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ChamberFest takes its audience on a journey in “Songs, Signs, and Souvenirs” (June 28)

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by Stephanie Manning

During this year’s ChamberFest, the “Lost and Found” theme showed up in all kinds of ways. Sometimes that meant performing recently-unearthed works from historic composers like Mozart and Chopin. Sometimes it referred to an emotional resonance, as when Judith Markovich’s music told the story of the grief and loss of a son.

But the listener has a role to play in this as well. As ChamberFest’s past Board chair Rebecca Carmi reminded the audience on June 28, getting “lost” in the music is also an experience to strive for. Thankfully, the engrossing final concert of ChamberFest’s 2025 season — held in Severance Music Center’s Reinberger Chamber Hall — provided plenty of opportunities.

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ChamberFest Cleveland: “Sing Hallelujah!” (June 26)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Sometimes the only thing that connects works in a concert is that they all appear on the same program page. That certainly characterized the mix of two Brahms songs, the premiere of a violin and piano work, a “repetitive music” classic for duo pianists, and a well-known piano trio that were featured in ChamberFest Cleveland’s sold out program “Sing Hallelujah!” on June 26 in Mixon Hall.

Johannes Brahms was partial to works that explore the lower, more mellow range of voices and instruments, as represented here by a pair of songs. Throughout both Gestillet Sehnsucht and Geistliches Wiegenlied, mezzo-soprano Fleur Barron, violist Kim Kashkashian, and pianist Amy Yang produced rich, expressive musical lines that projected beautifully into the hall. The “Sacred Crib Song” was especially endearing for quoting the well-known 14th-century Christmas song “Joseph lieber, Joseph mein,” a little joke referring to the work’s dedicatee, Joseph Joachim.

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ChamberFest Cleveland: “Inventions of Memory” (June 27)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

ChamberFest Cleveland’s June 27 program, “Inventions of Memory,” offered three distinct meditations on musical remembrance. Presented in the tranquil setting of Harkness Chapel at Case Western Reserve University, eight of the festival’s standout artists illuminated works by Claude Debussy, Brett Dean, and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.

The program opened with Debussy’s Trois Chansons de Bilitis, a cycle of idealized and slightly prurient visions of antiquity. Mezzo-soprano Fleur Barron and pianist Roman Rabinovich offered a reading attuned to the music’s erotic undertow and bathed in Lydian and whole-tone harmonies.

In La Flûte de Pan, Rabinovich’s shimmering textures evoked the strumming of a lyre as Barron spun out the tale of a young girl’s intimate flute lesson. Her voice, pliant and sumptuous, moved easily between innocence and seduction.
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ChamberFest Cleveland: “Fidelity and Betrayal” (June 17)

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by Mike Telin

From the beginning, ChamberFest Cleveland’s artistic directors have turned to creative themes for their programming inspiration. This season the Festival’s guiding light has taken a literary slant with Lightness of Being — after Milan Kundera’s 1984 novel The Unbearable Lightness of Being. But don’t feel like you need to have read the novel to enjoy the concerts — Donald Rosenberg’s brilliantly written program notes will tell you what you need to know.

On Saturday, June 17 in CIM’s Mixon Hall, the program “Fidelity and Betrayal” included works from the standard repertoire, a never-performed work by a well-known composer, a piece inspired by Cuban and South American dances, and music that had never been heard before — anytime, anywhere.

 

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ChamberFest Cleveland: “Karenin’s Smile” (June 16)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

After the seriousness and communal pall brought on by the COVID pandemic, this year’s ChamberFest is asserting “Lightness of Being” as a theme, inspired by Milan Kundera’s 1984 novel The Unbearable Lightness of Being. In the second concert of the Festival, titled “Karenin’s Smile,” works by Mozart, Janáček, and Saint-Saëns were appropriately buoyant and cheerful, thrilling those gathered at Cleveland’s St. Wendelin Church on June 16.

Mozart wrote two of his six so-called “viola quintets” in 1787 in close succession — one in C major, one in G minor. The C major, with its more amiable and optimistic disposition, was a fitting choice on Friday evening.

Cellist Jonathan Swensen opened with a puckish rising arpeggiated triad, which first violinist David Bowlin answered with equally cheeky delight. The wide-ranging motive hinted at the movement’s dimensions (a good fifteen minutes long), and the violin answer set the bantering pattern. Bowlin made a fine leader, acquitting himself in both Allegro movements with mirthful virtuosity.

