by Jarrett Hoffman
The Cleveland Orchestra is launching its own record label with a major release. Having turned 100 during the 2018-19 season, the ensemble looks ahead with A New Century. The six works across three discs were recorded in concert in Severance Hall under the baton of Music Director Franz Welser-Möst from 2017 to 2019.
by Timothy Robson
On Sunday afternoon, February 16, The Cleveland Orchestra accomplished the seemingly impossible feat of performing two concerts simultaneously at different parts of the Cleveland metropolis. One was the final performance of this week’s subscription concert, the other a free community concert at Lakewood Civic Auditorium.
by Jarrett Hoffman
Philippe Herreweghe’s musical career began with a focus on Renaissance music and Bach. Later he explored the French Baroque. Still musically curious, he began to examine the Classical and Romantic eras through the lens of period instruments.
More recently, Herreweghe has been brought in regularly by modern orchestras, like the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, to conduct Romantic music in a “new” way — one informed by his experience in early music and historical performance.
One of the latest such invitations has come from The Cleveland Orchestra, with whom the Belgian conductor will make his debut this week. His program at Severance Hall includes Mozart’s “Jupiter” Symphony and two works by Beethoven: the Overture to Egmont and the Violin Concerto, featuring Isabelle Faust as soloist.
by Mike Telin
When Susanna Mälkki made her Cleveland Orchestra debut in April of 2015, the Finnish conductor was well on her way to becoming a star in the international conducting firmament. Since that time Mälkki has clearly established herself as one of the leading conductors of our time.
Mälkki is currently in her fourth season as Chief Conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra and her third season as Principal Guest Conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. In December of 2016 she made her debut at The Metropolitan Opera leading the premiere of Kaija Saariaho’s L’Amour de loin. A recipient of the Pro Finlandia Medal of the Order of the Lion of Finland in 2016, the following year she was named Musical America’s Conductor of the Year.
On Thursday, February 6 at 7:30 pm, Mälkki will return to the Severance Hall podium to lead The Cleveland Orchestra in Sibelius’ En Saga and Symphony No. 1.
by Mike Telin
Sometimes the best thing a young artist can do is to turn down a job offer, no matter how tempting it might be to say yes. “Early in my career I was invited to conduct some major orchestras,” Lorenzo Viotti said during a recent telephone interview from Lisbon, Portugal, where he serves as Music Director of the Gulbenkian Orchestra. “The most important thing I did was to say no to all of them. I had many things to learn before I stood in front of such great institutions, and I wasn’t ready to deal with the pressure.”
On Friday, November 29 at 8:00 pm at Severance Hall, Lorenzo Viotti will make his Cleveland Orchestra debut with a concert that includes Prokofiev’s Suite from The Love for Three Oranges, Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 4, with Yuja Wang as soloist, Poulenc’s Sinfonietta, and Ravel’s La Valse. The program will be repeated on Saturday at 8:00 pm and Sunday at 3:00 pm. Tickets are available online.
“I’m very excited to be making my Cleveland debut,” the 29-year-old said. “When I was a student in Vienna, Franz Welser-Möst would bring the Orchestra to the Musikverein almost every year and I was at every concert, so I’m feeling very lucky to be able to come.”
by Mike Telin
“It’s always wonderful when I get to stand up front,” Cleveland Orchestra principal trumpet Michael Sachs said during a telephone conversation. “I’m usually at the back, so I’m hearing all these wonderful sounds in front of me. But to have those sounds converging upon you is a completely different perspective that I’m always amazed and humbled by. I have a renewed respect for the people that I am lucky enough to work with.”
On Thursday, November 21 at 7:30 pm, Friday the 22nd at 7:00 pm, and Saturday the 23rd at 8:00 pm, Michael Sachs will return to the front of the Severance Hall stage playing Hummel’s Concerto in E. The program, under the direction of Nicholas McGegan, also includes Haydn’s Symphony No. 104 (“London”) and selections from Schubert’s Rosamunde.
