Earlier this year, Norah Jones achieved yet another milestone in her estimable more-than-20-year career: She replaced herself at the top of Billboard’s Contemporary Jazz chart.
Her most recent album, Visions, debuted at No. 1. At No. 2 was her astonishing 2002 debut, Come Away With Me, which, as of this writing, has charted for 378 weeks, 335 of them in the top spot. The following week, the two albums switched positions, with Come Away With Me returning to No. 1.
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A year after graduating from the University of Arts in Havana in 2018, Jessica Altarriba left Cuba for Spain, planning to pursue her dream of a conducting career in a country where she spoke the language and was confident she would feel comfortable.
But COVID-19 soon hit, and things didn’t quite work out. Looking for a change, she applied for a Taki Alsop Conducting Fellowship but was turned down for lack of experience. But famed conductor Marin Alsop, the program’s founder, saw what she described as “huge potential,” so she reached out and urged Altarriba to begin master’s studies under her tutelage at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore.
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Classical music may have a centuries-old history, but among today’s top conductors, Marin Alsop is exceptionally open to trying new approaches. In both her choice of soloists and the programs she designed for her three weeks of Chicago Symphony Orchestra concerts July 12-26, Ravinia’s Chief Conductor is showcasing fresh faces and interesting ideas.
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Performing is Ben Platt’s greatest joy.
So, when the creative master of just about everything began work on his current album, Honeymind, Platt constantly envisioned what the music would look like, while performing it.
“I think the album is designed for live performance,” Platt tells Ravinia Magazine during a Zoom interview from outside his home in New York City, his backdrop a growing curtain of summer rain. “As soon as I started writing in this more emotionally intimate, Americana folk type of space, I was really excited to get back to rooms where I could have a more direct connection to the crowd. I think being somewhere beautiful and outside and in some of the prosceniums that I’m playing, it will just give a certain sense of warmth that the music wants to have.”
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Ravinia’s long-running summer training program for young professional musicians, the Steans Music Institute, has nurtured many careers— over 1,600 individual artists since 1988—at impressionable moments, and those who go on to bigger things often return in later years as part of main- stage programming. Among others, this summer violinist Augustin Hadelich will solo with the Chicago Symphony on July 25, more than 20 years after he spent a summer at the Steans Institute playing chamber music. And on July 18, the Viano Quartet will appear in the Martin Theatre, only four years after their virtual Steans experience during the pandemic year of 2020.
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Bassist Rufus Reid has lit up the New York City jazz scene for nearly 50 years, working in all the major clubs, fronting more than a dozen albums and serving as a duet partner and sideman on scores more with such luminaries as Kenny Barron, Kenny Burrell, Art Farmer, J.J. Johnson, and Akira Tana. But as important as the Big Apple as has been to this ever-dependable jazz stalwart, none of his success there would have been possible without his early years in Chicago…
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One of the Motion Picture Academy’s most grievous snubs was denying Antonio Sánchez even an Oscar nomination for his percussive score for Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman, which went on to win Oscars in 2015 for Best Picture, Director, Screenplay, and Cinematography. The mostly drum score was the propulsive accompaniment to the film, which seemingly unfolded in one unbroken take.
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Playing in an orchestra is, essentially, a team sport, one that many fledgling musicians dream about. But unlike baseball or soccer, it requires hours of solitary practice before “team play” begins. Sometimes trying to learn an instrument and performing only occasionally with local classmates can feel like a lonely slog. Budding athletes can plug into a vast network of local, regional, and national sports competitions, meets, and workshops that keep them excited about their sport. Little on that scale exists for young musicians. Marin Alsop, Ravinia’s Chief Conductor, is deeply invested…
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One of my favorite James Taylor songs is one you may not instantly recognize or associate with pop music’s lanky illuminator. After almost two decades of writing, singing, and performing many of the rock era’s most beloved ballads and appealing pop songs, with his honest, post-rehab album—1985’s That’s Why I’m Here—James Taylor finally confronted in song his personal demons and accepted his artistic reality.
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All concerts for Ravinia’s 2024 season go on sale to the public on Wednesday, April 24, at 8:00 a.m. CDT, only on ravinia.org!
We want to ensure you have a quick, easy, and secure experience purchasing tickets to the performances you most want to attend. Here are four tips to make your buying experience better.
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HIGHLAND PARK, IL — RaviniaⓇ President and CEO Jeffrey P. Haydon announces Ravinia Festival’s complete 2024 summer lineup, offering 60 artist debuts and more than 100 concerts ranging from rock/pop, R&B, classical, jazz, and country, to movies with live orchestra, dance performances, Fiesta Ravinia, and more. Summer 2024 also features the annual six-week summer residency by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) with Chief Conductor Marin Alsop and a range of classical offerings from solo recitals and chamber music to semi-staged opera and dance.
“With an extraordinary range of concerts and artists, we are excited to offer an inspiring and captivating season for everyone who comes to Ravinia,” said Haydon, Ravinia’s President and CEO. “Whether in Bennett Gordon Hall, Martin Theatre, Pavilion, Lawn, or Carousel, concertgoers will surely experience the spirit of summer with incredible music under the stars.”
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When saxophonist Wayne Shorter died last year at 89, the jazz world lost one of the most innovative and influential voices of his generation. Given Shorter’s wide-ranging reach and impact, it is hardly surprising that two upcoming concerts as part of Ravinia’s Fall/Spring Series in Bennett Gordon Hall will pay tribute to the recently departed jazz legend. The eight-member Ravinia Jazz Mentors will raise their hats to Shorter on March 16, and vocalist Kurt Elling and Panamanian pianist Danilo Pérez, who played with the saxophonist for 20 years, will devote much of their May 3 program to his music.
