“ ‘An American Influence,’ the Cliburn’s four-day, five-concert festival that begins Feb. 18, will have classical music patrons heading all over the map to some nontraditional venues around Fort Worth,” writes Gregory Sullivan Isaacs in Wednesday’s (2/10) Star-Telegram (Fort Worth, TX). “Each of the five concerts—themed ‘Americana,’ ‘Jazz,’ ‘Musical Theatre,’ ‘Hollywood’ and ‘Classics’—will examine a particular, fundamental element of American culture [and] explore ‘where U.S. popular culture and classical composition collide.’ … Concerts will take place at Van Cliburn Recital Hall, Scat Jazz Lounge, Four Day Weekend Theater, the Amon Carter Museum of American Art and Kimbell Art Museum’s Piano Pavilion…. The opening concert, ‘Americana’ … will feature music by American composers [and] Antonin Dvorak, who wrote prolifically while living in America…. The second concert explores the widespread influence of an American invention—jazz [and will include] Ravel’s Sonata for Violin and Piano … Russian Nikolai Kapustin’s Concert Etudes [and] selected jazz standards… [At] the third performance … many familiar names will be represented: George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim and Richard Rodgers.” Other concerts will feature music by Erich Korngold, John Williams, Lowell Liebermann, Aaron Copland, Samuel Barber, and Charles Ives. It is the second year the Cliburn is presenting the festival; last year’s festival focused on Chopin.
Posted February 12, 2016
