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Les Délices:
“Torchsongs Transformed”

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Les Délices has added a new twist to their acclaimed Baroque-jazz fusion program. Previously known as “Songs Without Words” — in the form of both a live concert and a beautiful album from 2018 — it’s now called “Torchsongs Transformed,” and adds soprano Hélène Brunet to the core of Debra Nagy (Baroque oboe), Mélisande Corriveau (viola da gamba and pardessus de viole), and Eric Milnes (harpsichord).

Here the ensemble explores the relationship between 17th-century French love songs (airs de cour) and 20th-century torchsongs and jazz standards arranged for and improvised by the ensemble. It’s all laid out in the arc of an affair, viewed through the lens of each passing season, as songs like Gershwin’s Summertime and Johnny Mercer’s Autumn Leaves are interleaved with music by Michel Lambert, Jean-Baptiste Lully, and Sebastian Le Camus. See the full program and read Debra Nagy’s notes here. 

Performances take place Friday, March 6 at 7:30 pm at Holy Trinity Lutheran in Akron, Saturday, March 7 at 7:30 pm at Lakewood Congregational, and Sunday, March 8 at 4:00 pm at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights. Tickets are available online.

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BlueWater Chamber Orchestra at Plymouth Church (Feb. 1)

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by David Kulma

During Daniel Meyer’s short tenure as artistic director and conductor of BlueWater Chamber Orchestra, the ensemble has risen to a new level of quality. On Saturday, February 1 at Plymouth Church, Meyer and his ensemble performed an excellent program titled “A Classical Feast,” focusing on music from the late 18th century.

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Cleveland Classical Guitar Society to present Beijing Guitar Duo

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by Mike Telin

If you’re looking for something special to share with your significant other for Valentine’s Day, why not take in a classical guitar concert? On Saturday, February 15 at 7:30 pm at Plymouth Church, the Beijing Guitar Duo — Meng Su and Yameng Wang — will return to the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society stage with a program of music by J.S. Bach, Debussy, Tan Dun, Chen Yi, and Piazzolla. Buy your tickets in advance here. 

“We’re looking forward to being back in Cleveland,” Meng Su said by telephone from Knoxville, Tennessee, the sixth stop on their month-long, twelve-city tour. I began our conversation by asking her about their eclectic program. 

Mike Telin: You and Yameng are getting down to business from the beginning with Bach’s “Chaconne.”

Meng Su: Yes. This arrangement is after the Busoni arrangement for piano — he added a lot of harmonies and made it more Romantic, but kept the essence of Bach’s writing. The arrangement we’re playing is by the German guitarist Ulrich Stracke. It works very well. We’ve been playing it for many years. The “Chaconne” is such a big task but as you get older you begin to understand it more. Now that Yameng has become a mother — she has a two-month old daughter — and I have started teaching in Hong Kong at the Academy for the Performing Arts, I think we have a deeper understanding of it. I’m sure we will be playing it for the rest of our lives.

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BlueWater: chatting with violin soloists Ken Johnston and Emily Cornelius

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Two founding members of BlueWater Chamber Orchestra will partner as soloists this weekend, when conductor Daniel Meyer and the ensemble perform “A Classical Feast” at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights on Saturday, February 1 at 7:30 pm.

Concertmaster Ken Johnston and principal second violin Emily Cornelius will play the Op. 13 Symphonie Concertante in G by Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, who is remembered as the first known classical composer of African origin. One of his contemporaries was Mozart, whose Symphony No. 40 in g closes Saturday’s program. And in between those two works, soprano Laura Pedersen will be featured in Beethoven’s concert aria Ah, Perfido! Tickets are available online.

Johnston and Cornelius have known each other for at least ten years — BlueWater celebrates its own decade in 2020 — but this will be their first time appearing together as soloists. “At this point, she and I are old friends,” Johnston said by telephone last week. “I have a tremendous amount of respect for her musicianship. I think we share the same sense of humor in a lot of ways, and that comes across.”

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Dover Quartet brings new David Bruce work to Cleveland Chamber Music Society

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by Jarrett Hoffman

On Tuesday, December 3 at 7:30 pm at Plymouth Church, the Dover Quartet will return to the Cleveland Chamber Music Society bearing a healthy, six-week-old piece of music by David Bruce alongside works by Britten and Brahms.

The group premiered Bruce’s The Lick Quartet in October on the Dallas Chamber Music Society, then played it again at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and the Stadthaus in Ulm, Germany. That makes this the fourth performance of the piece, and if you want to get geographic about it, the East-of-the-Mississippi U.S. premiere.