Friday’s performance is part of the Fridays@7 Series. The straight-through concert will be followed by a royal cocktail party in the Lotus Club with British-themed appetizers and cocktails, including bangers and mash, fish and chips, sticky toffee pudding, and a selection of English beers. Tickets are available online.
by Mike Telin
A new piano concerto is always an occasion, but the premiere of Thomas Adès’ Concerto, performed by pianist Kirill Gerstein and the Boston Symphony under the direction of the composer, has caused critics and audiences to sit up and take note. Following the New York premiere of the work, Anthony Tommasini of The New York Times wrote that the Concerto was
written for Gerstein, who exhilaratingly dispatched this joyous and audacious piece’s formidable solo part… This breathless, 20-minute concerto, structured in three essentially traditional movements (fast, slow, fast), comes across as zesty and accessible. But don’t be fooled. Just below the surface, the music sizzles with modernist harmonies, fractured phrases, gaggles of counterpoint and lyrical strands that keep breaking into skittish bits. The finale is a riotous, clattering, assaultive romp. I can’t wait to hear it again.
This weekend Kirill Gerstein will play the Cleveland premiere of Adès’ Piano Concerto with The Cleveland Orchestra under the direction of Alan Gilbert. The program also includes J.S. Bach’s Suite No. 3 and Brahms’ Symphony No. 3. The Severance Hall concerts take place on Friday, October 11 at 11:00 am (no Bach) and 8:00 pm, and Saturday, October 12 at 8:00 pm. Tickets are available here.
by Jarrett Hoffman
Film music leaves an impression on many of us at an early age, and Sarah Hicks was no exception. The principal conductor of the Minnesota Orchestra’s “Live at Orchestra Hall” series, Hicks is also known as an in-demand guest conductor, particularly in the genre of in-concert film.
“I saw the original Star Wars movies in theaters as a very young child,” Hicks said during a telephone interview. That wasn’t the spark to her interest in music — she was already playing the piano by age five — but it was still an experience she called transformative. “I remember those movies, I remember that music. It was a huge part of my childhood.”
Hicks will revisit The Empire Strikes Back, the second film from the original Star Wars trilogy, during screenings with The Cleveland Orchestra on August 30, 31, and September 1 at 7:30 pm at Blossom. (Fireworks to follow each performance, weather permitting.) That score by John Williams introduced the world to “The Imperial March (Darth Vader’s Theme)” — it’s hard to imagine Star Wars without it — and to “Yoda’s Theme.”
by Jarrett Hoffman
Musical theater fans have a thrill coming their way this Saturday, August 24 at 8:00 pm at Blossom. On tap is a production of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s 1949 South Pacific featuring students from the Baldwin Wallace Music Theater program. And the orchestra? It’s one you might have heard of.
“There’s no way for me to describe what it’s going to be like the first time the students hear The Cleveland Orchestra play this music,” Victoria Bussert said during a recent phone call. She heads the Music Theater program at BW and directs Saturday’s performance.
“It will be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity because even on Broadway, you don’t get orchestras of this size, or this world-renowned,” Bussert said. “I’m kind of tingly just waiting for when we all walk into Severance [for rehearsal] and the students sing with them for the first time.”
by Jarrett Hoffman
For Vinay Parameswaran, leading The Cleveland Orchestra at Blossom on Saturday, August 17 at 8:00 pm will be only one important event in what has to be called a good couple of months. He’s also conducted in Europe, driven about 5,000 miles back and forth across the U.S., and gotten hitched.
We spoke last week over the phone, and first he filled me in on all the details of June, July, and the first bit of August. Then we talked about this Saturday’s program, which includes Ives’ “Decoration Day” from the Holidays Symphony, Bernstein’s Jeremiah: Symphony No. 1 with mezzo-soprano Jennifer Johnson Cano, and Rachmaninoff’s Symphonic Dances.