by Robert Rollin
Last Saturday evening, May 14, as its final subscription concert of the season, the BlueWater Chamber Orchestra presented a lively and interesting program at the beautiful Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights. Guest conductor Raphael Jiménez replaced artistic director Carlton R. Woods, who was indisposed. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Last Friday morning, Canadian composer Tawnie Olson of the Hartt School of Music faculty in West Hartford, Connecticut — along with her four colleagues in the 2015 Iron Composer Competition at Baldwin Wallace Conservatory — accepted the challenge of writing an “instant” composition for recorders, celesta, and an overturned grand piano, to include this year’s “secret ingredient” of a board game. After five hours of creation and a brief rehearsal, Olson’s piece, called Subbeteo after the 1947 tabletop soccer game invented by Peter Adolph and published by Borras Plana SA, was declared the first prize winner during an evening concert in Gamble Auditorium. [Read more…]
by Mike Telin
On Friday, September 4 at Baldwin Wallace Conservatory, the creativity of five composers will be tested when they have five hours to write a brand new piece of music in order to win the coveted titled of Iron Composer. Competition director Joe Drew said that this years contestants are all accomplished composers and college-level teachers whose musical styles are quite varied. “We try to select as diverse a group as possible. We are putting on a show, and it wouldn’t work if we had a group of composers who all write in similar styles, or who would all have a similar response to the stimulus of the challenge.”
What is that challenge? On Friday at 9:00 am in the Chamber Hall, the five finalists will be assigned an instrumentation and a secret musical ingredient that must be incorporated into their work. Past challenges have paired piano trio with a Monet painting, pipe organ with 19th-century music boxes, and brass trio with audience participation. After five hours, the composers must submit a score and parts for their finished piece. Their work will be performed and judged during a free public concert at 8 pm in Gamble Auditorium. Following the performance, prizes will be awarded, and the title of Iron Composer will be bestowed.
by Mike Telin
“Deterioration can mean many things,” composer Jason Thorpe Buchanan said when asked about the title of his new work. “I’m interested in the sounds that can be produced by literally breaking down the instruments.” On Saturday, May 9 at 7:30 pm at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights, the BlueWater Chamber Orchestra under the direction of the composer will present the world premiere of de/ter| |ior.ation. The program will also include Paul Dukas’s Villanelle for horn and orchestra with Ken Wadenpfuhl as soloist, Libby Larsen’s Full Moon in the City for bassoon and strings featuring George Sakakeeny as soloist, and Schubert’s Symphony No. 3, under the direction of BWCO music director Carlton R. Woods. The 75-minute concert will be played without intermission.
by Jarrett Hoffman
A live gerbil as compositional material—it’s the most recent suggestion for a “secret musical ingredient” on the Iron Composer competition’s Facebook page, and contest director Joe Drew, for one, is open to it. “People say stuff, and they think it’s too crazy, but I could see a scenario where that would work,” said Drew over telephone as we talked about the upcoming 8th installment of Iron Composer, a project of Analog Arts. The competition will take place September 26 and will culminate in a free public concert at 8:00 that evening at the Great Lakes Science Center on Erieside Avenue in downtown Cleveland. Emceed by Mark Satola of WCLV, the concert will also be broadcast live on the station (104.9 FM) and on wclv.com.
by Guytano Parks
Blue Water Chamber Orchestra concluded its 2013/2014 season on Saturday evening at Plymouth Church in Shaker Hts. with a concert billed as “Iron Composer and Iron Violinist”. Conducted by Carlton R. Woods, the program featured BWCO concertmaster Kenneth Johnston as soloist in Beethoven’s Violin Concerto and included Two Pieces for Small Orchestra by Delius and Around the Blue-S by 2013 Iron Composer Competition winner Jakub Polaczyk.
Iron Composer is an instant composition contest held at Baldwin Wallace. Five composers are invited to compete in person. On the morning of the event, the finalists are assigned an instrumentation and a secret musical ingredient. They have just five hours to write a piece of music that incorporates those two elements. Their work is then performed and judged on a public concert that same evening. Blue Water Chamber Orchestra and the Iron Composer Competition have a collaborative venture in which works by competition winners are given a performance on its regular concert series. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway & Mike Telin
Even before the Labor Day weekend, many of Northeast Ohio’s universities, colleges and conservatories were already up and running. Because students have only just moved in, concerts at the beginning of the term usually feature faculty recitals and performances by visiting ensembles, and there are several of them scheduled for the early days of September.
The first faculty event at the Oberlin Conservatory this fall will feature violist Michael Strauss (left) and his colleagues Alexa Still, flute, and pianists Monique Duphil and James Howsmon in Dmitri Shostakovich’s Viola Sonata, op. 147, Maurice Duruflé’s 1928 Prélude, Récitatif, et Variations for Flute, Viola, and Piano, Op. 3, and Paul Hindemith’s Viola Sonata, op. 11, no. 4, in a free concert in Kulas Recital Hall at the Oberlin Conservatory on Saturday, September 7 at 8.
“The staff discussed who would perform the first recital of the semester”, Strauss told us by phone. “I said, yeah, I can do that. I’m sure that many of the faculty would have been fine with the slot, it’s just that no one had made the move.”
Now in his second year as associate professor of viola and chamber music, Strauss admits that opening with Shostakovich’s last work is a little risky. “It’s quite a dark piece and it is a big test in keeping your wits about you. I started looking at music that would fit and I thought of going heavy and then lightening up.” [Read more…]