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Cleveland Orchestra provides the live soundtrack to ‘Amadeus,’ reveling in the splendor and genius of Mozart (Sept 21)

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This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

By Peter Feher

CLEVELAND, Ohio — The classical season at Severance Music Center got off to a shocking start on Thursday, Sept. 2, with the Cleveland Orchestra’s live performance of the score to Amadeus. In the first half of the evening alone, there was cursing, flatulence, some hanky-panky, an attempted suicide, and much talk of murder — and all because of one 18th-century composer.

The brilliant 1984 film directed by Miloš Forman was adapted from Peter Shaffer’s 1979 play of the same name — Shaffer also wrote the screenplay. Yet nothing about Mozart’s character as portrayed in Amadeus should really scandalize contemporary audiences. The myths and misconceptions around the life and work of Wolfgang Amadé Mozart — he preferred Amadé over Amadeus — would sooner upset a historian than outrage the average 21st-century concertgoer.

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Conductor Richard Kaufman returns to Blossom for two evenings of film music

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by Stephanie Manning

To Richard Kaufman, returning to Blossom this weekend to lead The Cleveland Orchestra in music by John Williams “is like winning the concert lottery.” The combination of a world-class orchestra, a beautiful venue, and fantastic music fills the conductor with enthusiasm for the two performances on September 4 and 5 at 7:00 pm.

“There’s something about doing a concert during the summer, especially at a place like Blossom, where everybody is just in a great mood,” Kaufman said during a recent phone interview. The program, “Salute to John Williams,” will feature that composer’s music from beloved films like Superman, Harry Potter, and Star Wars. Tickets are available online — fireworks will follow both performances.

“You know, the difficult part about putting together a John Williams concert is what not to do, because there are so many fantastic choices of music that audiences love,” Kaufman said. “So you put together the program knowing that you can’t play everything.” Nevertheless, he’s confident that there’s something for everyone, from the “Flight to Neverland” from Hook to the “Flying Theme” from E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.

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Cleveland Orchestra plays live score for Singin’ in the Rain at Blossom (July 14)

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by Nicholas Stevens

The film-with-live-orchestra format has swept the U.S. of late because of its broad appeal. It boasts advantages over both the traditional open-air concert and the movie theater experience, uniting the vivid sound and fresh setting of the one with the narrative cohesion and thrilling visuals of the other. When a distinguished conductor leads one of the world’s greatest orchestras in one of history’s greatest film musical scores, what could go wrong? [Read more…]

Got summer plans, Cleveland Orchestra? Blossom + Summers@Severance + a few extra notables

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and Clevelanders haven’t heard their orchestra live since mid-May. In the interim, The Cleveland Orchestra has been on the road, finishing off their centennial-capping Prometheus Project with performances at Vienna’s Musikverein and Tokyo’s Suntory Hall. Oh, how we miss them.

We’ll get reacquainted with TCO soon, thanks to their schedule at this year’s 50th anniversary season of Blossom Music Festival, plus their fourth Summers@Severance series.

The Cleveland Orchestra marks the unofficial beginning of summer when they open their Blossom season on Saturday, July 7 at 8:00 pm. At the helm will be music director Franz Welser-Möst, leading the Orchestra in Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition in its orchestration by Ravel, Reznicek’s Overture to Donna Diana, and Beethoven’s Triple Concerto, featuring TCO’s own soloists –– pianist Joela Jones, violinist Stephen Rose, and cellist Mark Kosower. At this concert and two others, check out the Image Magnification system, which displays live video of the performers on LED screens in the Blossom Pavilion. Fingers crossed for the weather — a firework show is planned for afterwards.

