delight the audience at Tregoning & Co. gallery on Saturday evening.

The hour-long program began and ended with all hands on deck. [Read more…]

Review: Apollo’s Fire — “Virtuoso Orchestra” at Fairmount Presbyterian Church, Cleveland Heights (October 12)

by

by Nicholas Jones

AF-Virtuoso-OrchestraAs Apollo’s Fire heads out on a real tour across North American, last weekend’s set of concerts gave us a virtual tour of some of the top orchestras across Europe—all without leaving our seats. Talk about not leaving a carbon footprint!

As simply and quickly as on Google Earth, listeners swooped from one musical capital to another — from Hamburg on the North Sea, south to Venice on the Adriatic, and across what we now used to call East Germany, from Cöthen and Leipzig to Dresden.

Each of the sojourns featured one of the composers who lived and worked in that town – Telemann in Hamburg, Vivaldi in Venice, and Bach in Leipzig and Cöthen. Dresden—one of the grandest of the orchestras and the pride of the Elector of Saxony—was represented by the little known Johann David Heinichen.

The theme, “virtuoso orchestra,” led music director Jeannette Sorrell to feature concertos in which Apollo’s Fire’s soloists could step forward and dazzle us as their counterparts 300 years ago must have done. [Read more…]

Preview: Apollo’s Fire celebrates its twenty-second season with seven home programs and national and European tours

by

by Daniel Hathaway

SORRELL-JeannetteAfter I congratulated her on launching her ensemble’s twenty-second season, Apollo’s Fire founder and artistic director Jeannette Sorrell said, “We’re into adulthood now, and we’re in a really fantastic place regarding our artistic reputation.” Cleveland patrons don’t need to be reminded of the high quality of playing their resident baroque orchestra turns in on a regular basis, but a wider audience is now sitting up and paying attention.

One indication of Apollo’s Fire’s “grown-up” status: the ensemble has recently been picked up by Columbia Artists Management Inc. (CAMI), “a big stamp of approval”, Sorrell said. “We’re the first period instrument orchestra to appear on their roster, and after twenty-one years of honing our craft and trying to perfect our art, it’s great to be getting global attention.”

We reached Jeannette Sorrell via Skype last weekend to chat about the multiple performances of seven programs that local audiences will enjoy in area church venues this season. It all begins with “Virtuoso Orchestra”, which opens on Thursday, October 10 at First Methodist in Akron and will be repeated on October 11 and 12 at Fairmount Presbyterian in Cleveland Heights and on October 13 at Rocky River Presbyterian.

Sorrell promises that the program will live up to its name with dazzling performances including Vivaldi’s concerto for four violins, Bach’s fourth Brandenburg Concerto and a novelty for local audiences, a concerto by J.D. Heinichen. [Read more…]

Review: Les Délices — A Woman Scorned at Plymouth Church (October 6)

by

by Nicholas Jones

Les-Delices-Woman-Scorned-BustaAnger, murder, guilt, and recrimination! The last episode of Breaking Bad? No: this was the opening concert of the season for Les Délices, the remarkable Cleveland-based chamber group specializing in music of the French baroque.

The program, “A Woman Scorned,” featured lurid stories of betrayal and revenge involving five of the great women characters of classical myth. These were stories that the court of Louis XIV loved, apparently seeing them as safe ways in which to rehash their own tortuous infidelities: Juno, the goddess jealous of her philandering husband Jove; Phaedra, driven mad by passion for her stepson; Armida, sorceress and seductress; Circe, who turned men to beasts; and Medea, sorceress and lover—passed over by Jason for a younger woman, she proceeds to poison her rival and then murder her own children in order to drive her ex to kill himself.

Not material for the faint-hearted. [Read more…]

Preview: Les Délices —Woman Scorned

by

by Mike Telin

Les-Delices-3For the past four years Les Délices have presented well-researched, thought-provoking and highly entertaining programs that explore music and themes of the French Baroque. Their concerts are performed in intimate settings that create an atmosphere similar to that in which this music was intended to be enjoyed.

This weekend Les Délices begins their Fifth Anniversary season with Woman Scorned, a program of wild, descriptive music depicting sorceresses and temptresses that explores universal themes of desire, jealousy, shame, and revenge by giving voice to the spurned lovers of antiquity. The program also includes two works never before heard in Ohio.

