Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg Brings Tango to the CSO

Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg

There’s no one like violinist Nadja (Salerno-Sonnenberg), guest artist April 2 and 4 with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra led by guest conductor Yan Pascal Tortelier.

Yan Pascal Tortelier

   The program is pretty special, too, with the CSO premiere of tango king Astor Piazzolla’s “Cuatro Estaciones Portenos” (“Four Seasons of Buenos Aires”).  The charismatic Salerno-Sonnenberg will be soloist.
   Concerts are 7:30 p.m. April 2 and 8 p.m. April 4 at Music Hall.  The program is an appealing one, also including Ravel’s “Rhapsodie Espagnole” and music from Prokofiev’s ballet “Romeo and Juliet.”
   Admission to the April 2 concert includes complimentary buffet dinner beginning at 6:15 in the Music Hall Ballroom.
   Piazzolla’s “Four Seasons” began as four pieces composed separately for bandoneon (Argentine relative of the accordion) and chamber ensemble during the 1960s.  Russian composer Leonid Desyatnikov adapted them later for violin and strings.  They are a mix of tango, jazz and 20th century modernism.  Listeners will recognize references to Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons,” though the music does not attempt to be programmatic in the way Vivaldi’s concertos are.
   Salerno-Sonnenberg is an old tango hand, having recorded Piazzolla with the guitar duo Sergio and Odair Assad on an all-Piazzolla CD that won the 2002 Latin Grammy for Best Tango Album.
   Tickets are $12-$95, $10 for children and students, 75 percent off for seniors, at (513) 381-3300, or visit the CSO web site at www.cincinnatisymphony.org
   Note: Violinist Nicholas Kendall and the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra led by music director Mischa Santora presented the Cincinnati premiere of Piazzolla’s “Four Seasons” in conjunction with “The Four Seasons” by Antonio Vivaldi on a very special concert in June (see under “Reviews” June 16, 2008).
   Those who were there know that the CSO audience has a highly enjoyable experience in store.
   Also this weekend, the Kentucky Symphony Orchestra led by music director James R. Cassidy performs an all-Czech concert at 8 p.m. April 4 and 3 p.m. April 5 in Greaves Concert Hall at Northern Kentucky University.
   Dubbed “Czech, Please?” the program comprises Bedrich Smetana’s Overture to “The Bartered Bride,” the Sinfonia in D by Jan Vaclav Vorisek (1791-1825), Suite from Leo Janacek’s opera “The Cunning Little Vixen” and Dvorak’s Symphony No. 8.  The music will be accompanied by images of the Bohemian countryside projected on plasma screens during the performance.
   Tickets are $28 and $23, $18 for seniors, $10 for students.  Call (859) 431-6216 or visit www.kyso.org.

Arnold Schoenberg

One of the most stimulating concerts of the year is likely to be Concert:Nova’s “Demystifying Arnold Schoenberg,” a multi-media collaboration with actor Michael Burnham of the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music drama faculty and Schoenberg scholar
Steven Cahn at 7 p.m. April 5 at the C:N Garden, 538 Reading Rd. downtown (first floor of the Metaphor building).
    Performing with the C:N musicians will be soprano Meng Chun Lin.  CSO assistant conductor Kenneth Lam will conduct.
   Viennese composer Arnold Schoenberg, still a fearsome name, is the man who invented atonal, 12-tone composition, thereby changing the course of 20th-century music (at least for a period, since a reaction set in during the latter part of the century).  The object of the program, said C:N artistic director Ixi Chen, is “to get a look into his musical head space, get a sense of his world and his personality, and see a side of the music we otherwise might have missed.”
   Music to be performed includes Schoenberg’s Caberet Songs; Serenade, Op. 24; Five Piano Pieces, Op. 23; “Pierrot Lunaire;” and Chamber Symphony No. 1.  A reception with wine and refreshments will follow the performance.
   Tickets are $20, $10 for students and seniors, at the door and at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/59348.
Wired for Sound -- wired as in strings, that is -- CCM's newly formed student string band, presents its second concert of the season at 2:30 p.m. April 5 in Patricia Corbett Theater at CCM.
    Awadagin Pratt will conduct.

Awadagin Pratt

Violist Catherine Carroll will perform the Viola Concerto by J.C. Bach/Casadesus.

Catherine Carroll

Both are faculty artists at CCM.  The program also will include Mendelssohn's String Symphony No. 2 in celebration of the 200th anniversary of the composer's birth, plus a Mozart Serenade and Richard Strauss' profoundly moving "Metamorphosen" for 23 solo strings, a kind of requiem for German culture composed in 1948.  Strauss wove into it the funeral march from Beethoven's "Eroica" symphony as a poignant testament.  Admission is free.
   April 5 begins the Christian observance of Holy Week, culminating on Easter Sunday, April 12.  St. Peter in Chains Cathedral, 8th and Plum Streets downtown, will present the Ancient Office of Tenebrae (Latin for “darkness”) at 7:30 p.m. April 8.  The Cathedral Choir led by Anthony DiCello will perform the Chant “Lamentations,” Peter Hallock’s “Turn Us Again, O Lord God of Hosts,” Victoria’s “Eram quasi Agnus,” Poulenc’s “Timor et Tremor,” Pablo Casals’ “O vos omnes,” Gregorio Allegri’s “Miserere” (Psalm 51), Marc’Antonio Ingeneri’s “Tenebrae factae sunt” and Bruckner’s “Christus factus est.”
   There is no charge for admission.