The Cleveland Orchestra February 2-5 Concerts

Completely engaged. That’s how Joe Coyle feels about his life at Judson Manor.

An award-winning journalist who has lived in Paris, Santa Fe, and New York City, he arrived in July 2020 via the suggestion of a fellow resident. He’s been delighted ever since.

“As a writer, I enjoy spending time alone, and these surroundings are perfect: my apartment is quiet, and the views overlooking the Cleveland Museum of Art are lovely. But by far the best part of Judson is the people. Everyone is so knowledgeable about art and culture. I wanted to have stimulating company to spend my time with, and I’ve found that here. These are wonderful, interesting people,” says Joe.

Read the full story at judsonsmartliving.org/blog

“Expanding my curiosity about life is what it’s all about.”

Joe Coyle

2022/2023 SEASON

Boléro

Thursday, February 2, 2023, at 7:30 p.m.

Friday, February 3, 2023, at 7:30 p.m.

Saturday, February 4, 2023, at 8:00 p.m.

Sunday, February 5, 2023, at 3:00 p.m.

Klaus Mäkelä, conductor

Andrew Norman (b. 1979)

Claude Debussy (1862–1918)

Maurice Ravel (1875–1937)

Approximate

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“REPETITION IS THE MOTHER OF ALL LEARNING,” claims an oft-repeated Latin proverb, and, fittingly, variations of this phrase have filtered down through the centuries. Every musician who’s been instructed, “practice, practice, practice,” intimately understands these values. It’s at the heart of mastering any skill, from baking pastries to shooting free throws: Lather, wash, repeat.

Yet, the ritual of repetition becomes a radical act in tonight’s concert, led by Klaus Mäkelä (right). Ravel’s Boléro, which anchors this program, notoriously presents a slow crescendo unfolding over 18 reiterations of the same Spanish theme. The rousing effect was immediately embraced by audiences (and still is), but it provoked an equally passionate backlash among fellow composers. Even Ravel himself was irritated by Boléro’s runaway success.

Speaking to the London Daily Telegraph in 1931, Ravel admitted: “There are no contrasts, and there is practically no invention except in the plan and the manner of the execution.” Rather than compose variations on the theme or modulate the melody, Ravel unleashes his brilliance through his deft orchestration. As the catchy tune weaves around in surprising and unfamiliar combinations, he paints new, distinct soundworlds — sweet, seductive, mysterious, humorous, strident, bombastic.

Andrew Norman’s Sustain, which receives its Cleveland premiere at the top of the program, is also a study in repetition. More ambitious in scope

than Ravel’s so-called “experiment,” Norman’s Sustain harnesses time rather than instrumentation as his medium. Each of the 10 cycles of the same melodic material that comprise the piece is played about three times faster than last, forging new textures and momentums to earth-shattering effects. As the work hurtles forward, it encounters galaxies, black holes, and big bangs.

In between these two tightly structured works, Debussy’s evocative Images for orchestra echoes a recurrent theme from his catalogue. The composer twice employed the title “Images” — both in compositions for solo piano — before assembling a large symphonic orchestra to illustrate a triptych of scenes. Within these depictions of a sombre dance, a Spanish setting, and spring coming into bloom, Debussy delights in giving the listener a second chance to listen to a beautiful phrase or experience again a poignant melody, finding new sonorities and nuances in each reprise.

— Amanda Angel

PHOTO BY MARCO BORGGREVE

Sustain

By Andrew Norman

BORN : October 31, 1979, in Grand Rapids, Michigan

Ω COMPOSED : 2018

Ω WORLD PREMIERE: October 4, 2018, by the Los Angeles Philharmonic with conductor Gustavo Dudamel

Ω CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA PREMIERE: This weekend’s concerts mark the first performances of Sustain by The Cleveland Orchestra.

Ω ORCHESTRATION: 3 flutes (3rd doubling piccolo), 3 oboes, 3 clarinets, 3 bassoons, 4 horns, 4 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion (vibraphone, suspended plywood, bongos, triangle, suspended cymbals, temple blocks, vibraphone, bell tree, log drums, chimes), harp, two pianos (one tuned down a quarter tone), and strings

Ω DURATION: about 35 minutes

ON THE SURFACE , Andrew Norman’s Sustain presents a simple idea: 10 repetitions of the same material, with each repetition exponentially faster than the last. However, merely describing the blueprint of the piece belies the vast range of expression within its rigorous structure. Norman’s particular compositional gift lies not in standard harmonic or melodic writing, but in crafting entire metaphysical landscapes complete with dilations of time and space, gravitational centers, acoustic recreations of digital effects, and other Modern compositional tools that challenge the efficacy of our senses. If you consider the “purpose” of the symphonic tradition to be a general ledger of civilization over the last 400 years, meant to record the desires, night-

mares, triumphs, and technologies of the times, then there is no more perfect rendering of our moment, careening toward an uncertain future, than Sustain.

