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Apollo’s Fire: Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 (Oct. 8)

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by Peter Feher

Apollo’s Fire can’t help returning to the music of Claudio Monteverdi. Cleveland’s period orchestra revived its thrilling take on the composer’s Vespers of 1610 to start the season, and you couldn’t ask for a better beginning. The 40-odd singers and instrumentalists who filled First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights on Saturday, October 8 had musical riches to spare, and a distinctive creative vision united it all.

The unifying thread wasn’t Monteverdi, however, but artistic director Jeannette Sorrell, who’s made a focused project out of this sometimes sprawling piece. Part of the challenge lies in the work’s sheer scope, which is emblematic of the composer’s career. The music looks back on older Renaissance and Medieval styles while also anticipating the innovations of the Baroque era.

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Apollo’s Fire: Israel in Egypt (Feb. 17)

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by Peter Feher   

When it comes to Handel’s oratorios, another repeat isn’t always a welcome thing. But Apollo’s Fire knows how to make an evening exciting, and the group’s reprise performances of the composer’s Israel in Egypt last week — in a streamlined version first presented by the ensemble in 2017 — kept the intrigue factor high.

Artistic director Jeannette Sorrell adapted the Baroque score with certain modern expectations in mind. Her production retains Handel’s solemn opening, achieving a kind of period authenticity, but jettisons much of the repetition and inessential action in the rest of the music. The result is a lean and engaging dramatic arc — less than two hours — that translates 18th-century entertainment for the 21st century.

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Julian Wachner & Apollo’s Fire: Bach’s Christmas Oratorio at CMA (Dec. 13)

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by Daniel Hathaway

In 1735, Johann Sebastian Bach’s congregations in the two principal churches of Leipzig were treated to six new cantatas between Christmas Day and Epiphany, at a rate of one per feast day. In 2019, Apollo’s Fire’s audiences got to hear two-thirds of those pieces in one sitting, as guest conductor Julian Wachner led Cantatas Nos. 1, 2, 5, and 6 of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio in five venues around the city. I heard the performance on Friday, December 13 in Gartner Auditorium at the Cleveland Museum of Art. [Read more…]

Oberlin BPI’s Dido and Aeneas: ten minutes with Lucas Harris

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by Daniel Hathaway

The 48th year of Oberlin’s Baroque Performance Institute sports a remarkably inclusive theme: “Music of the Enemies of Louis XIV.” BPI’s promotional materials note that in addition to engaging in four large-scale conflicts, the French Sun King managed to ruffle the feathers of nearly every major power in Europe during his 72-year reign.

Last week’s faculty concert featured music by Joan Cabanilles, Johann Joseph Fux, Johann Heinrich Schmelzer, Heinrich Biber, Johannes Schenck, Tomaso Albinoni, Henry Purcell, and Arcangelo Corelli in a performance that filled Kulas Recital Hall to capacity just with BPI participants.

This Friday evening, June 28 at 7:30 pm, the big faculty/guest concert moves into the much larger space of Warner Concert Hall for Arcangelo Corelli’s Concerto Grosso in D, Op. 6, No. 4 in D, Petronio Franceschini’s Sonata for Two Trumpets, and Johann Joseph Fux’s Ouverture in d. The evening will close with a semi-staged production of Henry Purcell’s tragedy Dido and Aeneas, based on Book IV of Virgil’s Aeneid. [Read more…]

Apollo’s Fire: opening night of L’Orfeo at CIM (April 13)

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by David Kulma

EricaCarlosApollo’s Fire’s L’Orfeo is, in short, spell-binding. You should drop everything and go to their final local performance in Bay Village on Wednesday, April 18. If you’re not yet convinced, please keep reading. Two things stand out about this glorious semi-staged performance of Claudio Monteverdi’s “Favola di musica” in Kulas Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music on April 13. First is the magnificent production and performance. Second is the special music crafted by Apollo’s Fire principal cello René Schiffer to restore the original 1607 Bacchanale ending. [Read more…]

Apollo’s Fire: being a fly on the wall at early rehearsals of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo

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by Daniel Hathaway

Coro Wandering onto setAdmirers of Thomas Forrest Kelly’s 2000 book First Nights: Five Musical Premieres probably wish they could have been physically present to witness the very first performances of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo, Handel’s Messiah, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, and Stravinsky’s Le sacre du printemps.

Me? I wish I had been able to attend the rehearsals — which often prove as interesting as the performances themselves. Rehearsals are where artistic philosophies get established, deals are made between directors and performers, and kinks get worked out. When the piece in question is a staged work, the rehearsal process becomes more complex: the ideas (and egos) of more than one director need to be melded into a single product, and there’s much more that can go awry.

Apollo’s Fire will produce three semi-staged performances of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo in the next week: two in Kulas Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music on Friday and Saturday, April 13 and 14 at 7:30 pm, and one at St. Raphael Church in Bay Village on Wednesday, April 18 at 7:30 pm. [Read more…]

Apollo’s Fire: “Christmas on Sugarloaf Mountain” (Dec. 9)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Sugarloaf1The five sold-out performances of “Christmas on Sugarloaf Mountain” this month attest to the popularity of Apollo’s Fire’s crossover shows. Heard on Saturday, December 9 at First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights, the holiday sequel to “Sugarloaf Mountain: an Appalachian Gathering” was just as alluring and infectious as its predecessor, even if some of its elements were still in the process of settling in. [Read more…]

Apollo’s Fire: Handel’s Israel in Egypt at First Baptist, Shaker Heights (Oct. 13)

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by Daniel Hathaway

AF-Closeup-Orch-ChorusAt its premiere in 1739, Handel’s Biblical oratorio Israel in Egypt was almost entirely made up of choruses. Even in the composer’s revision, minus the opening lament and with Italian arias added, the work is probably more rewarding to sing than to listen to. Enter Jeannette Sorrell, who decided to restore part of the introduction that Handel lopped off, and to bring the rest of the piece down to under two hours in length. Her version made a fine impression on Friday evening, when Sorrell led Apollo’s Fire, Apollo’s Singers, and five extraordinary soloists in a leaner Israel in Egypt at First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights. [Read more…]

Apollo’s Fire: “Sacred Bach — a spiritual journey” at St. Paul’s, Cleveland Heights (Mar. 24)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Gascho-JosephHaving paid tribute to Johann Sebastian Bach’s prowess as a composer of orchestral music in its last set of concerts, Apollo’s Fire and Apollo’s Singers presented expertly performed examples of his Leipzig liturgical works at St. Paul’s in Cleveland Heights on Friday, March 24 with guest conductor Joseph Gascho at the helm. [Read more…]

Apollo’s Fire: “Resplendent Purcell” at First Baptist Church (October 8)

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by Nicholas Jones

purcell-henryThe short-lived English composer Henry Purcell wrote works that rank among the masterpieces of the Baroque. But, like many artists of the 17th century, he also had to produce a lot on demand. In his position as organist at both the Chapel Royal and Westminster Abbey, he needed to work up music for a number of royal occasions. Necessarily, while some of his music is deeply personal, other works — like his odes for the queen’s birthday — were clearly more routinely produced. [Read more…]

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