Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra November 16, 2018 Concert

CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA

Youth Orchestra .

V I N AY PA R A M E S WA R A N

M U S I C D I R E C TO R

November 16, 2O18 Severance Hall

2O18 SEASON 2O19

OBERLIN CONSERVATORY OF MUSIC CELEBRATING TRADITION. CREATING THE FUTURE.

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Oberlin students are mentored and challenged.

They grow comfortable with risk. They perform with ensembles small and large, with guest artists and peers, in recording studios and in concert halls, on stage and on tour, playing music by the masters and composers from our time.

Prelude Concert Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra

Friday evening, November 16, 2018, at 7:00 P. M. in Reinberger Chamber Hall Prior to each Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra concert at Severance Hall, a special Prelude Concert takes place featuring chamber music performances.

This evening’s instrumental ensemble represents our pioneering Advanced Performance Seminar program, in which Cleveland Orchestra coaches also perform in the chamber ensembles with Youth Orchestra students. Coaches are denoted with (*) next to their name.

GRAŻYNA BACEWICZ (1909-1969)

Quartet for four violins!

1. Allegretto — Allegro giocoso 2. Andante tranquillo 3. Molto allegro Kaylee Bontrager, violin Alison Chan, violin Yun-Ting Lee, violin* Lizzy Huang, violin

ANTON ARENSK Y (1861-1906)

from String Quartet No. 2, Opus 35 1. Moderato Moonhee Kim, violin Sonja Braaten Molloy, viola* Katarina Davies, cello Ania Lewis, cello

FELIX MENDELSSOHN (1809-1847)

from String Quartet No. 3 in D major, from Opus 44 1. Molto allegro vivace Miho Hashizume, violin* Alex Zhu, violin Ginger Deppman, viola Zach Keum, cello

SEVERANCE HALL

Prelude Concert

3

1986

1OO 2

More than 100 past and present Cleveland Orchestra members have coached the musicians of COYO, providing an extraordinary mentoring relationship — from today’s best to the talents of tomorrow.

overseas tours

COYO has undertaken two international concert tours, to Europe in 2012 and to China in 2015. In the U.S., they have performed as far east as Massachusetts and as far west as Michigan.

1500 YOUNG MUSICIANS

4 Four members of COYO are currently members of The Cleveland Orchestra, after college training and having won an audition.

1500 aspiring young musicians have been members of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra in its first three decades, learning together as an ensemble the ways and workings of a professional orchestra.

COYO has performed over 200 concerts, including a series of three concerts each year at Severance Hall, plus performances in communities throughout Northeast Ohio, and on concert tour.

Through last season . . .

COYO has performed the world premieres of

Eight music directors have led COYO since 1986: Jahja Ling, Gareth Morrell, Steven Smith, James Gaffigan, Jayce Ogren, James Feddeck, Brett Mitchell, and Vinay Parameswaran.

200

newly-written pieces.

Founded in 1986, the Youth Orchestra’s first public concert was held on February 1, 1987.

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Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra

BY THE NUMBERS

CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA

Youth Orchestra .

V I N AY PA R A M E S WA R A N

M U S I C D I R E C TO R

Friday evening, November 16, 2018, at 8:00 P. M. Severance Hall — Cleveland, Ohio Vinay Parameswaran, conductor JOHN ADAMS (b. 1947)

SAMUEL BARBER

The Chairman Dances: Foxtrot for Orchestra

2O18 SEASON 2O19

Violin Concerto, Opus 14

(1910-1981)

1. Allegro 2. Andante 3. Presto in moto perpetuo CÉLINA BETHOUX, violin

INTERMISSION JOHANNES BRAHMS

Symphony No. 2 in D major, Opus 73

(1833-1897)

1. Allegro non troppo 2. Adagio non troppo 3. Allegretto grazioso (quasi andantino) — Presto ma non assai — Tempo I — Presto ma non assai —Tempo I 4. Allegro con spirito

LIVE RADIO BROADCAST TONIGHT

This evening’s concert is being broadcast live on WCLV (104.9 FM).

The program will be rebroadcast as part of regular weekly programming on WCLV, on Sunday afternoons, December 30 and February 10, at 4:00 p.m.

UPCOMING YOUTH ORCHESTRA CONCERTS

The season continues with more concerts at Severance Hall: March 3 — Sunday at 7 p.m., with Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus May 10 — Friday at 8 p.m.

SEVERANCE HALL

Concert Program

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CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA

Youth Orchestra .

V I N AY PA R A M E S WA R A N FIRST VIOLIN Julia Schilz

Samantha Ma

CONCERTMASTER Hathaway Brown School

Neige DeAngelis

Wenlan Jackson

Revere High School

Lea Kim

Kai Bryngelson

Hansen Song

Ohio Connections Academy Hawken School

Owen Lockwood Shaker Heights High School

Alexandra Xuan Lake High School

Christine Shih Dublin Jerome High School

Lizzy Huang Shaker Heights High School

Cole Hoff Westlake High School

Maya Schane Oberlin High School

Alison Chan

Solon High School

Chagrin Falls High School

Nathan Hsiao Westlake High School

Enzo Zhou Western Reserve Academy

Célina Bethoux Home schooled

OBOE Amelia Johnson Br Bay High School

Victoria Schaefer

Annie Zhang

Brecksville-Broadview Heights High School

Cuyahoga Falls High School

Ohio Connections Academy

Leo Sherwood A

Anna Goldberg

University School

Laurel School

Zach Walker Ba

Helena Norman

Manchester High School

Hudson High School

Amanda Withrow

Adam Ryan

Eastwood High School

Hudson High School

VIOLA Mikel Rollet PRINCIPAL Ohio Virtual Academy

Kate Huang CLARINET Rachel Beil A

Home schooled

Matthew Kwok Walsh Jesuit High School

Canfield High School

Namjun Cho Br

Ayano Nakamura ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL Hudson High School

