Donald P. Pipino Concert Series Archives

The Harlem Quartet in Youngstown: an ensemble for the 21st Century

January 15, 2019 by Mike Telin

by Mike Telin

It’s no secret that today’s young musicians easily travel between musical genres. Take the Harlem Quartet, for example, who regularly present programs that combine standard string quartet literature with jazz, Latin, and contemporary works. They have a collaborative approach that broadens their repertoire and audience reach, as well as a commitment to residency activity and educational outreach. That combination makes them a prime example of a model 21st-century chamber music ensemble.

On Thursday, January 17 at 7:30 pm at the Ford Family Recital Hall in Youngstown, the Harlem Quartet (Ilmar Gavilán and Melissa White, violins, Jaime Amador, viola, and Felix Umansky, cello) will perform works by Beethoven, Bolcom, Gillespie, Gavilán, and Debussy. The concert is presented as part of the inaugural Donald P. Pipino Concert Series. Tickets are available online.

The program will open with Beethoven’s Quartet No. 11, Op. 95 (“Serioso”). “It’s beautiful, concise, and compact, and makes a great program opener,” first violinist Ilmar Gavilán said during a recent telephone conversation.

[Read more…]

ACRONYM to play Baroque battle music on inaugural Pipino Series at YSU

September 25, 2018 by Daniel Hathaway

by Daniel Hathaway
and Kivie Cahn-Lipman

Youngstown State University is inaugurating a new cycle of concerts this season: the Donald P. Pipino Performing Arts Series, which continues through April 2019, includes seven events in diverse genres. Commenting on the new offerings in a press release, Phyllis M. Paul, Dean of the Cliffe College of Creative Arts & Communication, said, “The Series brings to Youngstown the types of cultural opportunities usually found only in large metropolitan areas.”

The second event on Friday, October 5 at 7:30 pm in Ford Family Recital Hall at the DeYor Center on Youngstown’s Federal Plaza will feature the celebrated Baroque string band ACRONYM in a program commemorating the 1683 Battle of Vienna. That standoff was a turning point in the long conflict between the Ottoman and Holy Roman Empires and inspired a programmatic work by Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber.

“Dedicated to giving modern premieres of the wild instrumental music of the seventeenth century,” ACRONYM is itself an acronym for its fanciful moniker, “Altmusik Collective Resurrecting Obscure Nuanced Yesteryear’s Masterpieces.” The ensemble is largely made up of musicians who have passed through the Oberlin Conservatory’s Historical Performance Program. Its members can also be heard performing in such period and modern instrument groups as Cleveland’s Apollo’s Fire, Toronto’s Tafelmusik, Boston’s Handel and Haydn Society, the Boston Early Music Festival, the English Concert, the International Contemporary Ensemble, and Chicago Lyric Opera. [Read more…]

VOCES8’s Oberlin debut: a delightful 20th anniversary program (Oct. 28)

by Stephanie Manning

VOCES8’s 20th anniversary called for plenty of celebration and plenty of humor.

When the British a cappella group visited the Oberlin Artist Recital Series on October 28, they brought a program of audience favorites that delighted the sold-out crowd in Finney Chapel. Known for their ethereal voices and crystal clear harmonies, the octet demonstrated all that and more as they bridged the sacred and secular in “Songs From 20 Years.”

This two-decade milestone gave good reason to celebrate not only the singers, but also their longtime arranger-in-residence, Jim Clements. Responsible for some of the group’s most requested pieces, Clements is like “the secret burger sauce in the Big Mac,” joked tenor Blake Morgan.

[Read on…]

Guitarist Leonela Alejandro makes engaging Cleveland debut at CCGS (Oct. 25)

by Stephanie Manning

When an artist is on tour for months at a time, it can be hard not to feel homesick. Leonela Alejandro knows that experience well. Her current cross-country tour — celebrating her win at the 2024 Guitar Foundation of America International Concert Artist Competition — began in September and continues through next May.

That’s a lot of time away from Puerto Rico, where the 25-year-old guitarist grew up and began her musical education. So, as she explained to the audience at the Maltz Performing Arts Center on October 25, her Cleveland program brought a little bit of her home country with her. Presented by the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society, Alejandro’s local debut brought out her most engaging abilities as a performer, making the case that she is a young artist to watch. [Read on…]

No Exit opens season with “American Descent” at Praxis Fiber Workshop (Oct. 25)

by Mike Telin

There was not an open seat to be had at Praxis Fiber Workshop on Saturday, October 25 when the adventurous new music ensemble No Exit began their 17th season with a program of four thoroughly engaging works.

As a prelude to the program, James Rhodes presented two movements from Garth Knox’s Viola Spaces, a collection of eight etudes each of which focus on an extended technique.

No. 2, “Ghosts,” examines the technique of sul tasto — on the fingerboard. Beginning with a pitchless bowing on the strings, Rhodes brilliantly produced spooky, breathy, brushing sounds. In No. 6, “Harmonic Horizons,” Rhodes took listeners on a tour of the instrument’s harmonic series. Here he produced an interesting mix of straight-tones, double-stops, trills, and slides in every register of the viola.

[Read on…]

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