Chicago Classical Review

29/06/2024

Led by Ludovic Morlot, the Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus soared in Stravinsky's "Petrushka" and choral rarities by Brahms and Zoltan Kodaly Friday night at the Harris Theater.

One repeat on Saturday.

https://chicagoclassicalreview.com/2024/06/morlot-grant-park-forces-soar-in-stravinsky-choral-rarities/

28/06/2024

The ambitious Opera Festival of Chicago ventured a Puccini bridge too far with "Manon Lescaut" Thursday night in Evanston.

Over the last few years the Opera Festival of Chicago has done a valuable service to area opera-goers in rescuing worthwhile rarities of the Italian repertory from local neglect. By doing so, the company has helped to fill Chicago’s long operatic dry spell during the summer months.

27/06/2024

Ludovic Morlot opened his Grant Park Orchestra residency with a lightish program Wednesday night.

https://chicagoclassicalreview.com/2024/06/morlot-opens-grant-park-residency-with-light-program/

22/06/2024

Carlos Kalmar and the Grant Park Orchestra were at their considerable best Friday night in music of Prokofiev and Gabriela Lena Frank.

One repeat Saturday night.

The Grant Park Orchestra is concluding its second week doing what it does best: roving widely through novel, familiar, and lesser-known repertoire under the assured leadership of outgoing artistic director Carlos Kalmar.

21/06/2024

Daniil Trifonov delivered a triumphant local debut for Mason Bates’ Piano Concerto in the CSO‘s final program of the season Thursday night.

Three repeats this weekend.

Daniil Trifonov is one of today’s luminaries at the keyboard, and will be a Chicago Symphony Orchestra artist-in-residence for the 2024-25 season. Thursday he appeared with the orchestra and conductor Lahav Shani in the thrilling local premiere of Mason Bates’ Piano Concerto in the final program...

20/06/2024

Soprano Karen Slack brought a heartening and apt freedom of spirit to Jessie Montgomery’s “Five Freedom Songs” with the Grant Park Orchestra Wednesday night.

Carlos Kalmar, now in his 25th and final season as the Grant Park Orchestra’s principal conductor (and since 2011 the Grant Park Music Festival’s artistic director), has a keen eye for programming. Wednesday night’s concert at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion wasn’t simply an appropriate celebratio...

18/06/2024

Carlos Kalmar led the Grant Park Chorus in an eclectic concert Monday night at the South Shore Cultural Center, an event undermined by the lack of programs and texts.

One repeat Thursday night at the Columbus Park Refectory.

While the Millennium Park performances of the Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus are no doubt the Grant Park Music Festival’s marquee events, the summer series also hosts a number of smaller-scale performances at venues throughout the city each summer. 

15/06/2024

Haymarket Opera triumphed with an exciting performance of Handel's oratorio "La Resurrezione" Friday night at DePaul.

Haymarket Opera Company has been on a Handelian roll since its debut season in 2011, when it ventured the serenade Aci, Galatea et Polifemo. Since then, Chicago’s exemplar of period stage performance fidelity has racked up no fewer than seven more productions of works by George Frideric Handel.

15/06/2024

Rarities by Elgar and Holst soared Friday night in an all-English program at the Grant Park Music Festival.

One repeat Saturday night.

The Grant Park Music Festival hit cruising speed Friday night at Millennium Park by doing what it does best—presenting first-class performances of two neglected works, one of which is so obscure that it is unknown even to aficionados.

14/06/2024

Joshua Bell made a worthy case for his recent multi-composer commission, "The Elements" with the CSO Thursday night.

As awful as it was, the Covid-19 lockdown did have one upside: it gave artists time to conceive new works. While isolating in rural upstate New York with his family, Joshua Bell had the idea to commission a new piece for violin and orchestra—his first in two decades since John Corigliano’s The R...

13/06/2024

Alban Gerhardt's fresh and communicative Dvořák was the highlight of a mixed opening concert for the 90th season of the Grant Park Music Festival Wednesday night.

The skies were clear, the temperature pleasant and humidity comfortable for the opening concert of the Grant Park Music Festival Wednesday night at Millennium Park.

