by Stephanie Manning
School’s out for the summer, but that doesn’t mean all learning has to be put on pause. Enter programs like “Summer Fun For Everyone” at the Garfield Heights Branch of the Cuyahoga County Public Library.
On most weekday mornings during the summer, kids from grades one through six are welcome to drop in to the campus on Turney Road for exploratory educational activities. On Thursday, June 12, what was in store included a concert of string quartets, performed by the young artists of the ENCORE Chamber Music Institute.
While the musicians were warming up, a few kids and caregivers waited in the adjoining room. There, the tables were already lined with crafting supplies — cardboard boxes, rubber bands, and the like — to build makeshift instruments. [Read more…]
ENCORE Chamber Music held a musical tasting on Sunday afternoon, July 3rd at the Dodero Center for the Performing Arts. “Tales of Travel and Transformation” featured members of the Verona Quartet, artistic director Jinjoo Cho, and other faculty of the summer institute.
The theme of ENCORE Chamber Music’s fourth season is “La Bohème: Art and Freedom,” mixing meanings of Bohemianism. It has brought together the 19th-century artistic movement that sought to break down conventions (think the characters from Puccini’s opera) with composers from Bohemia, of which Dvořák is the most famous. I attended three concerts where the overarching theme was successfully bent to include music from Mozart to living American composers.
