Jay Ashby Archives - Cleveland Classical

Music, Sports, and Ancient Greece festival: Oberlin faculty recital (Oct. 10)

October 26, 2021 by Jarrett Hoffman

by Jarrett Hoffman

To open the academic calendar in recent years, Oberlin Conservatory violin professor Sibbi Bernhardsson has organized interdisciplinary festivals centered around intriguing themes. That continued earlier this month with “Music, Sports, and the Enduring Influence of Ancient Greece,” a topic that was examined through a variety of events, musical and otherwise, over the course of two days. I caught the tail-end of the festival via live stream: the fourth and final faculty recital in Warner Concert Hall on the evening of October 10.

The program was fresh and eclectic, featuring several works by lesser-known composers, and spanning from traditional classical to contemporary music and jazz — not to mention poetry.

CD Review — Under One Sun

November 3, 2017 by Jarrett Hoffman

by Jarrett Hoffman

Eight core musicians from three continents gather around the music of Billy Drewes in the latest release on the Oberlin Music label, Under One Sun. The album’s wide array of instruments, moods, and vocal styles makes for a fun and exploratory 70 minutes of jazz.

The Cleveland Orchestra Fridays@7 (May 15)

May 19, 2015 by Jarrett Hoffman

by Jarrett Hoffman

A good party doesn’t sit. It moves — from room to room, topic to topic, different people getting to tell their good joke.

Now imagine a party like that, but in a palace. Think golden handrails, spacious rooms, drinks poured and legs dancing, and good music. Think Gatsby.

Or think Severance Hall on Friday night, May 15th. The Cleveland Orchestra’s last Fridays@7 concert of the season featured four musical acts in four rooms, including one last party in the gilded Grand Foyer.

No Exit: New Season, New Sounds at SPACES Gallery (Oct. 19)

by Daniel Hathaway

No Exit New Music’s events are like carefully curated art shows, and come complete with printed programs that more resemble exhibition catalogs than what you’d normally be handed at the door of a concert venue.

It takes some space to present the often complex back stories of contemporary works, and the ensemble’s triad of October programs, simply titled “New Season, New Sounds” was accompanied by a colorful, artsy, 39-page booklet that could become a collector’s item.

I joined a good-sized and enthusiastic audience to attend the third performance at SPACES Gallery on Saturday evening, October 19. [Read on…]

Apollo’s Fire opens Bach-focused season with Brandenburgs (Oct. 18)

by Peter Feher

If it weren’t for J.S. Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, there might not be period-instrument ensembles like Apollo’s Fire. Cleveland’s Baroque orchestra, now in its 33rd season, opened its concert year with a solid program built around these staple pieces.

A lively performance of four of the concertos at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Cleveland Heights on Friday, October 18 was the first of half a dozen outings for Apollo’s Fire this month (with slight changes in repertoire and personnel along the way).

Bach’s music, in all its consolations and complexities, could easily fill an ensemble’s entire schedule. In fact, that’s sort of what Apollo’s Fire has planned for 2024–25, with artistic director Jeannette Sorrell conceiving of the composer as a “guide star” for the season. The yearlong focus on Bach is set to conclude this spring in a “Bachanalia,” a full month of concerts and workshops around Northeast Ohio. [Read on…]

Les Délices conjures Arcadia in high quality (Oct. 20)

by Stephanie Manning

Arcadia: that mythological Eden, that utopian natural paradise. The members of Italy’s Arcadian Academy, established in the late 17th century, aimed to replicate that pastoral life via the arts. And on October 20, Les Délices sought to do the same, by performing the music of composers from the Academy and beyond.

“Arcadian Dreams,” a program featuring soprano Hannah De Priest, gave the Harkness Chapel audience a taste of the early music group’s next recording. In fact, the musicians were gearing up to get in the studio the very next day — and they delivered a suitably high-quality performance in the process. [Read on…]

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