Commissioned by the Los Angeles

Philharmonic to write a large-scale orchestral work for its centenary celebration, Norman found his starting point in the most basic, essential building block at any composer’s disposal: time. In contrast to “fixed” arts like painting or sculpture, symphonic writing is able to sculpt with time itself. Through the prism of the orchestra, Norman composes a spectrum of temporalities, covering everything from colossal timescales of stars or mountain ranges to those more recognizable to us: a season, an afternoon nap, a passing thought.

PHOTO BY JESSA ANDERSON

A rising flourish by two iridescent pianos (tuned a quarter tone apart), serves as a guidepost on this harrowing journey. Placed on opposite ends of the stage, they act as bookends to the cycles, signaling the start of each of the 10 repetitions. Between these markers expands a seductive dreamworld, where themes don’t have variations, but instead melt, freeze, evaporate, or sublimate. Within each repetition, the music gradually coalesces around and is eventually pulled into a gravitational center of terrifying proportions. Once the material reaches the singularity, it is spat back out into inky black space, losing momentum as it succumbs to entropy.

One of the great joys of experiencing Sustain is to find new momentums and connective tissues as each cycle proceeds. Something that was scarcely perceptible in the first iteration might become tactile in the second and fundamental in the third. Elements that seemed unrelated at first glance are vulcanized into novel materials, while familiar motifs — glittering vibraphone chords or a yearning melody for solo flute — are subsumed by greater momentums.

Eventually, we discover that we are inextricably being drawn toward an even larger locus, an event horizon that annihilates absolutely everything in its orbit. As we hurtle to this final, total destruction, the conductor can no longer maintain control; Norman instructs certain wind musicians to “go crazy.”

The delicate architecture, bounded by

the previously reliable pair of quartertone pianos, implodes into cacophony.

But this is not the end. The spiral form has played itself out, but what are we left with? In his program note, Norman states that Sustain asks “bottomless” questions, but I hear the coda as something specifically human and reflective, in contrast to the scientific rigor of the preceding 25 minutes. We’ve entered a sort of sound bath, with shimmering piano interplay, reminiscences of wind chimes, and the gentle lapping of waves. During this aural Savasana, I sometimes find that I’ve forgotten, if only for a couple of minutes, that I occupy one body, in one place, at one time.

When asked about this ending, Norman answered with his own questions: “As I saw all my musical materials contracting into the vortex at the heart of the work, the questions became clear to me: What lies in the aftermath of apocalypse? What happens after the end of history? When the old rules collapse into a point of nothingness, what remains in their wake? My mind turned to galaxies and black holes and big bangs, and the image of an orchestra, once tightly coordinated by the gravitational pulls of a conductor’s inexorable beat, now completely untethered, a collection of free-floating, individual molecules wafting through space to their own chance-determined ends.”

— Ian Mercer

Ian Mercer is The Cleveland Orchestra’s production manager.

Composer’s Note

My first thought in writing Sustain was to imagine the audience that will sit in Disney Hall 100 years from now, during the 200th season of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. What will it mean to gather as a community and listen to an orchestra in 2118? How will the ears and minds of those people be different from ours? How will they be the same? How will their notions of time and space and sound and history be shaped by the world around them, and what will that world outside Disney Hall look like? What place will the art of live symphonic performance have in such a society?

These are broad and bottomless questions which led me in many directions, but gradually they coalesced around a pair of subjects. The first is time. Perhaps, 100 years from now, the act of sitting quietly and listening to a symphonic argument unfold over 45 minutes will mean even more than it does today. Perhaps, in a time when humans will be bombarded with increasingly atomized bits of information, when overstimulation, fragmentation, and isolation will be the given norms of experience and discourse, perhaps then communal listening to a single, long unbroken musical thought will carry a kind of significance, sacrifice, and otherness we can’t yet really imagine.

I realized, as I was trying to conceptualize Sustain as a one long unbroken musical thought, that I was attempting to access and understand spans of time that were much bigger than my own, that I was trying to move from times with which I was familiar — that of a tweet, or a work day, or a year — to things I could never personally experience, like the rise and fall of species, the movement of tectonic plates, the birth and death of stars.

Structurally speaking, Sustain is cast in the form of a contracting spiral. It repeats the same music 10 times in a row, each repetition being roughly three times faster than the time before. What takes many minutes to unfold at the beginning flies by in a few seconds toward the work’s center.

All this thinking about time and proportion brought me around to what is perhaps at the heart this piece: the natural world. Midway through writing Sustain I discovered that I was really writing a piece about the earth, and my — and our — relationship to it. All the work I was doing with long spans of musical time and geologically unfolding sonic processes was in many ways my attempt to place us, the listeners in Disney Hall, in relation to things in nature which are unfathomably bigger and longer than we are. And if there is a sense of sadness or loss that permeates this music, it comes from the knowledge that we, at this critical moment in our history, are not doing enough to sustain the planet that sustains us, that we are not preparing our home for those who will inhabit it in the next hundred, thousand, or million years.

— Andrew Norman

Images

By Claude Debussy

BORN : August 22, 1862, in St. Germain-en-Laye, France

DIED: March 25, 1918, in Paris

Ω COMPOSED : 1905–12

Ω WORLD PREMIERE : Ibéria was the first of the three pieces that comprise Debussy’s Images to premiere, on February 20, 1910, with Gabriel Pierné conducting. Rondes de printemps followed on March 2, under the direction of the composer. Gigues was first performed on January 26, 1913, under the baton of André Caplet, who helped orchestrate the work.