Natalie Brennecke

Charlotte Lo

Moonhee Kim

Alana Melvin

Solon Middle School

PICCOLO Annettte Lee A, Ba Vardaan Shah A

Shaker Heights High School

Beachwood High School

PRINCIPAL Central Christian High School

Alex Zhu

Cleveland Heights High School

Hudson High School

Erica Nie

Ginger Deppman

Medina High School

Strongsville High School

Lauren Hertzer

Tal Yankevich

SECOND VIOLIN Kaylee Bontrager

Claire Schmeller

Lily Waugh Br

Cleveland School of the Arts

Brunswick High School

Home schooled

ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL Beachwood High School

Ania Lewis

David Cho

Rachel Mancini

Hawken School

Wendi Song

Vardaan Shah

Kamryn McCrory

Lakewood High School

Firelands High School

Solon High School

ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL University School

Twinsburg High School

Safe Jassani

Claudia Hamilton

Kenston High School

Faith Geho

Chagrin Falls Middle School

Hudson High School

Annettte Lee A

Shaker Heights High School

Solon High School

Nathan Hammond

PRINCIPAL Home schooled

Theodora Bowne

Christina Bencin

Oberlin High School

FLUTE Kayleigh Fisher Ba

Gilmour Academy

Chagrin Falls High School

Richard Jiang

Andrew Hu

CELLO Katarina Davies Zach Keum

Hathaway Brown

ASSISTANT CONCERTMASTER Home schooled

Moshi Tang

M U S I C D I R E C TO R

Oberlin High School Shaker Heights High School Brunswick High School

Sandy Shen Solon High School

Kristen Nedza Solon High School

Mitchell Likovetz Hudson High School

Gunnar Brennecke Home schooled

Hudson High School

BASS Jamie Park

Amelia Martens Ba

PRINCIPAL Beachwood High School

Lauren Thomas

Cirrus Rowland-Seymour

Katherine Wang

ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL Shaker Heights High School

Maxwell Moses Elyria High School

Jacqueline Marshall Laurel School

Jorge Gonzalez Shaker Heights High School

Michael Yukos Hudson High School

Damian Rutti Mentor High School

JoHanna Arnold

Westlake High School Kenston High School Hathaway Brown School

BASS CLARINET Namjun Cho A BASSOON Izzy Ergh Copley-Fairlawn High School

Josh Prunty Ba, Br Midview High School

Emily Schrembeck A Lake High School

Fairview High School

Mark Yost Mentor High School

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Youth Orchestra

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2O18 SEASON 2O19 HORN Sophie Calabrese Br Shaker Heights High School

Nicolas Haynes Ba Home schooled

Lauren Jensen A Bay High School

Angeline Monitello Gilmour Academy

Maria Scotto Di Uccio

TROMBONE Felicia Goggins A Firestone Community Learning Center

Derek Gullett Br Lake High School

Juyoung Lee

Brunswick High School

Ryan Yonek Brunswick High School

TUBA Will Bowers A Cuyahoga Falls High School

TRUMPET Xan Denker Br

Nick Kusic Br Stow Munrow High School

Twinsburg High School

Kira Marjanovic Ba Lakewood High School

Nick McGan A Avon High School

Brett Nickolette Avon Lake High School

Firestone Community Learning Center

Westlake High School

Howland High School

Alex Yonek

PERCUSSION Nicole Buckland Ian Marr Brian Randall

TIMPANI Nicole Buckland Ba Medina High School

Alexa Clawson A Shaker Heights High School

MANAGER Lauren Generette LIBRARIAN Austin Land

KEYBOARD Wending Wu Hudson High School

HARP Anastasia Seckers Lakewood High School

Performers are listed alphabetically within each woodwind, brass, and percussion section.

PRINCIPAL PLAYERS A = Adams Ba = Barber Br = Brahms

Ian Marr Br Shaker Heights High School

The Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra is supported by a grant from the Martha Holden Jennings Foundation.

Endowed Funds The future of classical music shines brightly through the talented young musicians of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra. A gift to The Cleveland Orchestra’s endowment in support of the Youth Orchestra is a wonderful way to show your commitment to the future of this important program while providing vital funding for The Cleveland Orchestra.

In addition to the endowed musicians’ chairs listed at right, created by supportive donors, The George Gund Foundation has made a generous gift to the Orchestra’s endowment in support of the Youth Orchestra, the estate of Jules and Ruth Vinney has generously endowed a Touring Fund to support the Youth Orchestra’s performances beyond Northeast Ohio, and Christine Gitlin Miles has made a generous planned gift to honor Jahja Ling, founding music director of the Youth Orchestra.

SEVERANCE HALL

Youth Orchestra

The following seven endowed Youth Orchestra chairs have been created in recognition of generous gifts to The Cleveland Orchestra’s endowment: Concertmaster, Daniel Majeske Memorial Chair Principal Cello, Barbara P. and Alan S. Geismer Chair Principal Bass, Anthony F. Knight Memorial Chair Principal Flute, Virginia S. Jones Memorial Chair Piccolo, Patience Cameron Hoskins Chair Principal Harp, Norma Battes Chair Principal Keyboard, Victor C. Laughlin M.D. Memorial Chair

For more information about how you can support the Youth Orchestra through an endowed chair or fund, please contact The Cleveland Orchestra’s Development Office by calling 216-231-8006.

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CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA

Youth Orchestra .

P H OTO BY R O G E R MA S T R O I A N N I

V I N AY PA R A M E S WA R A N

T H E 2 01 8 -1 9 S E A S O N marks the

Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra’s 33nd season and the second year under the direction of Vinay Parameswaran. The Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra is one of the Cleveland area’s premier musical destinations for aspiring student musicians — and one of the most acclaimed youth orchestras in the United States.

Since its inaugural concert in 1987, the Youth Orchestra has performed more than 130 concerts and provided a musical home to 1,500 talented young instrumentalists.

