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Cellist Darrett Adkins: solo recital on LCCC Signature Series (Sept. 28)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Nothing seems to exemplify classical music during the COVID era quite so much as performances by solo cellists — often J.S. Bach solo suites, and usually broadcast online from the safe havens of musicians’ homes.

Now that live concerts are beginning to proliferate, it was delightful to hear Oberlin cello professor Darrett Adkins ring a change on the solo suite format with his Hypersuite No. 3 on September 28 in the Cirigliano Studio Theatre at Lorain County Community College. His program opened the new season of Signature Series performances in Elyria, and was dedicated to the memory of Eva Hornyak. [Read more…]

LCCC Signature Series to present pianist Awadagin Pratt on Nov. 18

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by Daniel Hathaway

Cincinnati-based pianist Awadagin Pratt will perform on the Lorain County Community College Signature Series on Monday, November 18 at 7:30 pm in the Cinema Hall at the Stocker Arts Center in Elyria. The free event is the annual Eva Hornyak Memorial Concert, for which Pratt will play Beethoven’s Sonata No. 31, Op. 110, Franck’s Prelude, Chorale and Fugue, and Liszt’s Sonata in b.

We last caught up with the pianist two years ago this month, before his performance on the Tri-C Classical Piano Series. In an interview with Jarrett Hoffman, Pratt talked about his training at the Peabody Conservatory (where he was the first to graduate with three diplomas — in piano, violin, and conducting), his prizes (he won the 1992 Naumburg Piano Competition and an Avery Fisher Career Grant two years later), his three visits to the White House (under presidents Clinton and Obama), and his appearance on Sesame Street (when he shared a piano with Big Bird).

I spoke with Awadagin Pratt by telephone at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory, where he teaches, and began by asking what’s been happening in his life during the last two years. [Read more…]

LCCC Signature Series presents violinist Lauren Cauley and cellist Mariel Roberts

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by Jarrett Hoffman

It happens so often in any industry that one collaboration morphs into many. That was the case when violinist Lauren Cauley and cellist Mariel Roberts worked with composer Jeffrey Mumford at June in Buffalo. At the time, Cauley and Roberts were members of the Mivos Quartet, which went on to perform Mumford’s the promise of the far horizon at the Kennedy Center in 2017.

Having recently left the Mivos, Cauley and Roberts will continue their partnership with each other — and with Mumford — on the next edition of Lorain County Community College’s Signature Series, which the composer curates.

The free concert of solos and duos will take place on Thursday, September 26 at 7:30 pm in Cirigliano Studio Theatre at the Stocker Arts Center. The program includes three works by Mumford, a world premiere by Richard Carrick, and music by Dai Fujikura, Clara Iannotta, Kaija Saariaho, and Mariel Roberts herself. [Read more…]

Cellist Seth Parker Woods to present “Dehiscence: A Sonic Radicalisation” on LCCC Signature Recital Series

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by Jarrett Hoffman

There’s nothing like learning a new word you can use to charming effect in conversation with your friends, co-workers, and dates. Like dehiscence — meaning ‘a splitting open,’ often of a surgical wound.

On second thought, best to leave out the wound aspect and focus on the musical side of the word, thought up by cellist Seth Parker Woods. As he told me during a recent telephone conversation, what interests him is the splitting open of divisions between periods of music. “I’m finding an opening, essentially, and fusing two worlds into one.”

Those worlds are the 17th-century Italian Baroque, and the 20th- and 21st-century avant-garde. He’ll set those genres against each other in “Dehiscence: A Sonic Radicalisation,” a free concert of solo cello music on Tuesday, November 27 at 8:00 pm at LCCC’s Cirigliano Studio Theatre, presented as part of the Signature Recital Series.

[Read more…]

Hub New Music to premiere Andrew Rindfleisch’s Fun House at CSU and LCCC

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by Jarrett Hoffman

hub3Next week, Boston-based quartet Hub New Music will make their Cleveland debut in two free concerts, highlighted by the premiere of Fun House by Andrew Rindfleisch, director of the composition department at Cleveland State.