Ω CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA PREMIERE : Each of the three parts of Images also debuted in Cleveland separately: Nikolai Sokoloff led the first performances of Ibéria in January 1921; Rondes de printemps came next, in 1937, with conductor Carlos Chavez; and Gigues entered the Orchestra’s repertoire in 1951, when Pierre Monteux led the Orchestra in the complete work for the first time.

Ω ORCHESTRATION : 3 flutes (3rd doubling piccolo), piccolo, 2 oboes, english horn, oboe d’amore, 3 clarinets, bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 4 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion (castanets, xylophone, tambourine, snare drum, chimes, tambourin provençal), 2 harps, celeste, and strings

Ω DURATION : 35 minutes

THE ASSOCIATION OF MUSIC and images is a fundamental characteristic of Claude Debussy’s works. In addition to the many specific physical references on which he based compositions — from the ocean in La Mer to all kinds of landscapes and portraits in the two books of piano preludes — the word Images appeared in an early set of piano pieces (1894) and in two better-known sets for piano (1905–08), before this title was used again for the orchestral Images

It was natural for Debussy to think in musical images. He was a great lover of art and counted many painters among his friends. But his artistic vision went beyond mere musical representation of a subject. For Debussy, his images were seen or dreamed by the mind’s eye and then realized in his colorful soundworld.

In the case of the orchestral Images, the tableaux primarily capture motion combined with the senses of sight, hearing, and even smell — the middle

section of Ibéria evokes nighttime aromas. As Charles Baudelaire, one of Debussy’s favorite poets, put it: “Les parfums, les couleurs et les sons se répondent…” (“The fragrances, the colors, and the sounds answer one another…”).

GIGUES

In the first section, Gigues, Debussy initially planned to append the adjective “triste,” or “sad,” to the title, according to a letter to his publisher Durand from 1905. No doubt, the idea of turning a cheerful dance into a melancholy melody was already present in his mind years before the composition was written.

The melody is derived from an English country dance or jig, related to but different from the Baroque gigue. Debussy had visited England on many occasions, and he may have come across

this melody on one of his trips, or he may have borrowed it from the song

“Dansons la gigue” (“Let’s dance the jig”) by his contemporary Charles Bordes (1863–1909).

After a brief introduction with a typically Debussyan combination of harp, celeste, and woodwinds, the jig melody is played by unaccompanied oboe d’amore (a double-reed instrument whose pitch lies between the oboe and the english horn). The other woodwinds and the horns play a faster rhythmic variant of this tune while the oboe d’amore keeps repeating its own, more soulful version of it. The music gets more and more agitated as the rhythmic pattern of the faster-moving material is developed in a powerful orchestral crescendo that suddenly breaks off. The sad jig tune returns, the tempo gradually slows down, the music gets ever softer, and finally fades into silence.

André Caplet, who collaborated with Debussy on the score of Gigues, wrote about the work in 1923: “Gigues … Sad Gigues… tragic Gigues… The portrait of a soul… a soul in pain, uttering its slow, lingering lamentation on the reed of an oboe d’amore. … Underneath the convulsive shudderings, the sudden efforts at restraint, the pitiful grimaces, which serve as a kind of disguise, we recognize the very soul of our dear, great Claude Debussy. We find there the spirit of sadness, infinite sadness, lying stretched as in the bed of a river whose flow, constantly augmented from new sources, increases inevitably, mercilessly.”

Like the French Impressionist painters, composer Claude Debussy sought to capture fleeting moments in his music.

PHOTO COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

French musicians had often been inspired by the rhythms of Spanish music — the greatest example being Bizet’s opera Carmen, which premiered in 1875. Two other composers in particular owed their fame to Spanishinfluenced compositions: Édouard

Lalo’s Symphonie espagnole (1875) and Emmanuel Chabrier’s España (1883). Both works must have been well known to the young Debussy, who wrote his own La soirée dans Grenade (“Evening in Grenada”) for solo piano in 1903.

Aside from one short trip across the border, Debussy never visited Spain. But he was familiar with works by composers on the other side of the Pyrenees such as Manuel de Falla and Isaac Albéniz. The latter composed a magnificent four-volume suite for piano titled Ibéria (1905–08), and Falla praised Debussy’s Ibéria, saying it had “a considerable and decisive influence on young Spanish composers.”

The first section of Ibéria, “Par les rues et par les chemins” (“In the Streets and Byways”), immediately creates a Spanish atmosphere with the sound of castanets. A whole town floods the streets on a warm summer evening. People walk, talk, sing, and dance. The clarinets play a dance marked by the composer as “elegant and rhythmic” and harmonized with parallel chords (one of Debussy’s recurrent techniques). Later, the horns and clarinets intone an equally cheerful second theme, soon combined with a third melody which, in contrast, is

more lyrical and expressive in character. The first theme with the castanet accompaniment finally returns (now played by the oboes instead of the clarinets). At last, the noisy parade is over; the people go home and the section quiets down to a pianissimo.