Founded for The Cleveland Orchestra

by Jahja Ling, then the ensemble’s resident conductor, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra provides serious young music students of middle school and high school age with a pre-professional orchestral training experience in a full symphony orchestra.

The unique musical experiences that the Youth Orchestra offers include weekly coachings with members of The Cleveland Orchestra, rehearsals and performances in historic Severance Hall, and opportunities to work with internationally renowned

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M U S I C D I R E C TO R

guest artists and conductors. Those guests have included Marin Alsop, Pierre Boulez, Stéphane Denève, Christoph von Dohnányi, Giancarlo Guererro, Witold Lutosławski, YoYo Ma, Gil Shaham, Michael Tilson Thomas, Antoni Wit, and Cleveland Orchestra Music Director Franz Welser-Möst.

The creation of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus in 1991, to provide a similar experience for young vocalists from across Northeast Ohio, also widened the repertoire for the Youth Orchestra and expanded the Youth Orchestra’s preparation for potential professional roles. As one of the best youth orchestras in North America, and one of just a few affiliated with a top-tier orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra has garnered a number of prestigious accolades. In 1998, the Youth Orchestra was selected to participate in the second National Youth Orchestra Festival sponsored by the League of American Orchestras. In 2001, the Youth Orchestra appeared on the Family Concert Series at New York’s Carnegie Hall, and, in June 2009, they traveled to Boston for a series of four performances. The ensemble’s recent sched-

Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra

Prague, 2012

SEVERANCE HALL

China, 2015

Music Directors of the

Cleveland Orchestra YOUTH ORCHESTRA Jahja Ling 1986-1993

Gareth Morrell 1993-1998 ule has included performances at the Ohio Music Education Association Conference in February 2015, and for the League of American Orchestras national conference held in Cleveland in May 2015. In March 2018, the ensemble performed with the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus in a special Arts Advocacy Day concert presentation for legislators at the Ohio Statehouse in Columbus during Music in Our Schools month.

Regular international touring is now a planned part of the Youth Orchestra’s schedule. Their first overseas tour, to Europe in June 2012, featured concerts in Prague, Vienna, and Salzburg, as well as educational programs and historic tours.

A second overseas tour, to four cities in China, took place in June 2015, and a third in 2019 will take the ensemble to Europe.

In recent years, several Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra students have been featured on the nationally syndicated radio series From the Top, and several former members have won full-time positions in major orchestras, including four in The Cleveland Orchestra.

Members of the Youth Orchestra come from forty communities in a dozen

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Steven Smith 1998-2003

James Gaffigan 2003-2006

Jayce Ogren 2006-2009

James Feddeck 2009-2013

Brett Mitchell 2013-2017

Vinay Parameswaran from 2017

counties throughout Northeast Ohio to rehearse together each week in Severance Hall. The Youth Orchestra season runs from August through May and includes a threeconcert subscription series at Severance Hall, with concert broadcasts on Cleveland’s classical music station WCLV (www.wclv.org), and including a variety of community concerts by both the full orchestra and chamber groups of Youth Orchestra members.

Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra

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BE THE FUTURE OF CLASSICAL MUSIC

• A stimulating, supportive atmosphere with a world-class faculty including nearly 40 members of The Cleveland Orchestra.

• Through CIM’s Center for Innovative Musicianship (CIM²), students can take advantage of comprehensive career services, community and virtual performance opportunities and an entrepreneurship-focused curriculum.

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Vinay Parameswaran P H OTO BY R O G E R MA S T R O I A N N I

Music Director Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra Assistant Conductor Elizabeth Ring and William Gwinn Mather Endowed Chair The Cleveland Orchestra

T H E 2 0 1 8 - 1 9 S E A S O N marks

Vinay Parameswaran’s second year as a member of The Cleveland Orchestra’s conducting staff. In this role, he leads the Orchestra in several dozen concerts each season at Severance Hall, Blossom Music Festival, and on tour. He also serves as music director of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra.

Mr. Parameswaran came to Cleveland following three seasons as associate conductor of the Nashville Symphony (2014-2017), where he led over 150 performances. In the summer of 2017, he was a Conducting Fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center. Recent seasons have included Mr. Parameswaran making his guest conducting debuts with the Rochester Philharmonic and the Tucson Symphony, and also made his subscription debut with the Nashville Symphony conducting works

by Gabriella Smith, Grieg, and Piev. Other recent engagements have included debuts with the National Symphony Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony, Jacksonville Symphony, Eugene Symphony, and the Vermont Symphony Orchestra.

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In addition to his concert work, Mr. Parameswaran has led performances of Mozart’s The Magic Flute and Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love with Curtis Opera Theater. He also assisted with Opera Philadelphia’s presentation of Verdi’s Nabucco.

Mr. Parameswaran has participated in conducting masterclasses with David Zinman at the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, as well as with Marin Alsop and Gustav Meier at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music. He is the conductor on the album Two x Four featuring the Curtis 20/21 ensemble alongside violinists Jaime Laredo and Jennifer Koh, featuring works

by Bach, David Ludwig, Philip Glass, and Anna Clyne.

A native of the San Francisco Bay Area, Mr. Parameswaran played as a student for six years in the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra. He holds a bachelor of arts degree in music and political science from Brown University. At Brown, he began his conducting studies with Paul Phillips. He received a diploma from the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Otto-Werner Mueller as the Albert M. Greenfield Fellow.

Youth Orchestra: Music Director

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CarnegieMellonMusic @CMUmusic

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T CarnegieMellonMusic

MUSIC.CMU.EDU

The Chairman Dances: Foxtrot for Orchestra

by John Adams

T

composed 1985

H E O P E R A N I XO N I N C H I N A premiered in 1987.

