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Cleveland Orchestra at Severance with Yo-Yo Ma delights (Nov. 6)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

This article was originally published on Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Yo-Yo Ma was the picture of cello perfection on Thursday evening, Nov. 6 at Severance Music Center, performing with The Cleveland Orchestra as if for the thousandth time — or the first.

Relaxed, head tilted in his familiar way, he seemed tuned to some private channel of truth and beauty. When not playing, he listened with delight, urging on the musicians around him.

Ma offered Dvořák’s Cello Concerto at the end of “An Evening with Yo-Yo-Ma,” beautifully wrapped like an early holiday gift. He strode onstage with purpose, revealing a heart as large as the hall, making his entrance not as a soloist demanding attention, but as a voice rising from within. He answered the horn heroics with warmth, then crooned the second theme like a benediction.

[Read more…]

Power of three: Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax and Leonidas Kavakos deliver wonderful interpretation of Beethoven works at Severance Music Center (Feb.1)

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By Peter Feher

Originally published in Cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio — Most performances of Beethoven’s symphonies at Severance Music Center have the full force of The Cleveland Orchestra behind them.

But last night, pianist Emanuel Ax, violinist Leonidas Kavakos, and cellist Yo-Yo Ma proved that consummate musicianship can power these compositions at any size. The trio played for a sold-out crowd in Mandel Concert Hall on Feb. 1, and between the choice of repertoire and the larger-than-life artistry, it was a chamber recital of symphonic scope.

“Think of us as the Euclid Avenue Philharmonic,” Ax quipped in his introductory remarks from the stage.

[Read more…]

Yo-Yo Ma: Bach Cello Suites at Blossom (August 12)

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by Nicholas Stevens

As Yo-Yo Ma stood, wincing and stretching to applause after playing Bach’s Cello Suite No. 3, the wonder of the situation hit home. Well over 10,000 people — maybe twice that number, depending exactly how many picnickers had crowded onto the lawn — had gathered at an outdoor pavilion on a Sunday evening to hear a continuous 140-minute recital. These thousands of paying visitors had driven miles from their homes to hear a single musician play a single set of 300-year-old dance suites on a single instrument, alone onstage with nothing but blue lights as a backdrop. If anyone ever tries to tell you that classical music is dead or dying, then that person is trying to sell you their latest book. [Read more…]

Got summer plans, Cleveland Orchestra? Blossom + Summers@Severance + a few extra notables

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and Clevelanders haven’t heard their orchestra live since mid-May. In the interim, The Cleveland Orchestra has been on the road, finishing off their centennial-capping Prometheus Project with performances at Vienna’s Musikverein and Tokyo’s Suntory Hall. Oh, how we miss them.

We’ll get reacquainted with TCO soon, thanks to their schedule at this year’s 50th anniversary season of Blossom Music Festival, plus their fourth Summers@Severance series.

The Cleveland Orchestra marks the unofficial beginning of summer when they open their Blossom season on Saturday, July 7 at 8:00 pm. At the helm will be music director Franz Welser-Möst, leading the Orchestra in Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition in its orchestration by Ravel, Reznicek’s Overture to Donna Diana, and Beethoven’s Triple Concerto, featuring TCO’s own soloists –– pianist Joela Jones, violinist Stephen Rose, and cellist Mark Kosower. At this concert and two others, check out the Image Magnification system, which displays live video of the performers on LED screens in the Blossom Pavilion. Fingers crossed for the weather — a firework show is planned for afterwards.

[Read more…]

Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble at Blossom Music Center (August 13)

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by Alexandra Vago

Silk-Road-EnsembleBad weather was no deterrent for concertgoers at the Blossom Music Center on Saturday, August 13. The audience in a nearly-packed pavilion and on an umbrella-laden lawn gave The Silk Road Ensemble two standing ovations, one at intermission and one at the conclusion of their stellar performance. [Read more…]

Looking forward to the summer season: a conversation with Cleveland Orchestra artistic administrator Ilya Gidalevich

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by Mike Telin

Blossom-Lawn-071115Now that summer is officially upon us, it’s time to locate the picnic basket, fill it with your favorite summer foods, and head to the Cuyahoga National Park with family and friends to enjoy a Cleveland Orchestra concert at Blossom Music Center. And, if anyone in your vehicle is under the age of 18, their seat on the lawn is free.