The second section is called “Les parfums de la nuit” (“The Fragrances of the Night”). Falla perceived here “the intoxicating spell of Andalusian nights,” which he must have known having been born in that province of Spain. Several factors contribute to the magic of this movement, including a virtuosic orchestration that makes sophisticated use of divided strings. For example, at one point the first violins split into seven

Édouard Manet’s painting, Mademoiselle V...in the Costume of an Espada (1862), depicts model Victorine Meurent in a matador’s costume, showing the French fascination with Spanish culture.

different groups, all playing with special techniques such as glissandos and harmonics. The celeste part is every bit as celestial as the instrument’s name. The chords are again parallel, with every part moving by the same interval regardless of keys; as a result, we get the so-called “whole-tone scale” (C, D, E, F-sharp, G-sharp, A-sharp), where any note may serve as a temporary or permanent resting-point. As a result, the music seems to hover in the air, never touching the ground or reaching closure.

The third section of Ibéria, “Le matin d’un jour de fête” (“The Morning of a Festival Day”) follows without interruption. As the day begins to break, we hear the distant sound of a drum with some softly plucked string pizzicatos. The night music returns for a moment in the form of a three-measure flute solo. The violins and violas imitate guitars —  Debussy instructs half the players to hold their instruments like guitars. The clarinets are instructed to play “very cheerfully, exaggerating the accents,” the violin solo, full of double stops, must be “free and whimsical,” the oboe and english horn parts “merry and whimsical.”

RONDES DE PRINTEMPS

The final section, translated as “Round Dances of Spring,” opens with an atmosphere of warmth and serenity, though at the 1910 premiere, according to Debussy biographer Léon Vallas, “the very high pitch of the violins, the sudden gusts of thirds in the wind instruments, the

rough sonorities of certain passages, suggested to some people icy blasts rather than the gentle breezes of spring.”

Following the introduction, Debussy includes a rare quote of a French folksong in one of his works: “Nous n’irons plus au bois” (“We won’t go to the woods anymore”). This melody — which also appears in his piano piece Jardins sous la pluie (“Gardens in the Rain”), from the cycle Estampes — is transformed in various ways, some derived from the Baroque contrapuntal techniques known as stretto and augmentation. This is also the only movement of Images to bear a dedication, inscribed to Debussy’s second wife, Emma.

After undergoing various rhythmic transformations, the folksong is played in long and strongly accented notes by the clarinets and the english horn, only to crumble away to tiny motifs, suddenly cut short by a powerful glissando by the harp and celeste that brings the piece to a close.

According to the composer’s correspondence with his publisher, Debussy was torn between choosing from three potential endings. “Shall I toss up between them,” he wrote, “or try to find a fourth solution?” He finally opted for a big crescendo, “brisk and vigorous.”

The last word belongs to the trombones, which cap the piece with a stupendous three-part sliding glissando.

— Peter Laki

Peter Laki is a musicologist and frequent lecturer on classical music. He is a visiting associate professor at Bard College.

Boléro

By Maurice Ravel

BORN : March 7, 1875, in Ciboure, Basses-Pyrénées, France

DIED: December 28, 1937, in Paris

Ω COMPOSED : 1928

Ω WORLD PREMIERE : November 22, 1928, at the Paris Opera in a performance by Ida Rubinstein’s dance company, with the founder in the main role, choreography by Bronislava Nijinska, and sets and costumes by Alexandre Benois.

Ω CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA PREMIERE : October 16, 1930, with Nikolai Sokoloff conducting

Ω ORCHESTRATION : 2 flutes (2nd doubling piccolo), piccolo, 2 oboes (2nd doubling oboe d’amore), english horn, 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, E-flat clarinet, soprano saxophone (doubling tenor saxophone), 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 4 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion (bass drum, cymbals, 2 snare drums, tam-tam), harp, celeste, and strings

Ω DURATION : 15 minutes

RAVEL DID NOT EXPECT Boléro to be a hit. He was simply fulfilling an obligation to write a piece of music. He’d been asked by the Russian ballerina Ida Rubinstein to write a new ballet with a Spanish theme. Her original request involved orchestrating some piano works by Isaac Albéniz, a relatively easier task than writing new music. But it turned out that the Albéniz pieces had already been arranged for orchestra — and copyright restrictions wouldn’t allow another version. So Ravel struck out on his own, looking for something interesting but not too time consuming. Eventu-

ally, he settled on the idea of an orchestration exercise, applied to a strangely meandering melody of his own devising, set against a steady and unchanging Spanish rhythm.

The mastery of Ravel is not in conjuring this exercise, but in the extraordinarily consummate skill with which he infused a unique musical message into a simple formula and idea. Somehow, Ravel managed just the right combination of stasis and change, keeping the piece in a narrow region between monotony and wildfire. New instruments are added precisely when the music requires an

infusion of energy or a modulation of tone and texture, but never in a predictable way or pace. In a good performance, the tension builds, ever climbing to a blazing climax, and at the moment this peak is scaled, it abruptly releases to extended applause. In a great performance, the result can be mesmerizing, tantalizing, and palpably bone tingling.