Composer Adams and his collaborators shocked a lot of people when they put contemporary figures — Richard Nixon and his advisor Henry Kissinger, plus Chairman Mao Zedong — on the operatic stage. Operas John usually did not portray real-life people. Yet Adams found ADAMS a larger, symbolic meaning behind the famous encounborn February 15, 1947 ter between American president Nixon and the Chinese in Worcester, Communist Party chief Mao. He saw these characters as Massachusetts mythical figures, not unlike the gods and legendary heliving in roes that had populated many classical operas.

Berkeley, California The Chairman Dances is not part of the opera but is related to it. In 1985, Adams had received an independent orchestral commission while working on the opera. He initially planned to write a work that would fit into the opera as well, where at one point in Act III Chairman Mao dances with his wife, Chiang Ch’ing. (The Nixons and the Maos reminisce about their youths while dancing.) In the end, Adams wrote different music for this scene, although the main melody of the foxtrot occurs in both the opera and this earlier rendition.

The imaginary stage situation of The Chairman Dances is described by Adams in a prefatory note to the score: “Madame Mao has gatecrashed the Presidential Banquet.

She is first seen standing where she is most in the way of the waiters. After a few minutes, she brings out a box of paper lanterns and hangs them around the hall, then strips down to a skin-tight dress from neck to ankle and slit up to the hip. She signals the orchestra to play and begins dancing herself. Mao is becoming excited. He steps down from his portrait on the wall and they begin to foxtrot together. They are back in Yenan, dancing to the gramophone . . .”

This “foxtrot for orchestra” is a good example of Adams’s style, indebted to the so-called Minimalist school of the 20th century, but transcending some of its limitations.

The Minimalists of the 1960s and ’70s (including Terry Riley, Steve Reich, and Philip Glass) developed a style based on multiple repetitions of simple rhythms and largely avoiding clashes of harmony. Minimalism had brought some much-needed freshness into new music, but Adams felt it had gone too far in simplification. “I demand more from musical experience,” he declared. Accordingly, his music is richer in changes and contrasts than the works of many Minimalists, and requires much more virtuosity on the part of the players. Note the variety of instrumental colors in The Chairman Dances, where, despite the persistent repeat of a hammering rhythmic motif, the sound of the music is frequently modified, with differing instruments playing, soft and loud dynamics, and many variations in flavors and ideas.

Performance Time: 12 minutes

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About the Music

13

Violin Concerto, Opus 14

by Samuel Barber composed 1939

b

A R B E R WA S T W E N T Y- N I N E years old when he

completed his Violin Concerto, a year after conductor Arturo Toscanini had helped catapult the young composer to fame with performances of his First Essay and Adagio for Strings. The violin concerto would be his first major commission. It came from Samuel Fels, a Samuel soap manufacturer and trustee at the Curtis Institute in BARBER Philadelphia, Barber’s alma mater. (Barber’s biographer Barbara Heyman writes that the composer later referred born March 9, 1910 West Chester, Pennsylvania to the work in private correspondence as his “concerto del sapone,” or “soap concerto.”) died January 23, 1981 Fels intended the concerto for his adopted son, New York City Iso Briselli, a former child prodigy and a student of the celebrated violinist Carl Flesch. Fels offered Barber $1000, half to be paid in advance and the other half upon completion of the concerto.

But things didn’t quite work out between composer and violinist. Briselli raised objections to the last movement of the concerto and asked Barber to make some major changes — which Barber declined to do. As a result, Briselli never played the work that had been written for him.

In order to defend against charges that the concerto was unplayable, a young student at Curtis, Herbert Baumel, was asked to help. Based on a 1984 interview with Baumel, biographer Heyman gives the following account of what happened: “One afternoon during the autumn of 1939, while Baumel was sitting in the commons room of the Curtis Institute of Music, [pianist] Ralph Berkowitz walked into the room and handed him a pencil manuscript of a violin part without telling him the name of the composer. He was told only that he had two hours in which to learn the music, that the ‘piece should be played very fast,’ and to return ‘dressed up’ and ready to play before a few people. The private performance took place in the studio of Josef Hofmann, where the tension and solemnity of the occasion, as recalled by Baumel, suggested that much was at stake for Barber besides the financial aspects of the commission. . . . Ralph Berkowitz accompanied Baumel, who produced dazzling evidence that the concerto was indeed playable at any tempo.

There were ‘bravos’ and the ritualistic tea and cookies. The verdict was that Barber was to be paid the full commission and Briselli had to relinquish his right to the first performance of the work. The trial was based on a performance of the incomplete third movement through rehearsal no. 6, ending abruptly at measure 94.”

If the finale was presented incomplete during Baumel’s demonstration, then no one present could fully understand how challenging the concerto nevertheless is, for the soloist plays at a feverish pace throughout almost the entire length of the movement. Indeed, the need for technical virtuosity so dominates the last movement that some critics have seen little else in it. More than a few musicians and commentators have repeatedly stated that the finale is the weakest of the concerto’s three move-

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About the Music

2 018 - 19 S E A S O N

ments. Yet, on closer inspection and consideration, that Presto last movement turns out to be the most harmonically adventurous of the concerto’s movements.

THE MUSIC

Without so much as a single measure of introduction, the solo violin begins the first movement with a tender melody, played over a gentle orchestral accompaniment.

The atmosphere is idyllic, like a sunny summer afternoon in a beautiful garden. Then the clarinet introduces a second melody (somewhat faster-moving than the first, but equally lyrical). A playful and animated but brief violin passage completes the collection of themes — with the three forming a happy family whose bliss nothing and no

SOLOIST Célina Bethoux Célina Bethoux appears as soloist in today’s concert as cowinner of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra’s 2017-18 Concerto Competition. Today, at age 14, she is a student of Cleveland Orchestra assistant concertmaster Jessica Lee and Philip Setzer of the Emerson Quartet. Since the age of 8, she has participated in the Cleveland Institute of Music preparatory chamber music program, coached by members of the Cavani String Quartet. She began her violin studies at age 5 with Cleveland Orchestra violinist Isabel Trautwein. She currently plays in a piano trio coached by Si Yan Darren Li and The Cleveland Orchestra’s Carolyn Warner, with whom she also studies sonata. The 2018-19 season is her third year as a member of COYO, where she has served as concertmaster. She has also played in the CIM Youth String Camerata orchestra.