And about that title — it has nothing to do with anyone’s tongue, but rather it’s the word for a melodic fragment in jazz. According to Bruce’s notes on the piece, the term “lick” has become a cliché, an Internet meme, and an inside joke among musicians. But after he noticed the resemblance of a lick in his early sketches for the piece, he decided to challenge himself to use it unironically.

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BlueWater: violinist Jinjoo Cho to play the Tchaikovsky Concerto

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Violinist Jinjoo Cho was born in Seoul and lives in Montreal, but you could easily say she’s from Northeast Ohio. She moved here as a teenager and enrolled in the Cleveland Institute of Music’s young artist program, and she didn’t leave the area until last year, when she joined the faculty of the Schulich School of Music at McGill University.

Her time living in Cleveland saw her career take off. Cho won a major competition (International Violin Competition of Indianapolis), made an important solo debut (Carnegie Hall), took on teaching positions (CIM and Oberlin Conservatory), and founded and continues to run a summer festival (ENCORE Chamber Music in Gates Mills).

Cho has been featured by many of the area’s prominent ensembles and presenting organizations — and she’s still adding to that list. She will play Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto this weekend in her first appearances with BlueWater Chamber Orchestra, led by Daniel Meyer.

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English clarinetist Colin Lawson to join Les Délices in Mozart and Beethoven

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by Jarrett Hoffman

You might expect that someone who’s a leader in their field was hooked from their initial encounter with it. Colin Lawson, described as “the doyen of period clarinettists” by BBC Magazine, had a different first impression of early music performance.

“I was rather put off because some of the musical results were not that fantastic,” Lawson said by telephone from the Royal College of Music in London, where he directs the school, chairs its historical performance program, and teaches classical clarinet. “I was very interested in the academic side of early music, but it took me a bit of time to get ‘round to playing it.”

Audiences are certainly happy that he did get around to it. His credentials as a player include performances with Britain’s leading period orchestras, solo appearances in Wigmore and Carnegie Halls, and recordings of an array of concertos and chamber music.

Lawson’s latest project falls in the category of things that are always exciting and often challenging: meeting new musicians — some from another continent, no less — and playing chamber music with them. Next weekend, under the umbrella of Les Délices, he will join oboist Debra Nagy, bassoonist Wouter Verschuren, hornist Todd Williams, and fortepianist Sylvia Berry in three concerts of music by Mozart and Beethoven.

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Two days, two guitarists: Feuillâtre and Davin to visit Guitar Society, Western Reserve 

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by Jarrett Hoffman

This weekend gives concertgoers the chance to hear one guitarist from France who will be making his Cleveland debut, and another from Bay Village who in the past several years, as he told me over the phone, has been re-solidifying his identity as a Clevelander.

Paris-based Raphaël Feuillâtre is in the midst of a victory lap following his Grand Prize at the 2018 Guitar Foundation of America International Concert Artists Competition. One stop on his 7-month, 50-city tour will be Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights on Saturday, October 5 at 7:30 pm, when he’ll bring works by Mangoré, Llobet, Rameau, Brouwer, Assad, Villa-Lobos, Scriabin, and Rachmaninoff to the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society’s International Series.

Co-head of the guitar faculty at the Cleveland Institute of Music and a frequent recitalist, Colin Davin is a name that needs little introduction around here. His recital on Sunday, October 6 at 5:00 pm at Christ Church Episcopal in Hudson as part of Music from The Western Reserve will include works by Ponce, Tower, Brouwer, and J.S. Bach.

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BlueWater Chamber Orchestra tells tales at Plymouth (May 4)

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by David Kulma

BlueWater Chamber Orchestra entered an exciting second era with the final concert of its 9th season on Saturday, May 4 at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights. Last month, conductor Daniel Meyer was named the orchestra’s artistic director, so now this important Northeast Ohio institution can chart a course into its second decade.

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Cleveland Classical Guitar Society: a conversation with Judicaël Perroy

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by Mike Telin

The decision to pursue the path of a professional musician came late for Judicaël Perroy. “I didn’t decide until I was in my twenties,” the French-born guitarist wrote in an email. Perroy, who serves on the faculty at the San Francisco Conservatory, said that although he learned to play the guitar early in life, he was always interested in other subjects while he was in school. “I was kind of a child prodigy and everybody thought that I would become a guitarist. So I decided late because I wanted it to be my decision.”

On Saturday, April 27 at 7:30 pm in Plymouth Church, Perroy will make his Cleveland debut with a concert featuring works by Bach, Sor, Mertz, Villa-Lobos, and Albéniz. The concert is presented as part of the Cleveland Classical Guitar Society’s International Series. Tickets are available online.

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