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It is not hard to find someone who has experienced love at our park, whether with the music, the magical atmosphere, or our beautiful grounds. The love between some Ravinia guests has continued outside and within the festival and is heartily blooming for years to come. Thank you to those who shared their special stories of love with us. We feel so honored to have been included in their romantic milestones.
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The trumpet of Jason Palmer, 2003 RSMI Jazz alumnus and 2024 Ravinia on Tour ensemble member (photo: Jimmy Katz)
Although just 25 years old, pianist Luca Mendoza is one of only two all-time Monterey Next Generation Jazz Festival “triple crown winners.” Chicago-native bassist Harish Raghavan has become a fixture on the New York jazz scene, fronting two recordings since moving in 2007. Though based on opposite coasts, they have a common thread that brings them together at Ravinia’s Bennett Gordon Hall on February 27 with saxophonist Veronica Leahy, trumpeter Jason Palmer, and drummer Mark Whitfield Jr.—the quintet has alighted to that stage before, though not at the same time. They’re all alumni of the Ravinia Steans Music Institute (RSMI) Jazz Program from the past two decades.
Mendoza has never performed with any of the other artists on the lineup, but he is sure they will bond quickly. “We all know who each other is,” he said. “That’s sort of the beauty of jazz being a small world at a certain level. We all know each other’s music and playing, and there is a certain caliber of respect that we’re bringing to the table. So, there is no concern at all—just excitement.”
In keeping with the spontaneity that is a hallmark of the jazz genre, the musicians will arrive at Ravinia a day two or early to work out a program and run through it. “Everybody is submitting some music, and we’re going to see how it goes at rehearsal,” Raghavan said.
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photo: Patrick Gipson/Ravinia
Kismet has a way of striking at unexpected times, and that is exactly what happened when three fellows at the Ravinia Festival’s Steans Music Institute (RSMI) happened to be put together with a violist to perform Gabriel Fauré’s Piano Quartet No. 2 in 2015.
Though previously acquainted at the Curtis Institute of Music, they had never played together and had no particular interest in being part of a piano trio. Or so they thought.
All that changed when they began rehearsing together, and the young artists immediately found themselves captivated by the collaboration. Four years later, they decided to make the happenstance assemblage into a permanent group.
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World-renowned tabla virtuoso Zakir Hussain remembers exactly when he first made music with guitar legend John McLaughlin. It was September 1972 in the Bay Area, and Hussain had been jaw-droppingly gobsmacked the night prior by McLaughlin, shredding up a storm in concert with his jazz-fusion band. The following day, they were hanging out at the home of maestro Ali Akbar Khan when McLaughlin asked Hussain, “Would you play with me?”
Half a century after that first jam session, McLaughlin and Hussain have launched a golden-anniversary world tour. In a big surprise for their fans, Shakti—a band mostly known for its concerts and live recordings—also recently released This Moment, the first new studio album in 45 years. Another fun surprise: their September 3 concert at Ravinia includes an appearance by banjo sorcerer Béla Fleck, with whom Hussain recently renewed a trio collaboration including bassist Edgar Meyer for the album and upcoming tour As We Speak.
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Photo: Benjamin Allen
There is a moment of sheer infectious joy on Ravinia Steans Music Institute alum Tessa Lark’s most recent album, The Stradgrass Sessions. There are several, actually, but one that stands out comes at the end of “Hysedelje,” a fiddle tune composed by Lark that is more (blue)grass than Strad(ivarius). At the end, she emits a “whoop” that evokes her Richmond, KY, roots as the daughter of a bluegrass musician. “It was a spur of the moment,” she told Ravinia. “Culturally, it is something you might do after playing a fiddle tune.” She added with a laugh, “You can take the girl out of Kentucky—”
Lark was born to the breed. Her father plays with the gospel-bluegrass ensemble Narrow Road. Her mother played piano for almost a decade when Lark was growing up. Classical music made an impression on her via radio and Performance Today, the American Public Radio series reputedly the most listened-to classical music program in the country. “I adored the music from a very young age,” she said. “My parents were amazing about having unique styles piping through the house. I would gravitate to what I thought was good music. It didn’t matter what the style or genre was. I quickly fell in love with classical because of the depth of emotion.”
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Photo: Benjamin Ealovega
On September 5, James Ehnes will join the Chicago-based Music of the Baroque and Dame Jane Glover as soloist in Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 3. He has appeared four times previously at the Ravinia Festival, but this visit will be his first since 2013. “I love playing in the Pavilion at Ravinia, but I’ve never played in the Martin Theatre, so this is going to be something new, different, and exciting,” he said. The 47-year-old violinist appeared as a soloist with Glover at the Aspen Music Festival in 2021 in the Beethoven Violin Concerto. “I just found her music-making to be so natural and so enjoyable to play with, so I’m really looking forward to being with her again.”
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“Like father, like son.” That old, familiar saying seems especially apt when it comes to Jeffrey Kahane and his son, Gabriel. Although they lived on opposite coasts for two decades and have different kinds of careers—Jeffrey, 66, following the path of a more traditional classical pianist and Gabriel, 42, finding his way as an entrepreneurial, cross-genre singer-songwriter—both have devoted their lives to music.
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Rufus Wainwright has a voice best described as “cashmere wood”—soft, fine, and delicate, but with a solid, hardened edge. And his songwriting matches it: a mysterious mix of heartfelt, honest, and raw ballads and sturdy pop/rock ravers. He’s instinctively carved a space that only he inhabits.
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