Flutist Michael Avitabile, clarinetist David Dziardziel, violinist Zenas Hsu, and cellist Jesse Christesen can be heard at CSU’s Drinko Recital Hall on Monday, March 26 at 8:00 pm, after a short residence working with the university’s composition department. Then they’ll head to Cirigliano Studio Theatre on Wednesday, March 28 at 7:30 pm to perform on LCCC’s Signature Series.

Opposite Fun House on the program is Soul House (2017), a commission from composer Robert Honstein, but there’s no connection between the two Houses. “Our program sounds like something off of HGTV,” Avitabile joked. “It’s funny that the pieces turned out that way,” he said in a recent conversation from Jamaica Plain in Boston — “I’m at the very end of the Orange Line.”

[Read more…]

Hilo Duo — Caroline Chin and Brian Snow — head to LCCC for Signature Series

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Hilo-DuoA married couple and parents to a 2 ½-year-old and 4-month-old, violinist Caroline Chin and cellist Brian Snow also both teach at Bowling Green State University — and together make up the Hilo Duo.

On Tuesday, October 10 at 7:30 pm at Cirigliano Studio Theatre at the Stocker Center for the Arts, Hilo Duo will perform 20th- and 21st-century works by Richard Carrick, Elliott Carter, Jeffrey Mumford, and Maurice Ravel. The free concert, part of Lorain County Community College’s Signature Series, is open to the public.

How do Chin and Snow feel about working together as Duo partners? “It’s always great to have a chance to perform together,” said Snow in an email, “and it’s especially enjoyable when we have a chance to play music that we love.”

[Read more…]

LCCC Signature Series: violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins with pianist Craig Ketter (March 31)

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by Nicholas Jones

Hall-TomkinsKelly Hall-Tompkins’s recent recital at Lorain County Community College began, as she said, with the miniature and proceeded to the giant. The excellent New York-based violinist, with pianist Craig Ketter, moved from modernist character pieces by Sergei Prokofiev and Jeffrey Mumford to the full-blown Romanticism of Richard Strauss. Versatile and expressive, Hall-Tompkins and Ketter gave the smaller works a dignity belied by their short duration, and brought a welcome variety to the much longer and distinctly pre-modern Strauss. [Read more…]

Ars Futura to perform Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire at CIM & LCCC

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by Mike Telin

Schoenberg-self-portrait-1910“I believe I am approaching a new way of expression,” composer Arnold Schoenberg wrote in his diary on March 12, 1912. The work Schoenberg is referring to is none other than his pioneering Pierrot Lunaire.

On Wednesday March 2 at 8:00 pm in CIM’s Mixon Hall, and Monday March 7 at 7:30 in Lorain County Community College’s Cirigliano Studio Theatre, the Cleveland-based new music ensemble Ars Futura will present Schoenberg’s melodrama. [Read more…]

LCCC Signature Series: a chat with In2ative — flutist Kimberly Zaleski and cellist Trevor Kazarian

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by Mike Telin

In2ativeThe story of how flutist Kimberly Zaleski and cellist Trevor Kazarian came to form the duo In2ative is fit for the big screen. After graduating from the Cleveland Institute of Music they both worked in restaurants, until one day they found themselves out of work. It was at that moment that they decided to take the risk.

“We literally went to CoolCleveland and searched for all of the festivals in the area,” Kazarian recalled during a conference call with his musical partner. “We would go to each event, put out a hat, and play. We were paying our rent from tip money, but at the same time we were meeting people and making connections. I feel that a lot of what we have today goes back to that moment of taking the risk, and really going for what we believed in. We’re lucky to be in the situation that we are now.” [Read more…]

French dances and more: “Toutes Suites” with Les Délices on LCCC Signature Series (September 24)

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by Nicholas Jones

Les-Delices-092415On Thursday the distinguished Cleveland-based group Les Délices, which specializes in French music of the 18th century, gave the first concert in this year’s Signature Series at Lorain County Community College’s Cirigliano Theater. With this performance, the series, which is curated by LCCC Distinguished Professor and composer Jeffrey Mumford and mostly presents new music, took a plunge into early music. Lully is a far cry from Ligeti, but maybe baroque is the new avant-garde?

[Read more…]

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