10/06/2024

The Grant Park Music Festival opens its 90th season Wednesday night--which will also be the 25th and final season for the series' longtime artistic director and principal conductor Carlos Kalmar.

CCR talked with Kalmar about his quarter-century leading the lakefront music series. Read the conductor's reflections on his tenure at the helm of the festival as well as about his impact on Chicago's classical music scene.

https://chicagoclassicalreview.com/2024/06/carlos-kalmar-looks-back-on-25-years-leading-the-grant-park-music-festival/

09/06/2024

A vibrant and violinistic finale closed this season's North Shore Chamber Music Festival Saturday night in Northbrook.

https://chicagoclassicalreview.com/2024/06/vibrant-violin-finale-closes-north-shore-chamber-fest/

07/06/2024

French music shined brilliantly as Stéphane Denève led the CSO Thursday night. Pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet delivered a season highlight with Saint-Saëns' "Egyptian" concerto.

https://chicagoclassicalreview.com/2024/06/french-rarities-shine-brilliantly-with-deneve-thibaudet-and-cso/

02/06/2024

The Kontras Quartet brightened a rainy Saturday afternoon with a bracing array of American music at Ganz Hall.

What a pleasure to spend a rainy Chicago Saturday afternoon listening to the Kontras Quartet perform in the warm acoustic of Roosevelt University’s elegant, intimate Ganz Hall.

01/06/2024

Come spend this rainy Saturday in the cozy elegance of Ganz Hall where the Kontras Quartet will perform at 3 p.m.

Hear a wide variety of American music spanning 130 years from
Arthur Foote's melody-packed String Quartet No, 1 of 1883 to a John Dowland mashup written by Jonathan Blumhofer in 2013.

There is also "Echoes," a rare concert work by Hitchcock film-score composer Bernard Herrmann ("Vertigo" fans will recognize some passages) as well as music of Quincy Porter and Ellen Taaffe Zwilich's "Voyage," marking her 85th birthday season.

Come join us 3 p.m. today June 1 at Roosevelt UnIversity's Ganz Hall, 430 S. Michigan.

The American Music Project is a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting and underwriting performances of American classical music of the past as well as selectively commissioning new works from American composers.

31/05/2024

Just 24 hours before the Kontras Quartet concert 3 p.m. Saturday June 1 at Ganz Hall, presented by the American Music Project.

Come hear 130 years of American music spanning from Arthur Foote's melody-packed String Quartet No. 1 of 1883 to a John Dowland mashup written by Jonathan Blumhofer in 2013. There is also "Echoes," a rare concert work by Hitchcock film-score composer Bernard Herrmann ("Vertigo" fans will recognize some passages) as well as music of Quincy Porter.

Finally, we mark the 85th birthday season of Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, with her "Voyage," inspired by a family of musicians fleeing N**i persecution to freedom in the U.S.

Join us 3 p.m. Saturday June 1 at Ganz Hall. Tickets are $20, $10 for students.

https://americanmusicproject.net/2024/04/06/kontras-quartet-returns-for-amp-concert-june-1/

31/05/2024

An offbeat CSO musical pairing last night with Cynthia Yeh as percussion soloist in the world premiere of Jessie Montgomery's "Procession" and Bruckner's Seventh Symphony, led by Manfred Honeck.

The competing exigencies of program scheduling can make for strange bedfellows. Such was the case with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert led by Manfred Honeck Thursday night, as a new percussion concerto served as prelude to a Bruckner symphony.

28/05/2024

Come hear 130 years of American music performed by the Kontras Quartet 3 p.m. Saturday June 1 at Ganz Hall, presented by the American Music Project.

The program spans from Arthur Foote's melody-packed String Quartet No. 1 of 1883 to a John Dowland mashup written by Jonathan Blumhofer in 2013. There is also "Echoes," a rare concert work by Hitchcock film-score composer Bernard Herrmann ("Vertigo" fans will recognize some passages) as well as music of Quincy Porter. Finally, we will mark the 85th birthday season of Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, with her "Voyage," inspired by a family of musicians fleeing N**i persecution to freedom in the U.S.