Ms. Bethoux has won several local concerto competitions in recent years, and from these enjoyed performing as a soloist with community orchestras including the Suburban Symphony Orchestra, the Cleveland Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Heights Chamber Orchestra. In addition, as one of two winners of the 2017 Jean L. Petitt Memorial Music Scholarship Competition, she played with the Cleveland Pops Orchestra. She was recently featured as concerto soloist with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra as first place winner of the 2018 Duquesne Young Artist National Concerto Competition.

Célina Bethoux attended the Jacobs School of Music Summer String Academy at Indiana University on a merit scholarship in 2016 and 2017. This past summer, she attended the Heifetz International Institute.

Célina believes that musicians should be connected to their communities and to the world at large, and is determined to reach out to others through her passion and love for music. She has played with her quartet at a UNICEF benefit concert, participated in Make Music Cleveland, and given recitals for the residents of Judson Manor and Judson Park. In addition to performing, she is also pursuing an interest in composing.

Ms. Bethoux’s favorite subjects include math, science, and philosophy.

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About the Soloist

15

one can perturb. Interestingly, the clarinet theme is taken over by the soloist only at the very end, giving an ethereal effect of unity and calm at the movement’s close.

The idyll continues in the Andante second movement. The solo oboe presents a long (and longing) melody, repeated by the cellos. The solo violin enters with more agitated material, leading to a cadenza, after which the violin takes over the opening melody. A brief fortissimo section flares up, before the movement ends on a calm and peaceful chord.

The first two movements were written in the summer of 1939, in Sils Maria in the beautiful Engadin Valley of Switzerland. Barber hoped to finish the third movement in Europe as well, but, as Heyman writes, “his plans were interrupted . . . when at the end of August all Americans were warned to leave Europe because of the impending invasion of Poland by the Nazis.”

Barber sailed home to America on September 2, the day after the German invasion, and finished the concerto in the Pocono Mountains of eastern Pennsylvania. We should not, however, infer any direct links between these circumstances and the concerto’s third movement, even if the sudden energy and hubbub of this last movement is in stark contrast to the first two. We know from correspondence and sketches that Barber had from the outset planned a finale with “ample opportunity to display the artist’s technical powers.”

The finale definitely immediately disrupts the idyll of the first two movements.

Despite the steady motion in triplets that represents no small part of the violinist’s challenge, the movement is filled with fun surprises. For one, after two largely diatonic movements (concentrating on the seven notes of the major or minor scale), the language in the third is very chromatic (using of all 12 pitches in the tonal system and giving us some crunchier and more astringent harmonies). For another, there are several unexpected changes in the meter that throw off the seemingly simple patterns established in the opening measures. Furthermore, Barber makes the music spicier by adding a snare drum, by ingeniously combining pizzicato (plucked) and arco (bowed) string techniques, and via a more pointed (and pointillistic) use of the woodwind instruments. There is a powerful climax near the end, after which Barber cranks up the tempo even further, replacing triplets with sixteenth-notes for the frantic last 17 measures of the concerto. It is a dazzling, whirlwind finish.

Performance Time: 25 minutes

There’s no reason music should be difficult for an audience to understand.

—Samuel Barber

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About the Music

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Youth Orchestra Coaching Staff These members of The Cleveland Orchestra are serving as coaches for the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra.

VIOLIN Peter Otto First Associate Concertmaster

WOODWIND John Rautenberg

PERCUSSION Thomas Sherwood

Flute Emeritus

Kathleen Collins

Frank Rosenwein

VIOLA Stanley Konopka

Jeffrey Rathbun

Percussion

Principal Oboe

Assistant Principal

Assistant Principal Oboe

First Assistant Principal

David Alan Harrell BASS Mark Atherton HARP Trina Struble Principal

Principal

Robert Woolfrey Clarinet

CELLO Richard Weiss

KEYBOARD Joela Jones

Jonathan Sherwin Bassoon / Contrabassoon

With Special Thanks To Robert O’Brien LIBRARIAN

BRASS Hans Clebsch Horn

Lyle Steelman Assistant Principal Trumpet

Shachar Israel Assistant Principal Trombone

Yasuhito Sugiyama Principal Tuba

THE CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA Franz Welser-Möst, Music Director Richard K. Smucker, President André Gremillet, Executive Director

2O18 SEASON 2O19

Education and Community Programs Joan Katz Napoli, Senior Director Sandra Jones, Manager, Education and Family Concerts Lauren Generette, Manager, Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra Mollibeth Cox, Manager, Community and Learning Programs Sarah Lamb, Manager, Community Engagement Austin Land, Artistic/Operations Coordinator, Youth Orchestra and Education Programs Courtney Gazda, Coordinator, Education and Community Programs

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Appreciation

SEVERANCE HALL

Symphony No. 2, in D major, Opus 73

by Johannes Brahms

I

composed 1877

T I S U S U A L LY S A I D of Brahms that he delayed

composing a symphony until after he was forty out of respect for Beethoven’s great set of nine — and from a fear of being found wanting in comparison with his mighty predecessor. There is much truth in this.

Indeed, Brahms acknowledged it himself.

Two decades earlier, Brahms’s rapid and young rise into the circle of leading composers was set in moJohannes tion by Robert Schumann, who declared publicly that the twenty-year-old Johannes Brahms was destined BRAHMS for a great future in the pedigree of German music. In born May 7, 1833 the company of Schumann and his wife Clara, Brahms in Hamburg, Germany had played much chamber music — which for them died April 3, 1897 represented the real Beethoven legacy, especially the in Vienna, Austria violin sonatas and late quartets. The symphonies, and especially the Ninth, were important, but not necessarily the center of what they viewed as Beethoven’s universe and achievements.