From the first beat, the snare drum taps out a driving rhythm that propels the entire piece. A wandering melody starts to snake its way through the

orchestra, starting with solo flute, next clarinet, followed by the bassoon, up through the high-pitched E-flat clarinet, before descending to the oboe d’amore (a double reed pitched between an oboe and english horn). More instruments take their turns: trumpet with flute, the unusual addition of saxophones, twinkling celeste and mellow horn, a quartet

Maurice Ravel wrote the Spanish-themed Boléro for Ida Rubinstein’s dance company, captured here during one of the first performances at the Paris Opera.

of reeds emulating an organ, an inebriated-sounding trombone sliding from note to note, the highest-pitched woodwinds carrying the melody into the stratosphere, and finally the strings enter.

From here to the end, everything continues building, with entire sections jumping in, more trumpets, more strings, raucous trombones, and crashing cymbals. Then suddenly, almost unexpectedly, it ends.

Boléro was a sensation at its premiere in Paris in 1928 — the music overshadowing the choreography —and the piece quickly took on a life of its own in the concert hall (and radio and recordings and movies and more).

Ravel was astonished — and even perturbed — by its quick rise to popularity. In 1931, he stated that Boléro “constitutes an experiment in a very special and limited direction, and should not be suspected of aiming at achieving anything different from, or anything more than, it actually does achieve. Before its first performance, I issued a warning to the effect that what I had written was a piece lasting seventeen minutes and consisting wholly of ‘orchestration without music’ — of one very long,

gradual crescendo. There are no contrasts, and practically no invention except the plan and the manner of execution.” Just so, and it works magnificently.

— Eric Sellen

One of the greatest orchestrators of his day, Maurice Ravel’s ability to create a rich tapestry of colorful soundworlds is fully realized in Boléro. Much to the chagrin of the composer, Boléro remains his most popular work, immortalized by the gold-medal routine that ice dancers Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean performed at the 1984 Olympics.

Eric Sellen is The Cleveland Orchestra’s editor emeritus. He previously was program book editor for 28 seasons.

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Klaus Mäkelä, Conductor

KLAUS MÄKELÄ IS CHIEF CONDUCTOR

of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, music director of Orchestre de Paris, and, since autumn 2022, artistic partner of the Concertgebouworkest. An exclusive Decca Classics artist, he has recorded the complete Sibelius Symphony cycle with the Oslo Philharmonic as his first project for the label.

Mr. Mäkelä’s third season with the Oslo Philharmonic features 11 contrasting programs, with repertoire ranging from Jean-Baptiste Lully and Pietro

Locatelli to Alban Berg and Gustav Mahler to Anna Thorvaldsdottir and Julia Perry. In fall 2022, Mr. Mäkelä and the Oslo Philharmonic embarked on their second European tour with performances in Germany, Belgium, and Austria with soloist Sol Gabetta.

For his second season with the Orchestre de Paris, Mr. Mäkelä has chosen to spotlight living composers

Pascal Dusapin, Betsy Jolas, Jimmy

López Bellido, Magnus Lindberg, and Kaija Saariaho, the latter featured with three different works. There is also a focus on the Ballets Russes with two key Diaghilev scores by Stravinsky: The Firebird and The Rite of Spring. In spring 2023, Mr. Mäkelä and Orchestre de Paris tour throughout Europe with Janine Jansen as soloist.

With the Concertgebouworkest Klaus Mäkelä embarks on a long-term collaboration this season, joining the orchestra as its artistic partner with his eventual

appointment to chief conductor in 2027. For their first season together, they perform six programs including Mahler’s Symphony No. 6, the Mozart Requiem, and Strauss’s Alpine Symphony, as well as premieres by López Bellido, Sauli Zinovjev, Alexander Raskatov, and Sally Beamish. On tour, they performed the opening concert of Musikfest Berlin and at the Cologne Philharmonie.

As a guest conductor in the 2022–23 season, Mr. Mäkelä makes his first appearances with the New York Philharmonic, Berliner Philharmoniker, Gewandhausorchester, and Wiener Symphoniker; and returns to The Cleveland Orchestra, where he’ll lead two consecutive programs, and Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Klaus Mäkelä studied conducting at the Sibelius Academy with Jorma Panula and cello with Marko Ylönen, Timo

Hanhinen, and Hannu Kiiski. As a soloist, he has performed with several Finnish orchestras and as a chamber musician at the Verbier Festival, among others.

PHOTO BY JEROME BONNET

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Premiering this Friday!

Shades of Light

February 3  | 7:00 p.m.

Longtime friend, Alan Gilbert, leads The Cleveland Orchestra in a shimmering program. Two works by impressionistic masters —  Lili Boulanger’s D’un matin de printemps and Claude Debussy’s La mer — paired with Unsuk Chin’s brilliantly wrought Rocaná round out this vivid episode.

ALSO AVAILABLE: The Drive

This weekend’s conductor, Klaus Mäkelä, partners up for the first time with conductor/ violinist Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider for an extraordinary rendering of Sibelius’s beloved Violin Concerto, before launching into a furious rendition of Shostakovich’s Tenth Symphony.

