by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Tonight at 7:30, during the first week of his two-week Cleveland Orchestra residency, 28-year-old Finnish conductor Klaus Mäkelä will lead a pair of iconic 20th-century British works: William Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast (with baritone Thomas Hampson and the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus) and Edward Elgar’s Cello Concerto (with soloist Sol Gabetta) in a program to be repeated Friday at 11 and Saturday at 8.

You can preview the Walton here in a performance by the Leeds Festival Chorus with the BBC Symphony Chorus and Orchestra conducted by Andrew Davis. (At 23:31, baritone Sir Willard White dramatically announces the fateful writing on the wall of the Babylonian king’s banqueting hall and the chorus responds with its famous outcry).

Also at 7:30 tonight, Timothy Weiss will lead the Oberlin Contemporary Music Ensemble in George Crumb’s Black Angels, Jerry Achtermann’s It Sneaks Up On You (world premiere), and Christopher Theofanidis’ If Falling is a Leaf & Artemis (2023 revision) in Warner Concert Hall or via live stream..

TODAY’S ALMANAC:

Hang on tight – April 11 was a busy day in the annals of classical music. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

In a follow-up to Monday’s spectacular solar event, at noon today at the Church of the Covenant, organist Jonathan W. Moyer will present “Total Eclipse: Music inspired by the theme of light and darkness.” Click here for the live stream.

And tonight at 7:30, CIM Perspectives will host oboist Titus Underwood & pianist in Mixon Hall, and Cleveland Chamber Music Society will present tenor Matthew Polenzani & pianist Julius Drake (pictured) at Disciples Church.

INTERESTING READ:

New milestone in concert stats. The Violin Channel reports that “In January 2023, pianist Yuja Wang completed an unprecedented Rachmaninoff marathon — in which she played all four Rachmaninoff concerti, as well as the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, in a single performance. She was joined by The Philadelphia Orchestra and conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

Saturday’s agenda includes three orchestra concerts: the Akron Symphony (7:30 at E.J. Thomas with trumpet soloist Mary Elizabeth Bowden, pictured), Firelands Symphony & Chorale with the Heidelberg Concert Choir (7:30 at Trinity UCC in Tiffin), and The Cleveland Orchestra with guest conductor John Adams, organist James McVinnie & saxophonist Timothy McAllister (8 pm at Severance Center), as well as a Cleveland Uncommon Sound Project program by Binary Canary (8 pm at Convivium 33 Gallery).

On Sunday, CIM repeats its Pocket Full of Operas (3 pm in Mixon Hall), Euclid Symphony features Young Artists Competition winner, pianist Louis Wang (3 pm at Shore Cultural Center), the Suburban Symphony hosts duo-pianists Antonio Pompa-Baldi and Emanuela Friscioni (3:30 pm at the Maltz), Firelands Symphony repeats its Saturday program (4 pm at St. Mary’s, Sandusky), and Oberlin Conservatory anticipates Monday’s solar event with a world premiere and other works with an eclipse theme (7:30 in Warner Concert Hall).

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Under the headline “Chicago Symphony Picks You Know Who,” Musical America wrote on Friday, “In what may have been the worst-kept secret about the world’s youngest, most oversubscribed music director, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra announced 28-year-old Finnish conductor Klaus Mäkelä as successor to Riccardo Muti.”

[Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

The Cleveland Orchestra: Out of this World. Daniel Reith leads “a fun-filled concert of intergalactic proportions” (7:30 at Severance Center), CIM’s Pocket Full of Operas features four 15-minute chamber operas composed by CIM composition students, performed by CIM Opera Theater and New Music Ensemble (7:30 in Mixon Hall), and Raphael Jiménez conducts Oberlin Chamber Orchestra in Rossini, Nielsen — with clarinetist Juan Pedro Espinosa Monteros — & Ginastera.

PROGRAM UPDATE:

The Cleveland Orchestra announced on Thursday that pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet will replace Yuja Wang in its concerts on April 18, 19, and 20, to be led by guest conductor Klaus Mäkelä. Thibaudet will be featured in Gershwin’s Concerto in F. Milhaud’s Le Boeuf sur le toit will open the program. The second half, featuring Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, remains unchanged. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Tonight at 7:30, composer John Adams conducts The Cleveland Orchestra with organist James McVinnie and saxophonist Timothy McAllister in Gabriella Smith’s Breathing Forests, Debussy’s Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, and his own City Noir.

At the same hour at The Auricle in Canton, the Canton Symphony’s Divergent Sounds Series hosts Alla Bora, the band specializing in near-extinct Italian folk music, and in Warner Concert Hall, conductor Timothy Weiss, violinist Hannah Hurwitz, baritone Timothy LeFebvre, and the Oberlin Sinfonietta launch Oberlin Conservatory’s “Oclipse” series, anticipating next Monday’s solar event.

