Shulamit Ran, 73, has gained national and even international fame for her wide swath of solo, chamber, orchestral, choral, and operatic works, winning in 1991 the Pulitzer Prize for Music, the ultimate imprimatur of compositional excellence in the United States.
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Hubbard Street Leaps at Ravinia, Touring Returns
When Linda-Denise Fisher-Harrell took over as artistic director of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago in March 2021, the internationally known contemporary company had closed their longtime home less than a year earlier, which left them temporarily renting space from a fellow troupe. In a letter to the company’s “friends and patrons” announcing that news, executive director David McDermott raised questions about its very survival.
But Hubbard has not only overcome that dark time but also regained its former artistic vigor. As evidence, the company can point to its summer touring, including August returns to the Jacob’s Pillow Festival and New York’s Central Park SummerStage series. In addition, it is returning September 16 to Ravinia, where it has not appeared since 2006. “It was always very successful to play Ravinia,” Fisher-Harrell said. “To me, it just made sense to go back.”
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Music & Mayhem: Karen Ouzounian Powerfully Shatters Pigeonholes with Her Artistic Partners
American cellist Karen Ouzounian’s professional résumé has one unexpected entry.
Most of her achievements fall in the category of a gifted, classically trained musician forging a strong, creative career: Bachelor’s and master’s degrees from The Juilliard School. Co-founding the Aizuri Quartet, which has held a residency at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and recently won the prestigious Cleveland Quartet Award for the 2022–24 seasons. Memberships in Yo-Yo Ma’s boundary-breaking Silkroad Ensemble as well as The Knights, the innovative New York City–based chamber orchestra.
Two of those highlights will bring her to Ravinia before 2022’s finale. On September 13, she will be the soloist with The Knights in Shorthand, a new work for cello and chamber ensemble commissioned from Anna Clyne. Then she returns December 10 with the Aizuri Quartet for “Song Emerging,” a concert centered on translating the incredible musical potential of the human voice.
The aforementioned outlier on Ouzounian’s résumé? The Aizuri Quartet’s five-night gig this past April as the opening act for Wilco, the fabled Chicago alt-rock band fronted by Jeff Tweedy, during its New York shows celebrating the 20th anniversary of its mega-hit debut album, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot.
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Dame Jane Glover, Chicago’s Continuo Conductor and Peripatetic Milestone Maker
in Classical, RaviniaNews
Since the #MeToo movement took fire in 2017 and the classical-music world has ratcheted up its efforts around gender equity, a raft of up-and-coming women conductors have grabbed the spotlight. But decades before these much-publicized developments, one veteran female conductor was already quietly leading by example—Jane Glover, longtime music director of Music of the Baroque.
Ravinia audiences will have a chance to see her in action September 3 when she leads Music of the Baroque in just its third-ever performance at Ravinia and its first in the festival’s expansive Pavilion. “We’re thrilled to be coming back, and we’re thrilled that we’re on, as it were, the main stage,” Glover said.
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The Lincoln Trio Premieres an Ode to Chicago Architecture
in Classical, Artist News
Following their chamber music Grammy nomination in 2016 with Trios from Our Homelands—comprising 20th-century piano trios from each member musician’s ancestral nations—the Lincoln Trio has brought that same focus to their current Chicagoland home on their latest album, Trios from the City of Big Shoulders, released three months ago.
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Intransient Authority: There’s no looking back for the supergroup Chicago
“We’ve always loved Ravinia,” says Lee Loughnane, the sole trumpeter the band Chicago has had since its inception in 1967. “It’s great to be able to come back and play the music that we’ve all grown up with: we grew up writing and playing it, you folks grew up listening to it. We haven’t played Ravinia in a few years, and we’re excited to come back and play two nights [August 10 and 11]. And if you like the Chicago Symphony and the group Chicago, you will like the surprise we have for you on those two nights! I won’t tell you what it is, but you have to come to the show to see it.”
Read MoreThe Beatles Have Been In Chicago For Years
in Artist News
As a touring band, The Beatles visited Chicago three times in the 1960s to play at two South Side venues that no longer exist: the International Amphitheatre (1964 and 1966) and Comiskey Park (1965). But in a way, the Fab Four have been in the Chicago area for decades. That’s because John Lennon and Paul McCartney’s personal handiwork is residing at Northwestern University’s music library in Evanston. The library refers to the collection as the Beatles Manuscripts—they comprise handwritten lyric sheets for seven songs The Beatles released in 1965 and 1966.
Specifically, the library holds the original lyric sheets for six songs from the 1966 album Revolver: “Eleanor Rigby,” “I’m Only Sleeping,” “Yellow Submarine,” “Good Day Sunshine,” “And Your Bird Can Sing,” and “For No One,” as well as the lyrics for “The Word” from 1965’s Rubber Soul. Go behind the glass with Chicago Tonight for a rare look at the historic manuscripts, and experience the music of The Beatles’ groundbreaking Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band live when it is performed note for note, cut for cut by Classic Albums Live on July 7.