NOW IN ITS SECOND CENTURY , The Cleveland Orchestra, under the leadership of music director Franz WelserMöst since 2002, is one of the most sought-after performing ensembles in the world. Year after year, the ensemble exemplifies extraordinary artistic excellence, creative programming, and community engagement. The New York Times has called Cleveland “the best in America” for its virtuosity, elegance of sound, variety of color, and chamberlike musical cohesion.

Founded by Adella Prentiss Hughes, the Orchestra performed its inaugural concert in December 1918. By the middle of the century, decades of growth and sustained support had turned it into one of the most admired globally.

The past decade has seen an increasing number of young people attending concerts, bringing fresh attention to The Cleveland Orchestra’s legendary sound and committed programming. More recently, the Orchestra launched several bold digital projects, including the streaming broadcast series In Focus, the podcast On a Personal Note, and its own recording label, a new chapter in the Orchestra’s long and distinguished recording and broadcast history. Together, they have captured the Orchestra’s unique artistry and the musical achievements of the Welser-Möst and Cleveland Orchestra partnership.

The 2022/23 season marks Franz Welser-Möst’s 21st year as music director, a period in which The Cleveland Orchestra earned unprecedented acclaim around the world, including a series of residencies at the Musikverein in Vienna, the first of its kind by an American orchestra, and a number of acclaimed opera presentations.

Since 1918, seven music directors —  Nikolai Sokoloff, Artur Rodziński, Erich Leinsdorf, George Szell, Lorin Maazel, Christoph von Dohnányi, and Franz Welser-Möst — have guided and shaped the ensemble’s growth and sound. Through concerts at home and on tour, broadcasts, and a catalog of acclaimed recordings, The Cleveland Orchestra is heard today by a growing group of fans around the world.

PHOTO BY ROGER MASTROIANNI

THE CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA

Franz Welser-Möst, MUSIC DIRECTOR

Kelvin Smith Family Chair

FIRST VIOLINS

David Radzynski

CONCERTMASTER

Blossom-Lee Chair

Peter Otto

FIRST ASSOCIATE CONCERTMASTER

Virginia M. Lindseth, PhD, Chair

Jung-Min Amy Lee

ASSOCIATE CONCERTMASTER

Gretchen D. and Ward Smith Chair

Jessica Lee

ASSISTANT CONCERTMASTER

Clara G. and George P.

Bickford Chair

Stephen Tavani

ASSISTANT CONCERTMASTER

Wei-Fang Gu

Drs. Paul M. and Renate H.

Duchesneau Chair

Kim Gomez

Elizabeth and Leslie

Kondorossy Chair

Chul-In Park

Harriet T. and David L.

Simon Chair

Miho Hashizume

Theodore Rautenberg

Chair

Jeanne Preucil Rose

Larry J.B. and Barbara S.

Robinson Chair

Alicia Koelz

Oswald and Phyllis Lerner

Gilroy Chair

Yu Yuan

Patty and John Collinson

Chair

Isabel Trautwein

Trevor and Jennie Jones

Chair

Katherine Bormann

Analisé Denise Kukelhan

Gladys B. Goetz Chair

Zhan Shu

SECOND VIOLINS

Stephen Rose*

Alfred M. and Clara T.

Rankin Chair

Eli Matthews1

Patricia M. Kozerefski and Richard J. Bogomolny

Chair

Sonja Braaten Molloy

Carolyn Gadiel Warner

Elayna Duitman

Ioana Missits

Jeffrey Zehngut

Sae Shiragami

Kathleen Collins

Beth Woodside

Emma Shook

Dr. Jeanette Grasselli

Brown and Dr. Glenn R. Brown Chair

Yun-Ting Lee

Jiah Chung Chapdelaine

VIOLAS

Wesley Collins*

Chaillé H. and Richard B.

Tullis Chair

Lynne Ramsey1

Charles M. and Janet G.

Kimball Chair

Stanley Konopka2

Mark Jackobs

Jean Wall Bennett Chair

Lisa Boyko

Richard and Nancy

Sneed Chair

Richard Waugh

Lembi Veskimets

The Morgan Sisters Chair

Eliesha Nelson

Joanna Patterson Zakany

William Bender

Gareth Zehngut

CELLOS

Mark Kosower*

Louis D. Beaumont Chair

Richard Weiss1

The GAR Foundation Chair

Charles Bernard2

Helen Weil Ross Chair

Bryan Dumm

Muriel and Noah Butkin

Chair

Tanya Ell

Thomas J. and Judith Fay

Gruber Chair

Ralph Curry

Brian Thornton

William P. Blair III Chair

David Alan Harrell

Martha Baldwin

Dane Johansen

Paul Kushious

BASSES

Maximilian Dimoff*

Clarence T. Reinberger Chair

Derek Zadinsky2

Mark Atherton

Thomas Sperl

Henry Peyrebrune

Charles Barr Memorial Chair

Charles Carleton

Scott Dixon

Charles Paul

HARP

Trina Struble*

Alice Chalifoux Chair

FLUTES

Joshua Smith*

Elizabeth M. and William C. Treuhaft Chair

Saeran St. Christopher

Jessica Sindell2

Austin B. and Ellen W.

