This article was originally published on Cleveland.com
by Kevin McLaughlin | ClevelandClassical.com
CUYAHOGA FALLS, Ohio — Finnish guest conductor Hannu Lintu strode onstage at the Blossom Music Center on July 27, all six-feet-plus of him, as purposefully as the hero in Lemminkäinen’s Return. The opening work on The Cleveland Orchestra’s program on Saturday is the fourth tone poem in Jan Sibelius’s “Lemminkäinen Suite,” based on Finland’s national epic, the “Kalevala.”
All he needed was a horse. But then, with a turn toward the orchestra and a mighty downbeat, he unleashed equestrian fury from strings and woodwinds, allowing some brass aggression here and there. With loose-limbed, ropey arms and an occasional leg-lift, Lintu projected the relaxed potency of a warrior leading his team to victory.
Since joining The Cleveland Orchestra as principal cello in 2010, Mark Kosower has thrilled audiences with his performances of concertos by Ginastera, Haydn, Dvořák, Barber, and Tchaikovsky.
Franz Welser-Möst led the final bows on Saturday night at Severance, like the star of any show should. The Cleveland Orchestra’s music director is in his element presiding over the ensemble’s annual opera production, which this season packs the drama. Verdi’s Otello — in a concert staging that opened May 21 and runs for two more performances (May 26 and 29) — demands big voices, instrumental forces to match, and a conductor who can give it all shape and direction. 
Half Mozart and half British, the repertory at Severance Music Center on Sunday afternoon, March 27 gave The Cleveland Orchestra multiple opportunities to shine under the baton of Dame Jane Glover, who organized the proceedings with a keen sense of style and narrative. And Dame Imogen Cooper, her compatriot in the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, crafted a memorable account of Mozart’s richly symphonic Piano Concerto No. 22.
Much had changed in the 130-some years that separate Wolfgang Amadé Mozart’s Vienna from that of Alban Berg. The Cleveland Orchestra titled episode 11 of its In Focus digital series “Order and Disorder,” presumably to contrast Mozart’s well-behaved, Enlightenment-inspired Clarinet Quintet from 1789 with the societal chaos reflected musically in Berg’s Lyric Suite, three of the six movements from the composer’s 1925-1926 String Quartet that he arranged for full string orchestra in 1928.
Wind players have arguably been the most frustrated instrumentalists during the pandemic. When you pursue your art and livelihood by forcing air from your lungs through an instrument, you’re among the most likely candidates to spread the novel coronavirus, thus your near exile from concert halls.