Me in Cleveland

I’ll be in Cleveland on Sunday, stepping out on stage at Severance Hall to lead some conversation during a Cleveland Orchestra concert. I’ve done this once before, last season, and will do it again on March 26 and April 23. (I’ll also be in Milwaukee from March 17 to March 19, speaking about the Milwaukee Symphony’s Brahms festival, and about some other things, along with my old friend Tim Page from The Washington Post.)

The Cleveland conversations will be short, but if past experience is any guide, pretty interesting. I’ll be talking to Jahja Ling, who’ll be conducting, and Garrick Ohlsson, who’ll play the Barber Piano Concerto. The program is unusual, and very effective: First Sibelius, “The Chase” and “Scena” from his Scenes Historiques

(pieces you certainly don’t hear every day, and which are far more discursive, in their short span, than Sibelius usually is). Then the Barber Concerto, and then his Toccata Festiva for Organ and Orchestra, a wildly crazy piece, with a killer solo organ part (Joella Jones will be the soloist). And then the Sibelius Fifth. Two supposedly conservative composers, with some not so conservative music.

If you read this blog, and you happen to be there, find me and say hello!