Ten remain in Cooper Piano Competition

July 16, 2018 by Daniel Hathaway

Following the second semifinal round on Monday, the jury for the Thomas and Evon Cooper International Piano Competition announced the ten competitors who will play full concertos with collaborative pianists on Tuesday, July 17 at 2:00 pm and 7:00 pm in Warner Concert Hall at the Oberlin Conservatory. Admission is free. The sessions will be streamed live here.

2 p.m. session:

Ryan Zhu (age 14), Vancouver, Canada
Liszt: Concerto No. 1 in E-flat
Bo Zhang (17), Hangzhou, China
Chopin: Concerto No. 1 in e
William Yang (17), Natick, Massachusetts, U.S.
Chopin: Concerto No. 1 in e
Kai-Min Chang (17), Changhua County, Taiwan
Chopin: Concerto No. 1 in e
Tony Yun (17), Toronto, Canada
Tchaikovsky: Concerto No. 1 in b-flat
William Chen (15), New York, New York, U.S.
Tchaikovsky: Concerto No. 1 in b-flat

7 p.m. session:

Yunchan Lim (14), Siheung-si, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea
Chopin: Concerto No. 2 in f
Yangrui Cai (17), Guangzhou, China
Prokofiev: Concerto No. 3 in C
Tyler Kim (15), Temecula, California, U.S.
Chopin: Concerto No. 2 in f
Anton Mejias (17), Helsinki, Finland
Rachmaninoff: Concerto No. 3 in d

About Daniel Hathaway

Daniel Hathaway founded ClevelandClassical.com in September, 2008, after a thirty-one year tenure as music director of Cleveland’s Trinity Cathedral, where he founded the Wednesday Noon Brownbag Concert Series and Trinity Chamber Orchestra. A graduate of Harvard College and the Episcopal Divinity School, he also studied historical musicology at Princeton and Harvard Universities. Before coming to Cleveland in 1977, he served as head of humanities at the Sunset Hill School in Kansas City and as head of arts at Groton School in Massachusetts. In Cleveland, he has served on the music staff of Cleveland Opera, Great Lakes Theater Festival, and the faculty of Laurel School. As an organist, Hathaway has played recitals in the U.S., England, France, Germany, and Austria. He team-teaches Music Journalism at Oberlin College and Conservatory and is a member of the Music Critics Association of North America.

Singers’ Club of Cleveland: To Dwell in Harmony (Dec. 9)

by Kevin McLaughlin

The Singers’ Club of Cleveland brought the joy of the season to Trinity Cathedral on Tuesday evening with a program titled To Dwell in Harmony, a holiday offering both polished and good-humored. The venerable all-male chorus — whose lineage stretches back to 1891 and includes collaborations with conductors from Beryl Rubinstein to Robert Shaw — now finds itself under new leadership.

Christopher Clark, appointed in August as Artistic Director (while serving concurrently as Director of Choirs at Case Western Reserve University), led his first Singers’ Club concert with easy command. The chorus appeared to trust him from the first downbeat, and the audience received him just as warmly.

Trinity Cathedral, whose acoustics can flatter or expose a chorus in equal measure, proved an asset. The evening opened with one of its most effective moments: Veni, Veni Emmanuel in John Englert’s arrangement. Clark placed the choir on three sides of the audience, creating a surround-sound of chant that was silky and assured — a confident beginning. [Read on…]

Les Délices welcomes the festive season with “Noel, Noel” (Dec. 7)

by Stephanie Manning

Once December kicks in, an almost overwhelming number of holiday programs pop up around Northeast Ohio. But Les Délices’ offering should draw your attention.

While other festive concerts may create the atmosphere of a bustling party by the fireplace, “Noel, Noel” is like observing a snowy evening from the warmth of the indoors. This is music best enjoyed in quiet contentment, and especially live — so it’s no surprise that the early music ensemble brought back this signature program for three performances this month.

On December 7 at West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church, the six-member group presented a lovely ninety-minute program, which is also available on CD and via streaming until the end of the year. [Read on…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir: In Four Voices (Dec. 3)

by Kevin McLaughlin

Renaissance polyphony can bloom in resonant spaces, but the Donna and James Reid Gallery at the Cleveland Museum of Art presents particular challenges: hard surfaces and a long reverb tend to blur consonants into watercolor. The Cleveland Chamber Choir’s four-voice ensemble met those conditions head-on during its “In Four Voices” program on December 3. What emerged was an evening of consistently beautiful vocal timbre shaped by a group navigating the sonic characteristics of the room.

The concert, to be followed in January and March by appearances of various-sized ensembles, is part of a new development for the Cleveland Chamber Choir, called the Camerata Series — more information here.

To improve their chances of hearing one another, the quartet — soprano Lauren Vanden Broeck, mezzo-soprano Kira McGirr, tenor Joel Kincannon, and bass Dominic Aragon — stood in a traditional “part book” formation, like a diamond, facing inward. This meant that their sound was directed toward each other, rather than outward to the listeners around them. [Read on…]

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