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ChamberFest Cleveland: “Spirited Away” at Disciples Church (June 17)

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by Daniel Hathaway

The post-COVID era may be on the horizon, but it hasn’t arrived yet. That dastardly microbe that has wrought havoc in the performing arts world for more than two years is still on the prowl.

Just ask Jessica Peek Sherwood, ChamberFest Cleveland’s new executive director, whose first official acts since coming on board June 1st have been to replace musicians whose positive test results have left them on the sidelines.

Swapping out individuals in a festival roster can often be accomplished quickly and efficiently, as for ChamberFest’s opening concert when Rising Star Sterling Elliott offered to step in for another cellist without missing a beat. It’s not so simple when a guest ensemble like King’s Return, the Dallas male vocal quartet, is scheduled to headline a concert. [Read more…]

ChamberFest Cleveland opens with “Exquisite Beginnings” at CIM (June 16)

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by Daniel Hathaway

ChamberFest Cleveland’s Season X — Roman numeral, not unknown quantity — got underway on Thursday, June 16 when a crowd of masked fans filled every seat in Mixon Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music for “Exquisite Beginnings,” an opening salvo of works by Mozart/Grieg, George Walker, and Brahms.

The joy of returning to live concerts was palpable, reinforced by co-artistic director Franklin Cohen — who warmly greeted attendees in the lobby beforehand — and captured in the words of performers in an almost giddily edited video by Erica Brenner that was shown right after intermission. Chez Cohen was once again bubbling over with the sounds of rehearsing musicians in the “Chamberhood” that the Festival has created over nine previous seasons. The audience showed its feelings in ardent ovations. [Read more…]

ChamberFest Cleveland: Emerging into Light (June 24)

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by Timothy Robson

It was with a sense of relief and anticipation that I attended last Thursday’s third-to-last concert of ChamberFest Cleveland 2021, after a complete pandemic cancellation of its 2020 season. This musical star of Cleveland summers returned along with many performers from past seasons, plus talented younger musicians in CFC’s Rising Star program. As usual, the performances were top-notch. [Read more…]

ChamberFest Cleveland: Looking Ahead at Week 3

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by Mike Telin

The third week of ChamberFest Cleveland begins on Thursday, June 24 at 7:00 pm at The Grove Amphitheatre in Mayfield. Admission is free, but reservations are required. A full weekly calendar listing is below.

In addition to three imaginative programs, the week will also welcome two Festival first-timers, violist Ayane Kozasa and cellist Sterling Elliott. Both musicians bring a wealth of chamber music experience to Cleveland and look forward to being part of the “Chamber Hood.”

Ayane Kozasa began studying the violin at age four. She pursued her undergraduate degree as a violinist at the Cleveland Institute of Music, until making the decision to become a violist. Kozasa went on to study at the Curtis Institute of Music and the Kronberg Academy in Germany. The winner of the Primrose, Astral, and Irving Klein competitions, she is a member of the award-winning Aizuri Quartet. Dedicated to expanding the viola repertoire, in 2012 she commissioned her life-partner Paul Wiancko to compose the viola/cello duo American Haiku, which was performed on this season’s ChamberFest opening concert. When not performing she enjoys pie baking, stop motion videos, and iconic movies, as well as camping and hiking.

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Akron Symphony, Cleveland Chamber Music Society & Cleveland Orchestra to feature young musicians

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by Daniel Hathaway

Ellsworth-Zander-May-2014Among the more appealing attractions of the classical music genre is its ability to wrap the talents of multiple generations into a single performance. In the next two weeks, young musicians will be showcased alongside their more seasoned colleagues in concerts by the Akron Symphony, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, and The Cleveland Orchestra.

On Saturday, January 10 at 8:00 pm in E.J. Thomas Hall, Akron Symphony music director Christopher Wilkins will yield his baton to one of his mentors, the distinguished British-born conductor Benjamin Zander (Wilkins played oboe with the Boston Philharmonic under Zander after graduating from Harvard). Zander, in turn, has invited one of his young mentorees, cellist Jonah Ellsworth, to play the Dvorak concerto with the orchestra (above, Ellsworth with Zander after their performance of Strauss’s Don Quixote in May, 2014). [Read more…]

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