In addition to Les Délice’s regulars, baroque oboist Debra Nagy, baroque violinist Julie Andrijeski, viola da gambist Emily Walhout and harpsichordist Michael Sponseller, Woman Scorned also features renowned, Chicago-based mezzo-soprano Angela Young Smucker.

Les Délice’s founder and artistic director Debra Nagy says the program exalts in wild, passionate music portraying characters such as Circé, Phèdre, Armide, and Medea while contemplating the somewhat misogynist portrayals of the women in these works that is – in some cases – far removed from their classical origins. [Read more…]

Review: Musicians with Northeast Ohio connections well represented at the Boston Early Music Festival this month

by

by Daniel Hathaway

BEMF-BannerEvery two years since 1980, performers and fans of early music have flocked to Boston for a rich festival of pre-Romantic music. The 2013 edition of the Boston Early Music Festival, subtitled “Youth: Genius and Folly” ran from June 9-16. The annual meeting of the Music Critics Association of North America was scheduled to coincide with several days of the Festival, but I came a few days earlier to catch some events in the Festival Fringe that showcased early music talent with connections to Northeast Ohio.

Case Western Reserve University, its partner, CIM, and the Oberlin Conservatory of Music have long been centers of activity in the Historically Informed Performance (HIP) movement, and faculty and student performers brought a wealth of expertise and excellent musicianship to Boston last week.

Oberlin musicians who perform under the banner of The Bach Project drew a sizeable audience to the Church of the Covenant in Back Bay on Tuesday afternoon, June 11 for a concert comprising all of Johann Sebastian Bach’s “authentic” flute sonatas. [Read more…]

Review: Les Délices — Four Seasons at William Busta Gallery (April 20)

by

by Nicholas Jones

Les-Delices2As I write this, Ohio seems to be stuck in an endless winter of discontent. But the ungiving weather was more than a little mollified by the warm elegance and sprightly eccentricity of this weekend’s seasonal program by Les Délices. The group, founded and directed by baroque oboist Debra Nagy, is now completing its fourth season, and specializes in the music of the French Baroque.

The centerpiece of the program was a substantial cantata titled L’Hyver (Winter), one of a cycle of four cantatas on the seasons by the early-18th-century composer Joseph Bodin de Boismortier. With appropriate Baroque word-painting, Boismortier depicts winter’s horrors—bare trees, mountain storms, and frost-stricken buds—then shifts to winter’s pleasures—dances, feasts, and plays. Winter’s destructive fury turns out to be a foil to the delights of a Parisian salon, well heated and well stocked with wine and music.

The presiding muse of those delights was the masterful soprano Clara Rottsolk, who was featured on Les Délices’ recent CD, Myths and Allegories. [Read more…]

Review: Trinity Brownbag Concert: Case Collegium Musicum (March 6

by

by Daniel Hathaway

CaseTrinity1Debra Nagy’s Case Collegium Musicum treated the Brownbag Concert audience at Trinity Cathedral on March 6 to fifteenth-century songs and dances by Guillaume Dufay, Pierre Fontaine, Hugo de Lantine, Gilles Binchois and Johannes LeGrant. And elaborations by a non-fifteenth-century composer, Debra Nagy, who continued her interesting practice of adding new voices to old music with such a sure hand that Dufay and company would surely applaud her efforts if they were still around.

The Collegium on this occasion included sopranos Elena Mullins and Sian Ricketts and mezzo-soprano Tracy Cowart (Ricketts also played recorder), tenor Corey Shotwell, vielle players Cynthia Black and John Romey, lutenist Michael Bane and recorder and douçaine player Luke Conklin. [Read more…]

Review: Les Délices — Portrait of Love at Tregoning and Co. Gallery (February 16)

by

by Nicholas Jones

Shaw-NorthThe second of Les Délices’s offerings for this, its fourth season, gave its audience a Valentine’s Day treat (a couple of days late), replete with musical confections, kisses, sentiment, and…ah, je ne sais quoi!

Love, usually thought of in reference to a couple, became here a matter of the four players, sometimes flirting, sometimes fierce, sometimes laughing, sometimes in earnest, but clearly bound to each other in the bonds of the music. [Read more…]

Follow ClevelandClassical.com

Contact us