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Cleveland Orchestra at the Movies:
a chat with Bride of Frankenstein conductor Richard Kaufman

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by Daniel Hathaway

Brideoffrankenstein“The score is really a character in the film — horrific when it’s supposed to be horrific, and when it’s supposed to be romantic, it’s really romantic,” said Richard Kaufman, who will conduct The Cleveland Orchestra in Franz Waxman’s score to Bride of Frankenstein on Tuesday, April 26 at 7:30 pm in Severance Hall. Meanwhile, James Whale’s 1935 sci-fi horror film will play on a big screen above their heads. “I only wish Waxman could be here to hear it — he would be in tears!”

Bride of Frankenstein is the sequel to Universal Pictures’ 1931 silent film Frankenstein, further developing a subplot in Mary Shelley’s 1818 gothic novel. As legend has it, Waxman, who had fled Europe in the wake of Hitler and ended up in Hollywood, met Whales at a party where the director proposed that he write a score for the sequel. [Read more…]

Review: The Cleveland Orchestra — Hollywood Under the Stars (August 3)

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By Guytano Parks

kaufman-richard-by-eric-stonerA near–capacity crowd filled the pavilion and lawn at Blossom Music Center on Sunday evening when The Cleveland Orchestra presented Hollywood Under The Stars.  Conducted by Richard Kaufman, in his 24th year as principal pops conductor with Orange County’s Pacific Symphony, the concert  included music by some of the most respected and revered film composers of our time.

“Hooray for Hollywood” appropriately opened the program in an invigorating and colorful arrangement by John Williams. Kaufman’s direct, no–nonsense conducting served this syncopated and accented score well, for toe–tapping and hum–along music. [Read more…]

Review: Cleveland Orchestra at Blossom — Pixar in Concert with Richard Kaufman (August 31)

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by Robert Rollin

Pixar-in-ConcertThe Cleveland Orchestra closed its Blossom Festival summer season on August 31 and September 1 with two performances of Pixar in Concert. I attended the Saturday performance, a delightful evening conducted by Richard Kaufman. Kaufman was for eighteen years music coordinator at MGM, supervising both film and television projects. He is now an active pops conductor.

Pixar, the most innovative animation company in recent years, has had a remarkable succession of hits since Toy Story (1995), and the evening concentrated on the quality film music that has helped usher in this new era. Several enormous screens projected the film visuals. Pixar’s skill has been in humanizing digital animation characters, whether children’s toys, monsters, fish, automobiles, insects, or rats, by giving them personalities, endearing expressions, and showing them in life and death struggles to fight the good fight simply to do what is morally right.

Kaufman skillfully coordinated the correlation of music with the films’ visual actions. Though a few musicians wore earphones providing click tracks to maintain ensemble, the large majority relied on Kaufman’s clear beat to stay together. [Read more…]

Preview: Cleveland Orchestra at Blossom:
two “Pixar in Concert” evenings —
a conversation with conductor Richard Kaufman

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by Mike Telin

Kaufman,-Richard---by-Eric-Stoner“I’ve been very blessed,” conductor Richard Kaufman says of his impressive musical career — most of which he has devoted to conducting and supervising music for film and television productions, as well as performing film and classical music in concert halls and on recordings. On Saturday, August 31, and Sunday, September 1, at Blossom Music Center, Richard Kaufman will lead The Cleveland Orchestra in Pixar in Concert. The production includes musical selections from A Bug’s Life, Brave, Cars and Cars 2, Finding Nemo, Monsters, Inc., Toy Story, Toy Story 2 and 3, Ratatouille, Up, and WALL·E along with video clips of each film. Both concerts will be followed by fireworks, weather permitting.

“I was part of the team that created the show at Disney and this weekend’s program is a montage of the 13 Pixar films’ music.” Kaufman points out that performing live to animation is not an easy task. “I have to say that I have played violin for many film scores but I think that playing for animation is by far the most challenging. In animation everything moves very quickly: you have to be able to turn on a dime. In the studio all the musicians use click-tracks but this weekend only part of the orchestra will be using click-tracks. And the fact that The Cleveland Orchestra is going to be playing this music on two summer evenings at Blossom is truly wonderful. It’s like all of the planets have aligned.” [Read more…]

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