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Cleveland Orchestra performs Mahler, Honegger with philosophical depth (Oct. 2)

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By Daniel Hathaway|Cleveland Classical

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Franz Welser-Möst and The Cleveland Orchestra set a high musical bar early in their new season at Severance Music Center on Thursday with totally committed performances of unique works by Arthur Honegger and Gustav Mahler.

Honegger set out to express the horror of World War II in three arresting movements named after religious texts in his Symphony No. 3, subtitled “Symphonie liturgique.”

And Mahler, who once said, “A symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything,” turned away from that idea in his symphonic song cycle “Das lied von der Erde,” crafting a six-movement work that simply sought to capture the experience of being human on planet Earth.

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Cleveland Orchestra delivers a stirring night of Shostakovich, Mozart and Chopin with Heras-Casado and Ax (Dec. 5)

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by Peter Feher

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — It’s fitting that conductor Pablo Heras-Casado should be leading The Cleveland Orchestra this week in Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 10 — the work of a mid-career composer who was looking to make a major statement.

A decade ago, Heras-Casado was regularly touted as a possible candidate for a music directorship at a top U.S. orchestra. Although some of the heat has died down since — the 47-year-old Spaniard is currently between posts and sticking to guest-conducting gigs — he started to get the furnace roaring again at Severance Music Center on Thursday, Dec. 5.

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Cleveland Orchestra’s principal piccolo Mary Kay Fink shines in premiere of Oden Zehavi’s ‘Aurora’

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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…]

The Cleveland Orchestra: Composer Oded Zehavi talks about his new piccolo concerto

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by Mike Telin

When Oded Zehavi heard Cleveland Orchestra principal piccolo Mary Kay Fink play during a program at the Cleveland Institute of Music, he knew he wanted to write a concerto for her. “I was so happy that she was open to it,” the Israeli composer said during a Zoom call.

Once Fink and Zehavi decided that a new concerto was something they wanted to pursue — and with The Cleveland Orchestra onboard for commissioning the piece — the creative process began. Everything went as planned, and the world premiere was set for April of 2020 — only to have it canceled due to COVID.

After a four-year wait, Zehavi will hear his concerto brought to life when Mary Kay Fink gives the world premiere of Aurora with The Cleveland Orchestra on Thursday, March 7 at 7:30 pm at Severance Music Center. [Read more…]

The Cleveland Orchestra: Mary Kay Fink to premiere new piccolo concerto

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by Mike Telin

When Oded Zehavi first heard Cleveland Orchestra principal piccolo Mary Kay Fink play during a program at the Cleveland Institute of Music, the Israeli composer knew he wanted to write a concerto for her. “The Violins of Hope were in residence and we were encouraged to put together programs featuring composers who perished during the Holocaust,” Fink, who serves on the CIM faculty, recalled during a telephone conversation. “I played in a trio by Erwin Schulhoff that has a fair amount of piccolo in it. And after the concert he found me and said, ‘I want to write you a piccolo concerto.’ That’s how it all started.”

Once Fink and Zehavi decided that a new concerto was something they wanted to pursue — and with The Cleveland Orchestra onboard for commissioning the piece — the creative process began. Everything went as planned, and the world premiere was set for April of 2020 — only to have it canceled due to COVID.

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Cleveland Chamber Collective and Inlet Dance Theater at Cain Park 

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by Mike Telin

In her article Four Qualities of Classic Literature, MJ Booklover says that

A great writer has something specific to say, or perhaps, more typically, a big question to ask about the nature of the world as it was in the times of that writer. But a great work also observes truths about the human condition as it occurs in any age. 

Perhaps no writer has captured the timeless truths of the human condition more profoundly than William Shakespeare, and nowhere as persuasively as in The Tempest, the inspiration for Ty Alan Emerson’s new ballet, Caliban Ascendant.

“This project started about eight years ago when I was working with a friend of mine, Josh Legg,” Emerson (pictured below) said during a telephone conversation. “He’s a choreographer and a wonderful person. We wanted to collaborate on a project so we started talking about what we’d like to do. I had seen many productions of Shakespeare’s The Tempest. I saw one at Bowling Green that was really fun — they actually put a gamelan onstage and Caliban was played by a two-person puppet. So I thought, ‘I’d like to dig into that.’”

On Sunday, August 29 at 8:00 pm at Cain Park Amphitheater, the Cleveland Chamber Music Collective in partnership with Inlet Dance Theatre will present the world premiere of Caliban Ascendant. The ballet is based on a story developed by Joshua Legg and Ty Alan Emerson and features music by Emerson and choreography by Bill Wade in collaboration with Dominic Moore-Dunson, Kevin Parker, Emily Stonecipher, and Katie Wilber. [Read more…]

RRCMS ends season with three quintets (May 17)

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by Jarrett Hoffman

The Rocky River Chamber Music Society’s live-streamed 62nd season came to a rousing conclusion on Monday, May 17, when five wind players and a pianist came together around quintets by masters of old and new.

Anton Reicha’s 24 woodwind quintets don’t have the most exciting reputation, but his Op. 88 in E-flat is superb: beautiful, varied, and in the right hands, compellingly picturesque. Those right hands (and left ones too) were those of flutist Mary Kay Fink, oboist Frank Rosenwein, clarinetist Robert Woolfrey, hornist Richard King, and bassoonist Barrick Stees, who together gave a first-rate performance, both deeply polished and deeply fun.

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Rocky River Chamber Music Society: five winds & a pianist

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Lately, wind players have only been sighted here and there on the calendar, and have mostly performed all on their lonesome. That makes the finale to the Rocky River Chamber Music Society’s 62nd season an extra special occasion for anyone with a fondness for music of the lungs.

Five members of The Cleveland Orchestra’s wind section — flutist Mary Kay Fink, oboist Frank Rosenwein, clarinetist Robert Woolfrey, hornist Richard King, and bassoonist Barrick Stees — will come together on the stage of West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church on Monday, May 17 at 7:30 pm for a live-streamed concert that can be viewed on Facebook or YouTube.

On opposite ends of the program are woodwind quintets by Anton Reicha and Valerie Coleman, two composers who also come from opposite ends of the genre’s history. In between, pianist Christina Dahl will replace Fink to showcase a different but related species of quintet, represented here by Beethoven.

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Cleveland Chamber Collective at Disciple’s Church (Mar. 1)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Members of The Cleveland Orchestra and friends who perform from time to time as the Cleveland Chamber Collective presented the premiere of a work by Geoffrey Peterson and the sneak preview of a Cleveland Orchestra-commissioned piccolo concerto in a chamber format. Filling out the program were well-known pieces by Beethoven and Debussy, performed in front of a small audience at Disciple’s Christian Church in Cleveland Heights on Sunday evening, March 1. [Read more…]

CIM hosts Music For Food at First Baptist February 18

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by Daniel Hathaway

One of the iterations of Music for Food, a musician-led initiative to fight hunger in local communities, is an annual concert to benefit the Greater Cleveland Food Bank. This year’s event will take place at First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights on Tuesday, February 18 at 8:00 pm. Sponsored by the Student Government Association of the Cleveland Institute of Music, the performance will bring CIM faculty and students together for music by Camille Saint-Saëns, Charles Gounod, and Felix Mendelssohn.

Faculty musicians include Jeanelle Brierley, Olga Dubossarskaya Kaler, and Jaime Laredo, violins, Sharon Robinson, cello, Mary Kay Fink, flute, Frank Rosenwein, oboe, Afendi Yusuf, clarinet, Barrick Stees, bassoon, and Richard King, horn. [Read more…]

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