Join us 3 p.m. Saturday June 1 at Ganz Hall. Tickets are $20, $10 for students.

https://americanmusicproject.net/2024/04/06/kontras-quartet-returns-for-amp-concert-june-1/

27/05/2024

Jake Heggie's "Before It All Goes Dark" made a moving impact despite its brevity, presented by COT.

Composer Jake Heggie and librettist Gene Scheer’s latest collaboration made its way to Chicago’s Studebaker Theater this weekend to close out the opera’s three-city premiere tour. Commissioned by Music of Remembrance and presented in partnership with Chicago Opera Theater, Before It All Goes D...

24/05/2024

The Axiom Brass served up a wide array of new music for brass quintet in the Chicago Composers' Collective final season event.

The long-running Chicago Composers’ Collective wrapped their 2024 season on Thursday night with a jewel box of new music for brass quintet at the Epiphany Arts Center. The new works were illuminated by the Axiom Brass Quintet, whose diligent and probing interpretations of contemporary works made t...

24/05/2024

Neeme Järvi led the CSO in a resounding performance of Mahler's "Resurrection" symphony Thursday night.

Two repeats this weekend.

https://chicagoclassicalreview.com/2024/05/jarvi-cso-scale-the-heights-with-a-resounding-mahler-resurrection/

19/05/2024

The contemporary-music chorus Stare at the Sun made an impressive showing in their season-closing program of (mostly) world premieres Saturday night in Wicker Park.

One repeat 4 p.m. Sunday in Winnetka.

The new-music chamber choir Stare at the Sun offered the final program of their season Saturday night at Wicker Park Lutheran Church (to be repeated Sunday). Under the assured leadership of conductor A.J. Keller, the youthful 23-member ensemble, whose mission is to champion the works of living compo...

14/05/2024

Music of the Baroque wrapped its season Monday night at Fourth Presbyterian Church with Patrick Dupre Quigley leading a spirited, imaginatively presented program of Bach, Handel, Purcell and Allegri.

https://chicagoclassicalreview.com/2024/05/music-of-the-baroque-wraps-season-in-varied-spirited-fashion-under-quigley/

14/05/2024

Come hear the Kontras Quartet perform some excellent neglected American music June 1 at Ganz Hall. This year's American Music Project lineup includes "Echoes," a rare concert work by Bernard Herrmann of Hitchcock film score fame, and "Voyage" by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich as we mark her 85th birthday anniversary.

Also on tap is music of Arthur Foote, Quincy Porter and Chicago native Jonathan Blumhofer.

https://americanmusicproject.net/2024/04/06/kontras-quartet-returns-for-amp-concert-june-1/

11/05/2024

The Chicago Sinfonietta served up an engaging and adventurous concert for its final program of the season Friday night in Naperville.

One repeat Saturday night at the Auditorium.

The Chicago Sinfonietta presented its final program of the season Friday night in Naperville (to be repeated Saturday in Chicago). As president & CEO Blake-Anthony Johnson noted in his user-friendly introduction at Wentz Concert Hall, it has been a noteworthy season for the diversity-minded ensemble...

10/05/2024

Guest conductor Pierre-Fabien Roubaty brought apt Gallic charm to the Apollo Chorus's French program at St. Michael's Church.

True to its name, the Apollo Chorus of Chicago’s French Festival, which they sang at St. Michael Catholic Church on Sunday afternoon, was all francophone music. Six of the composers were Frenchmen (Bizet, Duruflé, Fauré, Poulenc, Ravel, and Saint-Saëns) and two (Honegger and Kaelin) were Swiss-...

10/05/2024

Third Coast Percussion provided visual spectacle as well as characteristic instrumental virtuosity at last week's concert at DePaul University.

Third Coast Percussion’s concert on Friday night at DePaul University’s Holtschneider Performance Center demonstrated again why live performance is so vital. Only in person is it possible to feel the energy sizzling between the members of TCP as they bring to life such rhythmically and texturall...

04/12/2023

Damien Geter's impassioned song-cycle "Annunciations," performed by Russell Thomas, was the clear highlight in the season-opening MusicNOW concert.

“We’re in for a really big ride,” an enthusiastic Jessie Montgomery, the program curator and host of the opening concert of MusicNOW’s 2023-24 season, told the packed audience Sunday afternoon at Symphony Center.