Chinn Chair

Mary Kay Fink

PICCOLO

Mary Kay Fink

Anne M. and M. Roger Clapp Chair

OBOES

Frank Rosenwein*

Edith S. Taplin Chair

Corbin Stair

Sharon and Yoash Wiener Chair

Jeffrey Rathbun2

Everett D. and Eugenia S. McCurdy Chair

Robert Walters

ENGLISH HORN

Robert Walters

Samuel C. and Bernette K. Jaffe Chair

CLARINETS

Afendi Yusuf*

Robert Marcellus Chair

Robert Woolfrey

Victoire G. and Alfred M. Rankin, Jr. Chair

Daniel McKelway2

Robert R. and Vilma L. Kohn Chair

Amy Zoloto

E-FLAT CLARINET

Daniel McKelway

Stanley L. and Eloise M. Morgan Chair

BASS CLARINET

Amy Zoloto

Myrna and James Spira Chair

BASSOONS

John Clouser*

Louise Harkness Ingalls Chair

Gareth Thomas

Barrick Stees2

Sandra L. Haslinger Chair

Jonathan Sherwin

CONTRABASSOON

Jonathan Sherwin

HORNS

Nathaniel Silberschlag*

George Szell Memorial Chair

Michael Mayhew§ Knight Foundation Chair

Jesse McCormick

Robert B. Benyo Chair

Hans Clebsch

Richard King

TRUMPETS

Michael Sachs* Robert and Eunice Podis

Weiskopf Chair

Jack Sutte

Lyle Steelman2

James P. and Dolores D. Storer Chair

Michael Miller

CORNETS

Michael Sachs*

Mary Elizabeth and G. Robert Klein Chair

Michael Miller

TROMBONES

Brian Wendel*

Gilbert W. and Louise I. Humphrey Chair

Richard Stout Alexander and Marianna C. McAfee Chair

Shachar Israel2

EUPHONIUM & BASS TRUMPET

Richard Stout

TUBA

Yasuhito Sugiyama*

Nathalie C. Spence and Nathalie S. Boswell Chair

TIMPANI

Paul Yancich*

Otto G. and Corinne T. Voss Chair

PERCUSSION

Marc Damoulakis*

Margaret Allen Ireland Chair

Donald Miller

Thomas Sherwood

KEYBOARD INSTRUMENTS

Carolyn Gadiel Warner

Marjory and Marc L. Swartzbaugh Chair

LIBRARIANS

Michael Ferraguto

Joe and Marlene Toot Chair

Donald Miller

ENDOWED CHAIRS CURRENTLY UNOCCUPIED

Elizabeth Ring and William

Gwinn Mather Chair

Paul and Lucille Jones Chair

James and Donna Reid

Chair

Mary E. and F. Joseph Callahan Chair

Sunshine Chair

Mr. and Mrs. Richard K. Smucker Chair

Rudolf Serkin Chair

CONDUCTORS

Christoph von Dohnányi MUSIC DIRECTOR

LAUREATE

Daniel Reith

ASSISTANT CONDUCTOR

Sidney and Doris Dworkin Chair

Lisa Wong

DIRECTOR OF CHORUSES

Frances P. and Chester C. Bolton Chair

* Principal

§ Associate Principal

1 First Assistant Principal

2 Assistant Principal

This roster lists full-time members of The Cleveland Orchestra. The number and seating of musicians onstage varies depending on the piece being performed. Seating within the string sections rotates on a periodic basis.

FEB 2, 3, 4, 5 BOLÉRO

Klaus Mäkelä, conductor

NORMAN Sustain DEBUSSY Images

RAVEL Boléro

FEB 9, 11

MAHLER’S FIFTH

Klaus Mäkelä, conductor

CHIN SPIRA—Concerto for Orchestra

MAHLER Symphony No. 5

FEB 16, 17, 18

BEETHOVEN’S SEVENTH

Herbert Blomstedt, conductor

Emanuel Ax, piano

MOZART Piano Concerto No. 18 (“Paradis”)

BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 7

FEB 23, 24, 25

MOZART AND STRAUSS

Franz Welser-Möst, conductor

MOZART Divertimento No. 2*

SCHOENBERG Variations for Orchestra

STRAUSS Ein Heldenleben

* not part of Friday Matinee concert

MAR 2, 3, 4, 5

PICTURES AT AN EXHIBITION

Franz Welser-Möst, conductor

Víkingur Ólafsson, piano

FARRENC Symphony No. 3

RAVEL Piano Concerto in G major

MUSSORGSKY/RAVEL Pictures at an Exhibition

MAR 9, 10, 11, 12

MOZART’S REQUIEM

Franz Welser-Möst, conductor

Christoph Sietzen, percussion

Siobhan Stagg, soprano

Avery Amereau, alto

Ben Bliss, tenor

Anthony Schneider, bass

Cleveland Orchestra Chorus

STAUD Concerto for Percussion

MOZART Requiem

WINTER SPRING

MAR 30, 31, & APR 1 INSPIRATION: THE TEMPEST

Thomas Adès, conductor

Pekka Kuusisto, violin

ADÈS The Tempest Symphony

ADÈS Märchentänze

SIBELIUS Six Humoresques*

SIBELIUS Prelude and Suite No. 1 from The Tempest*

* Certain selections will not be part of the Friday Matinee concert

APR 6, 7, 8

SHOSTAKOVICH’S FIFTH SYMPHONY

Rafael Payare, conductor

Jean-Yves Thibaudet, piano

BERNSTEIN Symphony No. 2 (“The Age of Anxiety”)

