The Cleveland Orchestra Performs at Severance Before a European Tour and Five More Classical Music Events To Hit This Week

Brett Mitchell recently left his post as associate conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra to take the reins of the Colorado Symphony — but he’s back to lead the Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra in the first of its performances this season at Severance Hall. On Wednesday, October 4 at 8:00 pm, the evening will begin with Arnold Schoenberg’s Five Pieces for Orchestra, and feature Mason Bates’ The B-Sides for Orchestra and Electronica (2009) before concluding with Beethoven’s ever-popular Fifth Symphony. The concert is free, but you’ll need a ticket from the Severance Hall Box Office.

Franz Welser-Möst returns to the Severance Hall podium on Thursday, October 5 at 7:30 pm and Saturday, October 7 at 8:00 pm to lead The Cleveland Orchestra in a single work: Gustav Mahler’s 75-minute-long Sixth Symphony, performed without intermission. This is your last opportunity to hear the Orchestra before it takes off on a European tour, with stops in Austria, Germany, France, and Luxembourg (they’ll be back the weekend of November 3). Tickets can be reserved online.

Baldwin Wallace University sponsors an annual Focus Festival based around the work of a single composer. If you’ve ever played in a band or wind ensemble, you’ve probably encountered the music of this year’s honoree, Frank Ticheli. There are a number of events planned, including a presentation by the composer himself on Tuesday, October 3, a Symphonic Band and Motet Choir concert on Friday, October 6 at 7:00 pm, and a Symphonic Wind Ensemble concert on Saturday, October 7 at 7:00 pm. All events are in Gamble Auditorium at Baldwin Wallace in Berea, and it’s all free.

Ross W. Duffin’s Quire Cleveland celebrates its tenth season this year with more concerts than the professional choral ensemble has ever presented before. They begin with a program devoted to the psalms and anthems that 17th-century composer Henry Purcell wrote for the English Chapel Royal. There are two performances: on Thursday, October 5 in Morley Hall at Lake Erie College in Painesville (tickets here), and on Friday, October 6 at St. John’s Cathedral in downtown Cleveland (freewill offering). Both concerts begin at 7:30 pm.

Conductor Domenico Boyagian makes his debut as music director of Heights Chamber Orchestra on Sunday, October 8 at 3:30 pm at First Baptist Church in Cleveland Heights. Hrant Bagrazyan joins the ensemble for Beethoven’s Fourth Piano Concerto, and Boyagian takes on the challenge of Edward Elgar’s Enigma Variations. Suggested donation: $10.

And the Cleveland Chamber Music Society gets its new concert season underway at Plymouth Church in Shaker Heights on Tuesday, October 10 at 7:30 pm with a visit from the Danish String Quartet. Violinists Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen and Frederik Øland, violist Asbjørn Nørgaard, and cellist Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin will launch the evening with Béla Bartók’s Quartet No. 1, play a selection of folk music from the Nordic countries, and finish up with Beethoven’s Quartet Op. 59, No. 1. Click here for tickets. (And note that students pay only $5 — what a deal!)

For details of these and other events, visit the ClevelandClassical.com Concert Listings page.