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Jul. 25--Any concert in which you get to hear William Preucil play the violin solos in Scheherazade is a good one.
The Cleveland Orchestra's concert Sunday night at Blossom ran long, because of the addition of pieces performed by students in Kent/Blossom Music, a summer training institute.
But with Scheherazade as the concert's final course, and concertmaster Preucil playing those scrumptious solos, the night felt like a feast.
Kent/Blossom students, conducted by Cleveland Orchestra assistant conductor Andrew Grams, began the evening with Richard Strauss' Serenade in E-flat major and Arthur Honegger's Pastorale d'ete (Summer Pastorale).
The musicians carried off the pieces as pleasant summer fare, making an accomplished though somewhat sleepy opening to the night.
The Kent/Blossom Chamber Orchestra finished this portion of the program with the Suite from Appalachian Spring, a performance especially notable for the crisp, vibrant playing in the clarinet and piano.
After the first intermission, as if to rachet things up a notch to show what the Big Boys can do, guest conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya elicited brisk, appropriately showy playing from the Cleveland Orchestra in the Overture to Glinka's Ruslan and Ludmila.
The orchestra will be working more with Harth-Bedoya in coming months, as he makes his Severance Hall debut in February and travels with the orchestra in March to lead it in a week of concerts at the new Carnival Center for the Performing Arts in Miami.
Guest cellist Alban Gerhardt, making his Cleveland Orchestra debut, played with a fierce intensity and technique to burn in Dvorak's Cello Concerto in B minor, Op. 104. The orchestra occasionally covered him, but also turned in many stellar moments, particularly from the horns. A standing ovation brought back the young Berlin native to play the Prelude from the Sixth Suite in D major by J.S. Bach.
Scheherazade, certainly the high point of the evening, proved once again the astonishing ability of the Cleveland Orchestra to blend, even with students from Kent/Blossom Music interspersed to sit side by side with the professionals.
Harth-Bedoya guided the group like a mighty but nimble vehicle. Caressingly lovely solos by violin (William Preucil) and harp (Lisa Wellbaum), not to mention playing of breathtaking clarity in the trumpets, brought to life this tale of adventure and love on the high seas.
Sunday night's concert was the last for retiring violinist Alvaro deGranda, who is one of a small group of players remaining in the orchestra to have been appointed by legendary former music director George Szell.
DeGranda beamed as he walked up front for a final bow in front of the orchestra he joined in 1966 and served as assistant concertmaster for 31 years of his tenure.
Elaine Guregian can be reached at 330-996-3574 or eguregian@thebeaconjournal.com
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