by Daniel Hathaway
Most classical guitar recitals are one-player-on-the-stage affairs, so SoloDuo’s excellent recital on the evening of Saturday, June 4 in Mixon Hall at CIM was a double-your-pleasure, double-your-fun occasion. Italian guitarists Matteo Mela and Lorenzo Micheli wowed and delighted a sold-out crowd with intelligent and probing performances of arrangements of music by Domenico Scarlatti, Vincenzo Bellini, J.S. Bach, Claude Debussy, and Astor Piazzolla. [Read more…]
by Carlyn Kessler, Special Contributor
Italian Guitarists Matteo Mela and Lorenzo Micheli formed SoloDuo ten years ago. Their performances have received world-wide acclaim from New York’s Carnegie Hall to Seoul’s Sejong Chamber Hall, from Kiev’s Hall of Columns to Vienna’s Konzerthaus.
On Saturday, May 31 at 8:00 pm in the Cleveland Institute of Music’s Mixon Hall, SoloDuo will make a return visit to the Cleveland International Classical Guitar Festival with a program titled “Metamorphoses.” The performance includes the music of Albéniz, Beethoven, Debussy, Granados, Jolivet, and Rodrigo. On Sunday, June 1, SoloDuo will present a master class from 11:30 am until 2:30 pm in CIM’s Studio 113. The event is free and open to the public.
Although the Duo’s touring schedule did not allow for a telephone conversation, Matteo Mela and Lorenzo Micheli graciously agreed to answer questions by e-mail
Carlyn Kessler: How did the two of you meet?
SoloDuo: We met about fifteen years ago in San Antonio, Texas, while we were both on tour as soloists. We literally bumped into each other by chance. We both thought we could get along pretty well, and we met for lunch a few weeks later when we got back to Europe. That was the beginning of everything. [Read more…]
by James Flood, Daniel Hathaway & Mike Telin
The twelfth annual Classical Guitar Weekend was distinguished by four outstanding concerts by Pavel Steidl, Gaëlle Solal, SoloDuo and Jason Vieaux with soprano Jung Eun Oh; three excellent and informative lectures by luthier Bernhard Kresse, guitarist Jonathan Fitzgerald and record producer Alan Bise; and record audiences showed up for performances, talks and master classes over a three-day span from June 1-3 at the Cleveland Institute of Music. For the first time, Classical Guitar Weekend took on the air of a real festival chock full of delights for guitar enthusiasts as well as for music lovers in general, for which artistic director Armin Kelly deserves an up-front round of applause.
Recital by Pavel Steidl
Pavel Steidl chose his Friday evening program with a particular instrument in mind: a reproduction of a nineteenth century Stauffer instrument made by Bernhard Kresse. In an interview, Kresse contrasted it to the modern guitar as “the difference between a limousine and a sports car with the same engine”. Indeed, Steidl took us on a brisk and thrilling road trip through music by Johann Kaspar Mertz, Niccolò Paganini, J.S. Bach, Fernando Sor and Zani de Ferranti, showing us how well the smaller, peppier instrument responded in the areas of color, speed, articulation and ornamentation.
Pavel Steidl is an animated performer who uses his hands, his feet and his facial expressions as well as the guitar to put the essence of the music across. The Mertz pieces featured colorful harmonies, toccata-like gestures, lyrical stretches and cheerful, humorous moments that Steidl played brilliantly and footnoted with his body motions. [Read more…]