Critic’s Choice

Wed Jun 17, 2015 at 2:24 pm

By Lawrence A. Johnson

Carlos Kalmar opens the Grant Park Music Festival tonight with works of Norman, Rachmaninoff and Beethoven. File photo: Norman Timonera
Carlos Kalmar opens the Grant Park Music Festival tonight with works of Norman, Rachmaninoff and Beethoven. File photo: Norman Timonera

In just ten weeks every summer, the Grant Park Music Festival manages to serve up smart, bracing programming with a healthy complement of contemporary and American music that puts Chicago’s largest musical institutions to shame.

Carlos Kalmar and the Grant Park Orchestra will open the 81st season of the lakefront festival 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Pritzker Pavilion with a typically eclectic lineup, featuring Andrew Norman’s Drip, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 and Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with soloist Yevgeny Sudbin making his festival debut.

This weekend’s Grant Park program will bring the world premiere of Kenji Bunch’s Symphony No. 3 “Dream Songs,” a festival commission. The rest of the program offers Mozart’s Overture to The Magic Flute and Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 6. Concert times are 6:30 p.m. Friday and 7:30 p.m. Saturday. gpmf.org

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Riccardo Muti and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra present their final subscription concerts of the season this weekend. The program will offer the world premiere of Mason Bates’ Anthology of Fantastic Zoology and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5. Concerts are 8 p.m. Thursday, 1:30 p.m. Friday and 8 p.m. Saturday at Symphony Center. cso.org; 312-294-3000.

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2 Responses to “Critic’s Choice”

  1. Posted Jun 17, 2015 at 5:43 pm by Peter Borich

    Lawrence:

    I love ya buddy, but the Grant Park Symphony Orchestra is free And not worried about the bottom line like the CSO and other arts organizations. Curiously enough, after applauding the adventure programming of the GPO, you preview a CSO concert with a world premiere by Mason Bates.

    Your criticism is fair, but much too harsh….

  2. Posted Jun 19, 2015 at 1:43 pm by Tod Verklärung

    Not harsh enough, I’d say. Compare the CSO’s programs to those of the NY Philharmonic under Gilbert or San Francisco under Michael Tilson Thomas. A couple of weeks ago I heard the latter in an all John Cage program. Instead, we get, as you say, an occasional piece by Mason Bates, who writes contemporary orchestral music for those whose ears would be disturbed by Hindemith.

    Even with that, empty seats can be found at Muti concerts and many more for most of the other conductors. If the plan is to feed us “Bolero” in order to fill the house, it doesn’t seem to be working very well.

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