INTERESTING READ:

Van Magazine, the European weekly online journal simultaneously published in English and German, is taking Easter Week off, but offers reprints of some of its popular articles, including Benjamin Poore’s February 22 piece, “Inhabiting the Curve: How assistant conductors keep orchestras running.” [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

At Noon, organist Mark Slatter will play works by Thomas Tompkins, Girolamo Frescobaldi, Georg Böhm, Louis Vierne & Edward Elgar on both organs at the Church of the Covenant. Attend in person, or click here for the live stream.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

ChamberFest Cleveland has announced details for its 12th season, which runs from June 12-29. Co-artistic directors Diana Cohen, Franklin Cohen, and Roman Rabinovich (pictured above) write, “This year’s theme of “Sacred + Profane” is a timeless concept: We as humans have this necessity to transcend, to reach for the divine, and we also have bodies that exist in the real world, that hug and hurt and hear beautiful music.” Click here for complete programs and ticket information.

INTERESTING READ:

In a New York Times feature last Sunday, Hugh Morris writes that “Gustav Holst composed The Planets with crucial help from others. Firsthand accounts and the score reflect how collaborative its creation was.” Click here to read “The Team Effort Behind One of Classical Music’s greatest hits. [Read more…]

NEWS BRIEFS:

On Thursday, March 28 during a CIM Orchestra concert, the Cleveland Institute of Music officially announced that its multi-purpose Kulas Hall will close for fifteen months beginning in May to undergo a complete $22 million renovation, the first since the hall was inaugurated along with the Institute’s new building in 1961.

A press release notes that “The project entails raising the ceiling some 30 feet to the roof deck, rerouting a complex network of ductwork, installing acoustical panels above the stage and acoustical banners throughout the hall, reshaping the side walls, and constructing an enhanced stage and orchestra pit.

“In addition, 460 new seats selected by CIM’s students, faculty, staff, and guests will be installed, along with new state-of-the-art theater lighting and technology.”

Read a Plain Dealer article by Steven Litt here. [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING THIS WEEKEND:

Only a handful of Classical performances are scheduled for Easter weekend.

Celebrating its 50th Anniversary in 2024, the redesigned Cleveland International Piano Competition continues this weekend with first rounds at Baldwin Wallace on Thursday at 12 Noon, and Friday at 8 am and 1:15 pm. (By the way, Thursday, the 88th day of the year, is Piano Day, an international event established in 2015.)

Also on Thursday, frequent guest conductor JoAnn Falletta (pictured) will return to Kulas Hall to lead the CIM Orchestra and mentor student conductors Clancy Ellis and Jake Taniguchi in Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 1, “Classical,” Rimsky-Korsakov’s Capriccio Espagnol, and Ravel’s orchestration of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.

And on Saturday evening, the Music, Dance, and Visual Arts Departments of the Cleveland School of the Arts, with guest pianists Emanuela Friscioni and Ralitsa Georgieva-Smith, will bring some of the Cleveland Museum of Art’s collection to life in “Arts Live: A Night at the Museum.” It’s free at 7 pm in Gartner Auditorium.

For details of this and other events, visit our Concert Listings.

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Apollo’s Fire’s Summer Countryside Concerts, scheduled for July 17-21, 26 and August 13, will offer three versions of the ensemble’s Four Seasons Rediscovered program, pairing Vivaldi’s violin concertos with songs about nature by Purcell and Morley featuring soprano Andréa Walker, tempestuous Italian arias sung by Amanda Forsythe, or other instrumental works. Concerts will be presented under a tent-canopy at Holden Arboretum, and indoors at Avon Lake and Bath Churches. Details here.

THE ALMANAC will return on Monday, April 1.

by Daniel Hathaway

In this edition:

. Cleveland International Piano Competition begins first rounds & Jury fields questions at Happy Dog

. Count Basie Orchestra at Tri-C

. Tuesday Musical awards $34,550 in scholarships

. Almanac remembers Rostropovich, Grofé & Johanessen

HAPPENING TODAY:

Celebrating its 50th Anniversary in 2024, the redesigned Cleveland International Piano Competition gets started this week with first rounds at Baldwin Wallace and next week at the Paris Conservatory.

Following quarter-finals, semi-final and chamber music rounds this summer — amid a whirl of 88-keyed activities — the competition will culminate in the final round in August when four survivors will play concertos with The Cleveland Orchestra. (Pictured: the 2021 finalists with Jahja Ling.) [Read more…]

by Daniel Hathaway

HAPPENING TODAY:

Organist Nataly Pak (pictured) will play an all-Johann Sebastian Bach program at the Church of the Covenant today at noon at the Church of the Covenant. You can watch a live stream here.

For details of this and other events, visit our Concert Listings.

TODAY’S ALMANAC:

French composer and conductor Pierre Boulez was born on March 26, 1925 in Montbrison, while Renaissance composers Heinrich Isaac and Antonio de Cabezon, and German composer Ludwig van Beethoven took their final bows in 1517, 1566, and 1827 in Florence, Madrid, and Vienna, respectively. [Read more…]