by Stephanie Manning
On Super Bowl Sunday — a day that brings out plenty of competitive spirit — spending the afternoon with Apollo’s Fire felt like the perfect balance. In the few hours before “The Big Game” on February 9, those of us listening to the music in St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Cleveland Heights were all rooting for the same team.
The Baroque chamber orchestra performs in a way that values collaboration over competition, especially in a conductorless outing like this one. “Virtuoso Brilliance,” a program heard in Akron, Rocky River, and Cleveland Heights, united both musicians and audience in concertos by Antonio Vivaldi and Georg Philipp Telemann. [Read more…]
Who doesn’t love an Apollo’s Fire concert? Jeannette Sorrell and troupe always seem to offer a festival for the eye and ear — thoughtful thematic programs, all-out committed musicianship, and infectious exuberance. Wednesday’s program at Bath Church UCC was all this and more.
At the top of their program at the Cleveland Museum of Art on Sunday afternoon, October 24, Apollo’s Fire founder and artistic director Jeannette Sorrell told the full house that the Baroque orchestra was opening its 30th season with Vivaldi’s Four Seasons rediscovered, returning to a piece that the ensemble has featured every year since 1991.
Apollo’s Fire is making the most of the summer. Cleveland’s Baroque Orchestra is easing audiences back into live performances this month with a program, “Bach, Vivaldi, and Friends,” that satisfies all musical expectations. The group followed up a terrific first concert on Saturday, July 10, at the Avon Lake United Church of Christ with two more local performances and one on tour at Tanglewood.
With each of its themed programs, Apollo’s Fire is becoming more than just a period instrument ensemble that gives concerts. Its March program, “Tapestry — Jewish Ghettos of Baroque Italy,” which replaces performances of Handel’s Israel in Egypt, finds Jeannette Sorrell and her colleagues moving seamlessly out of their usual roles to morph into singing actors and dancers, all in order to bring the subject at hand to vibrant life.
With the novel coronavirus surrounded but not yet defeated, Apollo’s Fire’s February program “Elegance: The Harper’s Voice” morphed from in-person performances to a recording session at First Baptist Church on February 27 that yielded a fine video of a high-quality concert, released on March 10. A few invited souls sprinkled throughout the pews provided enough of an audience to make a brave noise when cheering was called for, and that was often.