If you can’t make it to Blossom, the Orchestra has scheduled three early Friday evening concerts in its Summers@Severance series. Special “happy hour” drink prices will be offered one hour prior to each concert on Severance Hall’s front terrace. Attendees are encouraged to arrive early and enjoy the outdoor delights of University Circle.

“As usual the summer season is a mix of musical genres and artists,” Cleveland Orchestra artistic administrator Ilya Gidalevich said during a recent telephone conversation. [Read more…]

Cleveland Cello Society: iCellisti at Harkness Chapel, CWRU (Feb. 28)

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by Carlyn Kessler

ICellistiOn Sunday evening, February 28, the Cleveland Cello Society (CCS) welcomed audience members into Case Western Reserve University’s Harkness Chapel for the 18th iCellisti concert, an annual event organized by CCS and directed by cellist Ida Mercer. [Read more…]

Review: Cleveland Orchestra at Blossom with Jahja Ling and Yo Yo Ma (August 16)

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by Nicholas Jones

MA-Yo-YoYo Yo Ma is as close as the classical world is likely to get to a rock star. On Saturday night, the near-sellout crowd at Blossom was certainly rocking as Ma took the stage, strutting like a winning prizefighter with his cello triumphantly raised above his head.

But antics gave way to artistry almost immediately as Ma took his seat and launched into the Elgar cello concerto, stamping its opening chords with a ferocity that would alternate with lyricism throughout the performance.

In 1919, Elgar’s cello concerto suffered from a disastrous first performance, and for almost half a century it was barely played. A key figure in its rediscovery in the late 1960s was the charismatic young cellist Jacqueline du Pré, who reinterpreted it as a document of introspection and anxiety for a world newly tossed by war and social change. One of the cellos that Yo Yo Ma regularly plays is the Davidov Stradivarius on which du Pré also performed. [Read more…]

Review: Cellist Yo-Yo Ma fills two concert halls at Oberlin College (November 20)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Ma-at-Oberlin-112013-(Mastroianni)Not only did international superstar cellist Yo-Yo Ma sell out Finney Chapel for his appearance on the Oberlin Artist Recital Series Wednesday evening, he packed them into Warner Concert Hall as well, where an overflow crowd witnessed his masterful recital via simulcast.

Ma, who last appeared at Oberlin before its current students were born*, put together an unusual but engaging program that reflected some of his wide-ranging musical tastes. He also managed to serve up dessert before the main course — who doesn’t like that to happen once in a while — and only one item on his playlist was originally written for the cello. I heard the recital in Finney Chapel.

Saving two substantial works for the second half, Ma and his superb, longtime and apparently clairvoyant collaborator, pianist Kathryn Stott, launched the evening with delightful readings of Stravinsky’s Suite Italienne, then a made-up suite of pieces by Villa-Lobos (Alma Brasileira), Piazzolla (Oblivion) and Camargo Guarnieri (Dansa Negra) arranged by Jorge Calandrelli (Villa-Lobos and Guarnieri) and Kyoko Yamamoto (Piazzolla), and finally, Manuel de Falla’s 7 Canciones Populares Españolas. [Read more…]

Preview: Oberlin Artist Recital Series — a chat with cellist Yo-Yo Ma

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by Mike Telin

MA-Yo-Yo“I can’t say that I don’t lead an interesting life,” cellist, humanitarian and Silk Road Project founder Yo-Yo Ma says with a laugh. “It’s sometimes a little crazy and when that happens I just need to look at myself and say, I am the one responsible for it and I can’t blame anybody but myself.”

On Wednesday, November 20 beginning at 8:00 pm in Finney Chapel, the Oberlin College Artist Recital Series presents Yo-Yo Ma and his long time collaborator, pianist Kathryn Stott, in a concert featuring the music of Stravinsky, Villa Lobos, Piazzolla, Guarnieri, de Falla, Messiaen and Brahms. The concert is sold out.

Yo-Yo Ma is a person who enjoys building relationships and finding common ground with everyone he meets, and it their mutual love of travel that he attributes to the long collaborative relationship he has enjoyed with Kathryn Stott. Ma and Stott have been sharing stages since 1985 and together won Grammy Awards in 1999 and 2004.

“Kathy loves adventures and we get along famously well. She is an incredible person and musician and she probably loves traveling or has traveled more then I have,” Ma says. [Read more…]

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