Tag: Music Hall

Tenor Bryan Hymel to step in for Polenzani in Verdi Requiem

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Tenor Bryan Hymel. Photo by Dario Acosta

The Cincinnati May Festival has announced that the celebrated tenor Matthew Polenzani is ill and unable to perform in Verdi’s Requiem to open the festival this Friday.

Bryan Hymel will replace Polenzani as tenor soloist on May 18. Hymel regularly appears with the Metropolitan Opera, Covent Garden, Opéra National de Paris, and La Scala.

He has performed the roles of Don José in Carmen, Pinkerton in Madama Butterfly and as tenor soloist in the Verdi Requiem. He has been the recipient of the opera world’s most prestigious awards including the Olivier Award, the Metropolitan Opera’s Beverly Sills Artist Award, and the George Thill Prize, and has been the top prize winner in the Lissner, Albanese, Zachary, Gari and Metropolitan Opera National Council competitions.

Rising star Eun Sun Kim will conduct the opening night performance, replacing James Levine.

For information, visit mayfestival.com.

Brahms Concerto shines with Ehnes in CSO season finale

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James Ehnes performed Brahms’ Violin Concerto in D Major with the CSO. Photo provided

Violinist James Ehnes’ inspired playing in the Brahms Violin Concerto with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra over the weekend can only be described as masterful. The golden sound that he achieved on his 1715 Stradivarius violin was stunning. In Saturday’s concert, it was equally fascinating to hear Ehnes reveal the Cincinnati connection behind his $8 million instrument.Read More »

CSO’s Baroque gems with Bicket a rare treat

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Countertenor Iestyn Davies joined Harry Bicket and the CSO in a rare Baroque concert at Music Hall. Photo provided by CSO/Kayla Moore

Harry Bicket’s Baroque concert of Handel and Rameau brought a breath of fresh air to the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra over the weekend.

A glance at the program told the story of how rare it was to hear these Baroque gems in Music Hall. Every single piece on the program – even Handel’s Concerto Grosso Op. 6, No. 11 – was being performed by the orchestra for the first time.

And there was no better partner in this repertoire than the superb British countertenor Iestyn Davies, who made his Cincinnati debut in arias from Handel operas. Davies is one of a new generation of countertenors now making international waves. Read More »

Robert Porco’s contract extended with May Festival

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Director of choruses Robert Porco

The Cincinnati May Festival announced today a two-year contract extension for Robert Porco, Director of Choruses, through the end of the 2020 May Festival.

Porco has served in that role since 1989, preparing the volunteer May Festival Chorus for hundreds of performances for the festival, as well as for concerts with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and the Cincinnati Pops.Read More »

A new view of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4

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There were 92 players onstage at Music Hall for Beethoven’s Fourth. Photo provided by CSO/Lee Snow

I was fascinated by the large-scale arrangement of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4 performed by Louis Langrée and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra over the weekend. It’s regarded as one of Beethoven’s more “classical” symphonies, calling for a smaller complement of players. But for this performance in Music Hall, there were 92 players onstage. (According to the CSO, Langrée was using a new critical edition by Bärenreiter.)

Curious about this arrangement, I spent some time digging through my personal library to no avail. Then, online, I found a doctoral thesis by Mark Christopher Ferraguto of Cornell University that mentioned a performance of the Fourth for a large-scale public concert in 1825. Beethoven arranged it for an estimated 94 musicians for the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde (Society of Friends of Music) concert in a large ballroom of the Imperial Court.

Here’s the review, which you can read free at bizjournals.com, thanks to their new initiative to cover the arts.

What did you think?

Classical Roots hosts its first artist-in-residence

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Kelly Hall-Tompkins is the first artist-in-residence for the CSO’s Classical Roots program.

Violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins, winner of the Honorarium Prize in the 2003 Naumburg International Violin Competition and a career grant from the Concert Artists Guild, is the inaugural artist-in-residence for Classical Roots, an outreach program of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.

During her residency this week, the violinist will visit City Gospel Mission, where she and CSO musicians will perform Stravinsky’s “The Soldier’s Tale” for clients. The performance is inspired by her not-for-profit Music Kitchen, which takes live classical music to homeless shelters in New York City.Read More »

Opera Rap

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Join Cincinnati Opera’s Harry T. Wilkes artistic director Evans Mirageas and me as we discuss arts journalism in today’s cultural climate, and more — 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Mercantile Library, Downtown. It promises to be fun. And, I might bring a surprise guest…

The Opera Rap — a lively discussion — is free to Library members; $10 nonmembers.

Reservations required: 513.621.0717 or email reservations@mercantilelibrary.com

Hope to see you there!

‘Classical Roots’ to explore Music Hall’s diverse history

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Classical Roots Community Mass Choir
Photo provided

This year’s “Classical Roots” concert will explore Music Hall’s history as a gathering place for a wide spectrum of Cincinnati’s society.

The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra’s “Under One Roof,” led by Pops conductor John Morris Russell, will take place at 7:30 p.m. on April 20 in Music Hall. The program will illuminate Music Hall’s history — both as a great concert venue for the orchestra in the main hall and as a community gathering place that hosted many of the greatest jazz, soul, rock and R&B artists of the 20th century in the Greystone Club. Today that space in the South Hall is known as the Music Hall Ballroom.Read More »

Strauss’ ‘Der Rosenkavalier’ a glowing highlight of CSO concert

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Read the review on the new Cincinnati Business Courier Arts Front, which made its debut yesterday. (See the previous post.)

And here’s the review to Audra McDonald’s concert with the Pops on Sunday night.

Guest conductor Juraj Valčuha takes bows with violinist Simone Lamsma after her performance in Bernstein’s “Serenade, after Plato’s Symposium.”

Several times per month, I will be reviewing for their new arts page, which is free online.