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Yuja Wang and Víkingur Ólafsson dazzle Severance crowd with piano virtuosity (Feb. 23)

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by Peter Feher

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Rock stars are known to make certain demands on tour, stipulating everything they expect to find in their dressing rooms and onstage.

Pianists Yuja Wang and Víkingur Ólafsson — two of the biggest names in classical music today — have one request that’s absolutely essential. In order to team up in recital and tackle the virtuosic repertoire they want to play together, Wang and Ólafsson each need a separate piano.

And so a pair of Steinways sat carefully arranged in Mandel Concert Hall at Severance Music Center on Sunday afternoon, Feb. 23. Both instruments had their lids off, and their keyboards were lined up center stage, the players side by side but facing in opposite directions. [Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra weathers the storm with Tchaikovsky’s Fifth at Blossom (Aug. 17)

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by Stephanie Manning

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com.

CUYAHOGA FALLS, Ohio — The Cleveland Orchestra hasn’t had much luck with the weather lately.

Last week’s performance with John Legend started late, got put on pause, and was eventually canceled after strong storms moved over Blossom Music Center. August 17 presented another uncertain forecast, but the Orchestra was determined to forge ahead if possible. And this time, they weathered the storm.

The turbulent weather — which delayed the concert by 30 minutes — made the marquee work feel especially fitting for the occasion. Written during a tempestuous period in Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s life, his Symphony No. 5 explores the composer’s inner turmoil and his struggles against the forces of Fate.

[Read more…]

Cleveland Orchestra: vivid Pictures & more under Welser-Möst (March 3)

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by Daniel Hathaway

If these fingers were crafting a marketing piece for The Cleveland Orchestra’s concerts on the weekend of March 2 rather than a review, they might be tempted to entice readers to attend with such alliterative flights of prose as “Sizzling Sonic Spectacular — and more.” But in retrospect, the Orchestra’s performance of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition was just that.

The huge orchestra that filled the Mandel stage after intermission on Sunday played the closing pages of Maurice Ravel’s brilliant orchestration of the original solo piano score with spacious grandeur, the kind of treatment “The Great Gate of Kiev” deserves in these perilous times.

Franz Welser-Möst led the audience through the gallery of Victor Hartmann’s idiosyncratic art like a skilled docent, pointing up interesting details and drawing precise playing from his orchestral colleagues. [Read more…]

Víkingur Ólafsson brings
“Mozart & Contemporaries” to Severance (Nov. 30)

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by Peter Feher

Mozart got top billing on pianist Víkingur Ólafsson’s November 30 recital in Reinberger Chamber Hall, but another composer should have had the honor. Haydn’s musical sensibility was the key to understanding the bold claims and idiosyncratic style of the evening’s program, “Mozart and Contemporaries.”

Happily, both composers — along with several lesser-known figures of the Classical era — featured in Ólafsson’s performance, the first in a series of high-profile piano recitals that The Cleveland Orchestra will present at Severance Music Center this season. It was an up-close look at one of classical music’s more thought-provoking soloists in recent years — and at one of his signature projects.

[Read more…]

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