When he finally resolved to write his own symphony, Brahms had Schumann’s symphonies sounding in his ears just as strongly as Beethoven’s. When we listen to the finale of Brahms’s First, though, we do unmistakably encounter an echo of the choral finale of Beethoven’s Ninth. “Any fool can see that,” was Brahms’s dismissive comment when asked about the connection.

It may have taken Brahms four decades to create his first symphony. But once he’d done so, it was easier for him to embark on creating more. The rest followed relatively quickly, all within nine years. The Second followed very soon after the First, and the Fourth appeared within two years of the Third.

Yet we know that Brahms always regarded symphonic writing as a tough proposition, to the point where we should be thankful that he gave us as many as four. We know he was self-critical to the point of destroying a significant number of sketches and completed works across his lifetime, when they did not satisfy his exacting standards.

We can, therefore, be grateful for the opportunity to hear each of Brahms’s symphonies, for their individual viewpoints and soundworlds.

B R A H M S ’ S F I R S T S Y M P H O N Y , long awaited, was first performed in the relatively small city of Karlsruhe in November 1876 — the composer was anxious to test it in one of the less prominent cities of Germany before allowing performances where reputations and review really mattered, Vienna or Leipzig or Berlin. Such was the symphony’s success, however, that performances quickly followed in major cities around the world, at home and abroad.

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mer worked the miracle and produced the new work the very next year.

Since 1864, with the opening of a railroad connection from Vienna to Lake Wörth in the very southernmost part of Austria, the capital’s well-to-do had begun spending summers there. Like Gustav Mahler a few years later, Brahms liked to compose during his holidays, and in the village of Pörtschach on the lake’s northern shore he found a haven: “It is delightful here,” he wrote, “I will never again spend the summer far from the Prater [Vienna’s main street].” Many a great work was to emerge from Brahms’s summer retreats amid Alpine lakes and mountains, including the Violin Concerto the following year. (Mahler too, who built a villa at Maiernigg just across the lake from Pörtschach, found inspiration in these lovely surroundings.)

The Second Symphony was speedily composed during the summer of 1877, and this time Brahms had no hesitation in offering it first to a Viennese audience. They heard it on December 30 that year, and like its predecessor it was soon taken up by all the great orchestras of the world.

This work includes some dark passages and no lack of tension, but on the whole it is a sunny work, full of light and vivacity. Hearing it leaves most listeners in a state of happy elation.

Darker spirits come first. Within a few bars of the start of the opening movement, trombones are heard lurking in the shadows, and later on, in the movement’s development section, those hints turn into real threats when the trombones “show their teeth” in overlapping, grinding entries. Later, as if in remorse, the trombones play a soothing role in the slow second movement, while Brahms explores a constant counterpoint, with at

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CONTACT INFORMATION music.depauw.edu 765-658-4118 georgepalton@depauw.edu

2019 AUDITION DATES February 9, March 1 or by appointment

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About the Music

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least two themes always to be heard at the same time. The cellos have a similar kind of leading role, with an especially ravishing melody (supported by the violas) as the second subject of the first movement, and an important expressive line in the second movement.

The contrast of these forces in motion and anguish with the plain tunefulness of the third movement is quite striking.

The symphony’s overall impression — of mostly sunshine and happiness — is most strongly conveyed by the charming third movement, which dissolves the intricacies and tensions of the first two movements (and often lingers enough in listeners’ minds to subdue the technical skill of the brilliant finale, which sweeps everything before it). The third movement is, in fact, a kind of intermezzo, in which a gentle folksy theme is treated as a rondo (with a principal theme alternating with a contrasting section), interrupted by two equally charming episodes. The first is a fairylike transformation of the initial theme, speeded up; the second is a faster dance idea, full of cross-accents and chattering exchanges between winds and strings.

If the trombones are a sinister force in the first two movements, they step proudly forward in the last movement, and they close the symphony with one of the most thrillingly sounded D-major chords in all symphonic music.

Along the way through the symphony, we should also remember the first horn’s superbly-shaped solo in the coda of the first movement, which is followed by the first violins indulging their taste for broad melody on their lower strings — as if this was the point towards which the entire edifice of the first movement had been leading. Indeed, in Brahms’s music, there are many great moments like these. And the Second Symphony is filled with many rewards for listeners throughout. But keep your ears open, for quiet patience rewards alert and focused ears — from merriment and calm to uncertainty and anquish, and back again to sheer warmth and happiness.

Performance Time: 45 minutes PROGRAM NOTES BY ERIC SELLEN, PETER LAKI, AND HUGH MACDONALD © 2018.

It is not hard to compose, but what is fabulously hard is to leave the superfluous notes under the table.

—Johannes Brahms

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School Music Teachers The members of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra express gratitude to their school music directors for the role they play on a daily basis in developing musical skills.