SHOSTAKOVICH Symphony No. 5

APR 13, 15, 16

MAHLER’S TITAN

Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor

Leif Ove Andsnes, piano

DEBUSSY Jeux, poème dansé

DEBUSSY Fantaisie for Piano and Orchestra

MAHLER Symphony No. 1 (“Titan”)

APR 20, 21, 22, 23

ALL MOZART

Bernard Labadie, conductor

Lucy Crowe, soprano

MOZART Overture to La clemenza di Tito

MOZART “Giunse al fin il momento... Al desio di chi t’adora”

MOZART Ruhe Zanft from Zaide

MOZART Masonic Funeral Music

MOZART “Venga la morte...

Non temer, amato bene”

MOZART Symphony No. 41 (“Jupiter”)

APR 27, 28, 29

MARSALIS AND NEW WORLD

Franz Welser-Möst, conductor

Michael Sachs, trumpet

MARTINŮ Symphony No. 2

MARSALIS Trumpet Concerto DVOŘÁK Symphony No. 9 (“From the New World”)

MAY 4, 6

WEILERSTEIN PLAYS BARBER

Franz Welser-Möst, conductor

Alisa Weilerstein, cello

LOGGINS-HULL Can You See?

BARBER Cello Concerto

PROKOFIEV Symphony No. 4

MAY 14, 17, 20

THE GIRL OF THE GOLDEN WEST

Franz Welser-Möst, conductor

Tamara Wilson, soprano (Minnie)

Eric Owens, bass (Jack Rance)

Limmie Pulliam, tenor (Dick Johnson)

Cleveland Orchestra Chorus

PUCCINI La Fanciulla del West (The Girl of the Golden West)

* Opera presentation, sung in Italian with projected supertitles

A SPECIAL VALENTINE’S DAY

Join The Cleveland Orchestra for an evening of romance, with pre-concer t dinner and drinks at the Severance Restaurant , and a cocktail party following the Friday, Februar y 17th performance.

Dinner reservations can be made with Open Table or at clevelandorchestra.com. For questions about the Valentine’s dinner, email cx@clevelandorchestra.com.

BEETHOVEN’S SEVENTH

FEB 17 | FRI 7:30 PM

Herbert Blomstedt conductor

Emanuel Ax piano

YOUR VISIT

HEALTH & SAFETY

The Cleveland Orchestra is committed to creating a comfortable, enjoyable, and safe environment for all guests at Severance Music Center. While mask and COVID-19 vaccination are recommended they are not required. Protocols are reviewed regularly with the assistance of our Cleveland Clinic partners; for up-to-date information, visit: clevelandorchestra. com/attend/health-safety

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. These seating breaks are at the discretion of the House Manager in consultation with the performing artists.

PAGERS, CELL PHONES & WRISTWATCH ALARMS

As a courtesy to others, please silence all devices prior to the start of the concert.

PHOTOGRAPHY, VIDEOGRAPHY & RECORDING

Audio recording, photography, and videography are prohibited during performances at Severance. Photographs can only be taken when the performance is not in progress.

HEARING AIDS & 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. For Infrared Assistive-Listening Devices, please see the House Manager or Head Usher for more details.

FREE MOBILE APP TICKET WALLET

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.

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 age-appropriate series designed specifically for children and youth, including Music Explorers (for 3 to 6 years old) and Family Concerts (for ages 7 and older).

The Cleveland Orchestra is grateful to the following organizations for their ongoing generous support of The Cleveland Orchestra: the State of Ohio and Ohio Arts Council and to the residents of Cuyahoga County through Cuyahoga Arts and Culture.

For more information and direct links to download, visit clevelandorchestra.com/ticketwallet or scan the code with your smartphone camera to download the app for iPhone or Android.

Available for iOS and Android on Google Play and at the Apple App Store.

The Cleveland Orchestra is proud of its long-term partnership with Kent State University, made possible in part through generous funding from the State of Ohio. The Cleveland Orchestra is proud to have its home, Severance Music Center, located on the campus of Case Western Reserve University, with whom it has a long history of collaboration and partnership.

© 2023 The Cleveland Orchestra and the Musical Arts Association

Program books for Cleveland Orchestra concerts are produced by The Cleveland Orchestra and are distributed free to attending audience members.

EDITOR

Amanda Angel

Managing Editor of Content

aangel@clevelandorchestra.com

DESIGN Elizabeth Eddins, eddinsdesign.com

ADVERTISING Live Publishing Company, 216-721-1800

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A SYMPHONY OFSuccess

We believe that all Cleveland youth should have access to high-quality arts education. Through the generosity of our donors, we are investing to scale up neighborhood-

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