Originally posted on Cleveland.com
by Daniel Hathaway | Cleveland Classical
CLEVELAND, Ohio — It’s become fashionable to blame COVID for everything that didn’t happen in the past few years, but in the case of Oded Zehavi’s piccolo concerto, the pandemic truly kept the work waiting in the wings of Severance Music Center for four long years past its originally scheduled premiere in April of 2020.
On Thursday evening, Cleveland Orchestra principal piccolo Mary Kay Fink finally unveiled the 14-minute work in a performance led by guest conductor Fabio Luisi that was as glistering as the soloist’s silver concert gown.
Titled Aurora after the classical goddess of the dawn, the time of day Zehavi set aside for composition after young children came into his domestic life, the piece is an extended aria for the smallest but by no means the least expressive instrument in the orchestra. In the hands of a player like Fink, who completely unlocks the potential of the piccolo, the instrument can sing like the best of divas. [Read more…]
If the goal of the Cleveland Orchestra’s Fridays @ 7 series is to create more diversity in their audiences, the concert in Severance Hall on Friday, March 13 can be considered a fantastic success. Curated by Jamey Haddad, the pre- and post concerts that sandwich the orchestra’s performance included music from singer, songwriter and accordion player Magda Giannikou, students from Oberlin’s performance and Improvisation Ensembles, and the eclectic jazz and funk band Snarky Puppy. 
A large and conspicuously intergenerational audience — unusually so for a Thursday evening — gathered at Severance Hall for The Cleveland Orchestra concert on March 12. Did they turn out in droves to hear guest conductor Fabio Luisi lead Beethoven’s seventh symphony? Or to hear Jean-Yves Thibaudet play Liszt’s second piano concerto? Maybe both. Whatever drew the crowds in, they experienced a distinguished evening of music. 