Aaron Jacobs, Avon High School David Eddleman, Avon Lake High School Darren Allen, Bay High School Lisa Goldman, Beachwood High School Steven Cocchiola, Brecksville-Broadview Heights High School Valerie Roman & Jay Wardeska, Brunswick High School Michael Kelly, Canfield High School Lara Dudack, Central Christian School Kendra Karriker, Chagrin Falls Middle School & High School Brett Baker, Cleveland Heights High School Dianna Richardson, Cleveland School of the Arts Michael Foster, Copley-Fairlawn High School Dustin Harris, Cuyahoga Falls High School Michelle Adair, Dublin Jerome High School Brian Myers, Eastwood High School David Pope, Elyria High School Hillery Needham, Fairview High School Dustin Wiley, Firelands High School Katherine Ferguson, Firestone Community Learning Center David Kilkenney, Gilmour Academy Linda Simon-Mietus, Hathaway Brown School Liesl Langmack, Jodie Ricci, & Jessica Sherwood, Hawken School Greg Rezabek, Howland High School Roberto Iriarte & Beverly O’Connor, Hudson High School Jeff Link, Kenston High School Jared Cooey & Arleen Scott, Lake High School Elizabeth Hankins, Lakewood High School Julie Tabaj, Lakewood Middle School Joel McDaniel, Laurel School Michelle Bagwell, Manchester High School Jason Locher & Shelly Jansen, Medina High School Stephen Poremba & Matthew Yoke, Mentor High School Josh Brunger, Midview High School Audrey Melzer, Oberlin High School William Hughes & Donna Jelen, Shaker Heights High Schools Gerald MacDougall & Mark Mauldin, Solon High School Gregory Newman, Stow Munroe Falls High School Andrew Hire, Strongsville High School Ryan Bonitz & Damon Conn, Twinsburg High School Daniel Singer-Sord, University School David Banks, Walsh Jesuit High School Margaret Karam, Western Reserve Academy Hilary Patriok, Westlake High School

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Appreciation

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DEGREES

Hugh A. Glauser School of Music

Bachelors Masters Doctorate PROGRAMS Music Education Performance Conducting Ethnomusicology Music Theory/Composition

Dr. Jungho Kim Director of Orchestra

All programs are accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music.

ORCHESTRA

AT

KENT STATE

FACULTY

Our highly skilled and dedicated teaching faculty are consumate performers, appearing with groups such as The Cleveland Orchestra*, Erie Philharmonic, Miami String Quartet, Blue Water Chamber Orchestra and more.

Home of the Kent Blossom Music Festival.

WOODWINDS

Diane McCloskey Rechner | flute Danna Sundet | oboe Amitai Vardi | clarinet Mark DeMio | bassoon Noa Even | saxophone

STRINGS

Jung-Min Amy Lee | violin* Cathy Meng Robinson | violin Joanna Patterson Zakany | viola* Keith Robinson | cello Bryan Thomas | double bass

BRASS

Kent Larmee | horn Michael Chunn | trumpet David Mitchell | trombone Ken Heinlein | tuba

PERCUSSION Matthew Holm

ADMISSIONS AND AUDITIONS GRADUATE ADMISSIONS

AUDITIONS AND ADMISSIONS

COURSES AND TRANSFER

Michael Chunn Graduate Coordinator

Jesse Leyva Recruitment Coordinator

Dana Brown Assistant to the Director

mchunn@kent.edu

jleyva@kent.edu

dabrown@kent.edu

SCHOLARSHIPS AND GRADUATE ASSISTANTSHIPS AVAILABLE! About the Music WWW.KENT.EDU/MUSIC | 330-672-2172

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Youth Orchestra Teachers The members of the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra express gratitude About the Music to their private teachers for their insight, patience, and expertise.

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VIOLIN TEACHERS Masha Andreini Amy Barlowe Sibbi Bernhardsson Alan Bodman Wei-Shu Co Vladimir Deninzon* Wei-Fang Gu* Rachel Huch Joan Kwuon Amy Lee* Jessica Lee* Sonja Molloy* Yoko Moore Vali Phillips Eugenia Poustyreva William Preucil Mary Price Erin Reidhead Stephen Rose* Stephen Sims Cory Smith Sofia Vitek Jin Yu

BASS TEACHERS Ann Gilbert Tracy Rowell Henry Samuels Bryan Thomas Chris Vance Matthew Yoke

VIOLA TEACHERS Lisa Boyko* Jeffrey Irvine Eva Kennedy Laura Poper Laura Shuster Ann Smith Louise Zeitlin

BASSOON TEACHERS Renee Dee Jessica Smith

CELLO TEACHERS Martha Baldwin* Rachel Bernstein David Alan Harrell* Pamela Kelly Andris Koh Melissa Kraut Ida Mercer Daniel Pereira Keith Robinson Sharon Robinson Richard Weiss*

TRUMPET TEACHERS Nina Bell Amanda Bekeny Michael Miller* Rich Pokrywka

FLUTE TEACHERS Doris Malone Linda Miller Heidi Ruby-Kushious Dawn Schwartz OBOE TEACHERS Nermis Mieses Corbin Stair* Danna Sundet Cynthia Warren Craig Wohlschlager CLARINET TEACHERS Angelo Fortini Jennifer Magistrelli Amitai Vardi

TROMBONE TEACHERS Michele Kuhar Leland Matsumura Richard Stout* Bernard Williams IV TUBA TEACHERS Ray Harcar Justin White PERCUSSION TEACHERS Matthew Dudack Ryun Louie Luke Rinderknecht HARP TEACHERS Xiao Lei Salovara KEYBOARD TEACHERS Nancy Bachus

* Member of The Cleveland Orchestra

HORN TEACHERS Hans Clebsch* Meghan Guegold Melinda Kellerstrass

Appreciation

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Dreams can come true

Cleveland Public Theatre’s STEP Education Program Photo by Steve Wagner

... WITH INVESTMENT BY CUYAHOGA ARTS & CULTURE Cuyahoga Arts & Culture (CAC) uses public dollars approved by you to bring arts and culture to every corner of our County. From grade schools to senior centers to large public events and investments to small neighborhood art projects and educational outreach, we are leveraging your investment for everyone to experience.

Your Investment: Strengthening Community Visit cacgrants.org/impact to learn more.

11001 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44106 CLEVELANDORCHESTRA.COM

LATE SEATING As a courtesy to the audience members and musicians in the hall, late-arriving patrons are asked to wait quietly until the first convenient break in the program, when ushers will help you to your seats. These seating breaks are at the discretion of the House Manager in consultation with the performing artists.

