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NEOSonicFest: a look back at the beginning, and a peek at what’s on tap in 2019

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by Jarrett Hoffman

When a festival runs for long enough, it becomes interesting to look back and remember that it wasn’t always a staple of the local culture. At one time, it was entirely new.

“Last weekend,” Daniel Hathaway wrote in April of 2014, the Cleveland Chamber Symphony “burst suddenly into bloom like a crocus after a long winter with the first of two concerts anchoring its promising new enterprise, NEOSonicFest…”

Back then, music director Steven Smith had been thinking for years about how to keep the name and activities of the Cleveland Chamber Symphony alive, as Mike Telin reported in our very first preview of NEOSonicFest. The retirement of the orchestra’s founder, Edwin London, and the end of its residency at Cleveland State University had slowed the group’s momentum.

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NEOSonicFest: Cleveland Chamber Symphony Young and Emerging Composers (April 11)

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by Daniel Hathaway

CCSCodyRayThe final event in the Cleveland Chamber Symphony’s 2018 NEOSonicFest gave eight young composers the opportunity to hear their creations played by a professional orchestra led by Steven Smith — himself a composer. The pieces were performed in Gamble Auditorium at Baldwin Wallace University on Wednesday, April 11.

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NEOSonicFest 2018 to present five concerts April 5 through 11

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by Mike Telin

CCS-Y&EC-040614Since 2014, the Grammy Award-winning Cleveland Chamber Symphony has sponsored NEOSonicFest, a festival of new music performed by musicians from Northeast Ohio and beyond. The 2018 festival will run from April 5 through 11 (see below for concert dates and times).

Clarinetist Carol Robinson and trumpeter Nate Wooley will kick things off by performing selections from Éliane Radigue’s Occam Ocean on April 5 at MOCA. The composer describes her work as “an ongoing acoustic work with influences ranging from electromagnetic waves, to William of Ockham’s philosophies, to science fiction mythologies.”

The always creative No Exit will return to the Festival on April 6 at Heights Arts. The ensemble was founded by composer Timothy Beyer as an outlet for the commissioning and performance of contemporary avant-garde concert music. No Exit is committed to promoting the works of living composers, particularly the music of young and emerging artists who haven’t yet received either the opportunities or exposure of their better-known counterparts. (Works by Leo Ornstein, Ty Emerson, Per Nørgård, James Praznik, Andrew Rindfleisch & Tristan Murail).

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NEOSonicFest presents contemporary music over a ten-day period (March 17-26)

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by Mike Telin

NSF-Moyer-GalleryIf you’ve ever tried to define the term “contemporary classical music” in clear and decisive language, chances are that you’ve found it impossible. Modernism, post-modernism, spectral music, polystylism, historicism, neo-romanticism, new simplicity, and new complexity, as well as minimalism and post-minimalism — encountering these categories might leave you throwing up your hands in frustration. Honestly, the best way to understand the breadth of contemporary classical music is to experience it live — as often as possible. [Read more…]

NEOSonicFest continues with four new music concerts this week

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by Mike Telin

ccs-yec-040614NEOSonicFest 2017 continues this week with  four concerts that celebrate the breadth of Cleveland’s new music scene.

On Wednesday, March 22 at 7:00 pm in Baldwin Wallace Conservatory’s Gamble Auditorium, the Cleveland Chamber Symphony, under the direction of Steven Smith, will present its annual Young and Emerging Composers concert.

Coordinated by composer and BW faculty member Clint Needham, the Young and Emerging program has been part of CCS’s mission since its founding in 1980. In an interview with this publication, Smith told Jeremy Reynolds, “It’s rare for young composers to have the opportunity for a professional orchestra to perform their works. The seven pieces are all very different in their ideas about sound — some are more traditional, while others are more experimental.” [Read more…]

NEOSonicFest 2017 to include half a dozen new music concerts

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by Jeremy Reynolds

CCS-032814-Bill-NairnanFor the past three years, the Cleveland Chamber Symphony has sponsored NEOSonicFest, a new music festival that spotlights musicians and groups in Northeast Ohio. The festival begins on Friday, March 17 and runs through Sunday, March 26 (see below for concert dates and times).

“There’s always been an incredibly active new music scene in Cleveland,” said Steven Smith, music director of the Grammy Award-winning Cleveland Chamber Symphony. “Cleveland is unique in terms of the high level of its artistic institutions for a city of its size, and it’s been that way for a very long time.” New to the 2017 roster are the ensembles No Exit, the percussion and saxophone duo Patchwork, and harpist Stephan Haluska. [Read more…]

Boulez tribute at CIM continues with “Boulez the Conductor” on October 5

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by Mike Telin

BOULEZ-TCOPierre Boulez conducted The Cleveland Orchestra over a span of nearly fifty years. After making his American professional conducting debut with the Orchestra in 1965, he led them in more than 220 concerts. He was appointed the Orchestra’s first Principal Guest Conductor in 1969 and served as Musical Advisor for two seasons beginning shortly after George Szell’s death in 1970.

On Wednesday, October 5 at 8:00 pm in Kulas Hall at the Cleveland Institute of Music, Steven Smith will lead the CIM Orchestra in a program titled “Boulez the Conductor” as part of CIM’s series celebrating “The Boulez Legacy.” The evening will feature Stravinsky’s Le Chant du Rossignol, Mahler’s “Adagio” from Symphony No. 10, and Messiaen’s Sept Haïkaï: Esquisses japonaises with Cleveland Orchestra principal keyboard and CIM faculty member Joela Jones as soloist.

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CIM Orchestra: Steven Smith conducts music by Shulamit Ran (January 27)

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by Daniel Hathaway

RAN-ShulamitIn a post-intermission conversation with CIM composition professor Keith Fitch last Wednesday evening, January 27 in Kulas Hall, visiting composer Shulamit Ran showered praise on guest conductor Steven Smith and the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra. They had just assumed the considerable challenges of performing her Legends and Violin Concerto, and she found that impressive. “I wouldn’t have thought I’d live to hear both of those pieces on the same program,” she said. [Read more…]

NEOSonicFest Second Concert: world premieres with Verb Ballets (March 21)

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by Mike Telin

NEOSONIC-3_21_2015_March-21Looking at the Cleveland Chamber Symphony’s March 21st program, you might think the concert was part of a festival of world premieres. However, the program for their Gamble Auditorium concert at Baldwin Wallace was actually part of the 2015 edition of the orchestra’s NEOSonicFest. The evening included a work by Henry Cowell, as well as world premieres by Jeremy Allen, CCS’s music director Steven Smith and Clint Needham. [Read more…]

NEOSonicFest: Ed London tribute with CCS & CYO at Waetjen Auditorium (Mar. 24)

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by Daniel Hathaway

CCSRehearsalNEOSonicFest planned a big agenda for its fourth concert at CSU’s Waetjen Auditorium on Tuesday, March 24. The Cleveland Chamber Symphony brought works by five “Young and Emerging Composers” to life under music director Steven Smith; Liza Grossman and the Contemporary Youth Orchestra reprised Stefan Podell’s Concerto for Two Violas and Orchestra with Lynne Ramsey and Jeffrey Irvine; and the two orchestras played side-by-side under Smith’s direction in a performance of Bernard Rands’ London Serenade to honor the memory of CCS founder Edwin London. [Read more…]

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