Author: Ginger Dolden

The Elkhart County Symphony will perform at Wellfield Botanic Gardens in Elkhart, Indiana on July 11; due to the pandemic, the concert represents the orchestra’s first in-person performances conducted by Soo Han, its new music director. The outdoor “Musical Origami” concert takes place during the gardens’ “OrigamiintheGarden^2” outdoor origami sculpture exhibition, created by Santa Fe artists Jennifer and Kevin Box and including work by origami artists Tim Armijo, Te Jui Fu, Beth Johnson, Michael G. LaFosse, and Robert J. Lang. Elkhart Symphony musicians will perform in the botanic garden’s Oak Savannah and Island Garden areas, and a larger orchestral performance will take place in the Event Garden, led by Soo Han, who became music director in October 2020.

“Think of the ‘period’ or historically informed performance movement, and the mind probably turns to Monteverdi, Bach, Handel,” writes David Allen in Thursday’s (6/1) New York Times. “The first advocates for performances on original instruments … concentrated their initial work on the Baroque and then Classical repertories, the music in which their findings were most audibly different compared with then-standard practices. It would take until the 1980s … to push period performance into Beethoven … through Berlioz, Schumann and Brahms in the 1990s. Despite those advances, though, ‘period’ has mostly remained a synonym for ‘early.’ Step forward François-Xavier Roth, 49, a former assistant to [John Eliot] Gardiner whose Parisian ensemble Les Siècles, which he founded in 2003, has released a number of period-instrument recordings on Harmonia Mundi since 2018, all of them excellent…. It is highly unusual to hear period performances, like theirs, of later music, using instruments and approaches fitting for the late 19th or early 20th century. The orchestral works of Ravel? An early version of Mahler’s First? Stravinsky’s … ‘The Rite of Spring,’ reissued recently … Debussy’s ‘Prélude à l’Après-midi d’un Faune.’ … Les Siècles can produce sounds that amply reprise the shock of the new.”

“Is the Nashville Symphony about to play its first-ever hip-hop concert? As Nas once said, ‘It ain’t hard to tell,’ ” writes Dave Paulson in Friday’s (7/2) Tennessean (Nashville). “The acclaimed rapper—who burst onto the scene with his 1994 debut, ‘Illmatic’—will perform with the orchestra at Ascend Amphitheater on Sept. 12. The concert was originally planned to take place in 2020 but was postponed due to the pandemic. 47-year-old Nasir Jones has long been considered one of the greatest rappers of all time, finding commercial success with ‘If I Ruled the World’ and ‘Hate Me Now,’ and enjoying an infamous (and long-settled) rivalry with Jay-Z. He’s not to be confused with 22-year-old pop phenom Lil Nas X … The Nashville Symphony announced several more rescheduled shows for 2021 and 2022 this week, including performances with Jennifer Nettles (Nov. 30 and Dec. 1), Yolanda Adams (May 8) and Bernadette Peters (June 22).” The Nashville Symphony also added “Beethoven Under the Stars with the Nashville Symphony” (Sept. 11) and “The Princess Bride in Concert with the Nashville Symphony” (Oct. 29 and 30).

“We aren’t out of the pandemic woods yet. And in the face of ongoing government restrictions, Toronto Summer Music, like many of its sister festivals, has decided yet again to go virtual,” writes William Littler in Saturday’s (7/3) Toronto Star (Canada). “The annual classical music celebration will present an online program of more than two dozen concerts … from July 15 to Aug. 1, under the artistic direction of Toronto Symphony Orchestra concertmaster Jonathan Crow.…. ‘Many of the artists are artists who had to cancel last year and, because of border regulations, all fellows this year are in Canada,’ Crow explains. The fellows … are musicians between 18 and 35 who participate on scholarship…. The festival [will] offer its online programming this summer free of charge…. The bulk of the programming will, as usual, be devoted to chamber music, including concerts by the Gryphon Trio (premiering a new work by Toronto-based Bruce A. Russell) and Crow’s own New Orford String Quartet, both of them offering a special kids’ concert in addition to an adult program….. This summer’s concerts may be mostly filmed or livestreamed … but they aim to be as real as musicians can make them.”

“July 4th celebrations made a comeback this year after having to cancel last year due to COVID-19 concerns. Sunday night, thousands of people came out to Auditorium Shores and The Long Center for the HEB Austin Symphony Concert and Fireworks event,” writes Lindsey Ragas in Sunday’s (7/4) CBS TV (Austin, TX). “ ‘Last year, we took a hiatus due to the pandemic, so for us we’re just very excited that we could bring it back this year for the people of Austin and Central Texas,’ said David Pratt, CEO & Executive Director of Austin Symphony Orchestra.… Up to 100,000 people come out to watch the fireworks every year, but because this event was canceled last year, that number almost doubled on Sunday. ‘After this whole lockdown and pandemic and what we’ve been dealing with, there’s a real thirst and hunger to come together,’ Pratt said. The Bradley family attends every year this event is put on, but not just for the fireworks. ‘It’s really fun to hear the music from the symphony and obviously the fireworks are great, but you feel like you’re really celebrating with your community,’ [a Bradley family Member] said. ‘We’re really thankful they’re doing it this year.’ ”

Astral Artists and Concert Artists Guild have each announced the winners of their 2021 competitions for emerging musicians, which were conducted virtually this year. Astral Artists’ 2021 national auditions were open to voice, strings, small chamber ensembles, piano, woodwinds, and brass candidates. The seven Astral Artists winners are: string duo ARKAI, clarinetist Amer Hasan, pianist Hilda Huang, soprano Helen Zhibing Huang, saxophonist Valentin Kovalev, violinist Julian Rhee, and guitarist Hao Yang. Astral’s artistic director is composer Dan Visconti; Lourdes Starr-Demers is executive director. The artists will be showcased in performance at the 2021 Astral National Auditions Winners Concert, October 20 at Stotesbury Mansion in Philadelphia. The grand-prize winners of Concert Artists Guild’s 2021 Virtual Competition are Balourdet String Quartet, Chromic Duo (toy piano electric duo), pianist Ariel Lanyi, and violinist Charlotte Saluste-Bridoux. Each winner will receive American and European international management with New York-based CAG and U.K.-based Young Classical Artists Trust; performances at Merkin Concert Hall in New York City and Wigmore Hall in London; and will participate in CAG’s new leadership development program. Pianist Evren Ozel and flutist Adam Sadberry each won CAG Ambassador Prizes, which include North American management with CAG; New York debut performances; and participation in CAG’s leadership development program.

“When the conductor Grant Llewellyn had a stroke last summer, it was not a sudden attack … but the impact was no less dramatic” writes Nelli Bird in Friday’s (6/11) BBC News (U.K.). “The 60-year-old, who lives in Dinas Powys, Vale of Glamorgan [in Wales], went to hospital. It took three days for his symptoms to stop getting worse and many scans to confirm he had had a stroke…. After a month in the stroke unit in nearby Llandough Hospital, Grant returned home. The six months that followed were a ‘severe learning curve’ in managing his expectations of recovery. ‘The physiotherapists were concerned that I wouldn’t hurt myself—not that I would ever conduct again,’ he said…. Since March, Grant has been back working with his orchestra in France, L’Orchestre National de Bretagne…. He recently conducted an hour and a half concert…. ‘I can conduct Beethoven symphonies, but I can’t get out of bed. I can’t tie my shoelaces.’ … Grant said he knew his recovery would ‘not be 100%.’ But … Grant is focusing on what he can do and the joy of making music again.” Llewelyn was music director of the North Carolina Symphony from 2004 to 2020.