PAGERS, CELL PHONES, AND WRISTWATCH ALARMS Please silence any alarms or ringers on pagers, cellular telephones, or wristwatches prior to the start of the concert.

of the world’s most beautiful concert halls, Severance Hall has been home to The Cleveland Orchestra since its opening on February 5, 1931. After that first concert, a Cleveland newspaper editorial stated: “We believe that Mr. Severance intended to build a temple to music, and not a temple to wealth; and we believe it is his intention that all music lovers should be welcome there.” John Long Severance (president of The Cleveland Orchestra, 1921-1936) and his wife, Elisabeth, donated the funds necessary to erect this magnificent building. Designed by Walker & Weeks, its elegant Georgian exterior was constructed to harmonize with the classical architecture of other prominent buildings in the University Circle area. The interior of the building reflects a combination of design styles, including Art Deco, Egyptian Revival, Classicism, and Modernism.

An extensive renovation, restoration, and expansion of the facility was completed in January 2000.

HAILED AS ONE

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Severance Hall

PHOTOGRAPHY, VIDEOGRAPHY, AND RECORDING Audio recording, photography, and videography are prohibited during performances at Severance Hall. Photographs of the hall and selfies can be taken when the performance is not in progress.

As courtesy to others, please turn off any phone/ device that makes noise or emits light.

IN THE EVENT OF AN EMERGENCY Contact an usher or a member of house staff if you require medical assistance. Emergency exits are clearly marked throughout the building. Ushers and house staff will provide instructions in the event of an emergency.

HEARING AIDS AND OTHER HEALTH-ASSISTIVE DEVICES For the comfort of those around you, please reduce the volume on hearing aids and other devices that may produce a noise that would detract from the program. Infrared AssistiveListening Devices are available. Please see the House Manager or Head Usher for more details.

AGE RESTRICTIONS Regardless of age, each person must have a ticket and be able to sit quietly in a seat throughout the performance. Classical season subscription concerts are not recommended for children under the age of 8. However, there are several ageappropriate series designed specifically for children and youth, including: Musical Rainbows (recommended for children 3 to 6 years old) and Family Concerts (for ages 7 and older).

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Your Role . . . in The Cleveland Orchestra’s Future Generations of Clevelanders have supported the Orchestra and enjoyed its concerts. Tens of thousands have learned to love music through its education programs, celebrated important events with the power of its music, and shared in its musicmaking — at school, at Severance Hall, at Blossom, in downtown Cleveland, on the radio, and with family and friends.

As Ohio’s most visible international ambassador, The Cleveland Orchestra proudly carries the name of our great city everywhere we go. Here at home, we are committed to serving all of Northeast Ohio with vital education and community programs, presented alongside wide-ranging musical performances. Ticket sales cover less than half the cost of presenting the Orchestra’s season each year. By making a donation, you can make a crucial difference in helping to ensure our work going forward. To make a gift to The Cleveland Orchestra, please visit us online, or call 216-231-7556.

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clevelandorchestra.com

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Opportunities to Perform T H E C L E V E L A N D O R C H E S T R A believes in the power of music to transform lives.

t li t looking l ki The Orchestra sponsors several ensembles for student singers or instrumentalists to pursue their interest in music. Students selected through auditions have the unparalleled opportunity to work closely week in and week out with professional musicians and conductors, who immerse them in the high standards and traditions of artistic excellence of a world-class orchestra. In addition to significant skill-building and beautiful musicmaking — and the academic and developmental benefits that come with rigorous music study — participants forge lifelong friendships and come to regard Severance Hall as their musical home.

C L E V E L A N D O R C H E S T R A

Founded in 1986, the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra provides a unique preprofessional experience for musicians in grades 7-12. Players rehearse weekly and perform in Severance Hall, are directed by a member of The Cleveland Orchestra’s conducting staff, and receive coaching from Cleveland Orchestra musicians. Membership is by competitive auditions held in May. For information, please call the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra at 216-2317352 or visit www.ClevelandOrchestraYouthOrchestra.com.

Youth Orchestra

C L E V E L A N D O R C H E S T R A

The Cleveland Orchestra Youth Chorus was founded in 1991 to help raise awareness of choral music-making in the schools of Northeast Ohio and to encourage more students to continue their choral activities through college and into adulthood. Members of the Youth Chorus have the opportunity to perform concerts in the greater Cleveland community as well as onstage at Severance Hall alongside their colleagues in the Youth Orchestra. Members of the Youth Chorus are chosen through auditions. For more information, please call the Chorus Office at 216-231-7374 or email chorus@clevelandorchestra.com.

Youth Chorus

C L E V E L A N D O R C H E S T R A The Cleveland Orchestra Children’s Chorus was founded in 1967 and is comprised of Children’s Chorus students in grades 6-9. The group performs regularly with The Cleveland Orchestra and Cleveland Orchestra Chorus. The Children’s Preparatory Chorus is comprised of students in grades 5-8 and collaborates with the Children’s Chorus in two concerts each season. Participation in each ensemble helps students develop their leadership skills through music and works to strengthen their abilities for future musical experiences. For more information, please call the Chorus Office at 216-231-7374 or email chorus@clevelandorchestra.com.

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Student Performance Ensembles

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Bachelor of Music (BM) Music Composition Music History & Literature Music Performance: Keyboard, Strings, Voice, Brass, Percussion Music Theatre Music Theory Music Therapy

Bachelor of Music Education (BME) Bachelor of Arts (BA)

Arts Management & Entrepreneurship Music: Liberal Arts (Academic or Applied)

BELIEVE IN YOUR NEXT NOTE... WE DO. CONSERVATORY of MUSIC Study with the best. From faculty who are artists and scholars committed to your success.

bw.edu/conservatory Baldwin Wallace University, Berea, Ohio 44017 32

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Baldwin Wallace University does not discriminate on the basis of race, creed, age, disability, national origin, gender or sexual orientation in the administration of any policies or programs.