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Two Music World Stars to Perform with the MH Chamber Music Festival, Tuesday July 19
Violinist Irina Muresanu
Two stars from the international music scene will perform with the Meeting House Chamber Music Festival. Romanian-born violinist Irina Muresanu, a Festival favorite, is known for her passionate, fearless playing. Her dazzling performances have been cited frequently by The Boston Globe as among the best of classical music performances. Cellist Sergey Antonov was the Gold Medal Winner (XIII) in the International Tchaikovsky Competition. Music critic Stephen Brookes of The Washington Post referred to Antonov as one of Russia’s "most spectacular soloists.” Both of these musicians have people crowding into recital halls around the world and Cape Cod residents and visitors will have their opportunity to hear them, along with the Festival’s artistic director and pianist Donald Enos, at Holy Spirit Episcopal in Orleans. Single tickets ($25) may be purchased at the door. Complete ticketing and program information at http://www.meetinghousemusic.org or by calling 508.896.3344.
The concert program includes Brahms’ Piano Trio in B major, premiered by a youthful Brahms in 1855 and imbued by the composer with even greater beauty and dynamism in a revision three decades later. A second piece is by the Norwegian composer, conductor, and violinist Johan Halvorsen—a widely acknowledged work of genius that has an important place in the chamber music repertoire: Passacaglia for Violin and Cello, based on the final movement of Handel’s Harpsichord Suite in G Minor.
This 48th summer season of the Meeting House Chamber Music Festival might be called the season of standing ovations, as concert after concert has brought audiences to their feet. This penultimate concert promises to do the same. The final concert of the season will be given on Monday, July 25 at 7:30 PM, also at Holy Spirit Episcopal. It will feature Donald Enos and the highly lauded soloist, chamber musician, and teacher Katie Lansdale.A complete program listing for the 2022 season is available at http://www.meetinghousemusic.org.
The Meeting House Chamber Festival is grateful for the support of the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the Cape Cod 5 Foundation, and the Mary-Louise and Ruth N. Eddy Foundation.
Hot New Musical "Lily the Tiger" to Rock Cotuit on Tuesday, June 28!
On Tuesday, June 28, at 7:30 pm, a “campfire version” of Dana McCoy’s rock musical Lily the Tiger will be presented in the outdoor theater of Cotuit Center for the Arts, Cotuit, MA. The show features McCoy’s original songs and a story filled with poignancy and humor as “Lily” navigates a parade of catastrophes. McCoy will bring to the performance a plethora of New York talent including notable rock musicians Albert Bouchard of Blue Oyster Cult, Alec Morton of Raging Slab and Monster Magnet, and Mike Fornatale of The Losers’ Lounge NYC, Dot Wiggin Band and The Left Banke. The audience will be treated to a peek at the new musical’s stories and songs in advance of McCoy’s UK tour and the show’s New York launch later this year. Tickets are $35; $30 for Cotuit Center members; $33 for seniors and veterans. Ticketing and additional information: https://artsonthecape.org/explore/lily-the-tiger.
Lily the Tiger took its first steps onto the stage at New York’s historic Theatre 80 on May 31, 2022 in a reading for invited guests, including producers and potential investors. Hit Broadway performer, writer, and director, Gretchen Cryer of I’m Getting My Act Together and Taking It On The Road fame is helping to shape and direct Lily The Tiger, which also features marvelous dramatic coaching from Marcia Haufrecht of the Actor’s Studio. The show’s developmental producer is Janet Murphy Robertson of ArtistsAndMusicians.org. In early July, McCoy will set off on a UK tour performing selected songs from the evolving show.
A part-time local resident, Dana McCoy is delighted to share her latest creative work here on the Cape as she continues its development. Increasingly well known to Cape audiences, McCoy was actor, story-writer, composer, and co-director for A Woman’s Heart, based on the poetry of Judith Partelow, in 2019. In addition to her original score, the play featured songs composed and sung by McCoy. The Cape Cod Times’ features editor Gwenn Friss said of McCoy’s portrayal of a woman raising her children as she deals with a depressed and abusive husband, “Watching how she pulls off a lightness of being for her child is like seeing a Disney princess cast in a Quentin Tarantino movie.”
Dana McCoy’s professional accomplishments fill the gamut of performing arts—from dance and instrumental music to voice and theater performance, on stage, on film, and in video. McCoy and her music compositions have been heard in venues throughout the U.S., including CBGB’s, The Ritz, and Lincoln Center, as well as in Europe and the U.K. Her hit songs have been performed by such noted groups as Inner City, Degrees of Motion, and Left Field. She produced and performed “88 Butterfly, Taking Shape, a solo CD designated by Billboard editors as one of the best albums of the year. McCoy’s work on stage also includes her original rock musical "Prom Queens" co-written with Jennifer Schanke and Christina Cass. She workshopped the musical at Arnold Engelman’s Westbeth Entertainment in New York, a performance venue known for presenting bold new works from the likes of Stephen Colbert, Patti LuPone, and Sandra Bernhardt—and at Don Hill’s, a SoHo club at the heart of the New York rock scene. The musical was showcased off-Broadway and at Crown & Anchor’s Paramount Room in Provincetown, MA. McCoy played the lead role of Daisey and provided lead and background vocals and dance.
She also originated the starring role of Ingrid in Richard Caliban’s MoM: A Rock Concert Musical,winner of Outstanding Musical at the New York International Fringe Festival in 2008. The musical was selected as part of the Fringe Benefits Anniversary Series and was named one of the Fringe’s best 15 musical in 15 years. Reviewers at numerous publications, including The New York Times and Broadway World cited McCoy’s outstanding work. New York Times theater critic Anita Gates wrote, “(McCoy’s character) Ingrid is the interesting one. She begins as a trophy-wife type with a French twist, goes through an entertaining Patsy Stone of “Ab Fab” phase and ends up as Janis Joplin.” TalkinBroadway.com saluted McCoy for her charisma in the role, as well as her work on keyboards, bass, and percussion.
Dana McCoy has performed regularly at Joe McGinty’s Loser's Lounge, sharing the stage with former Saturday Night Live cast member Fred Armisen, cabaret artist Justin Vivian Bond, and other notables. She later founded and hosted Life Café NYC’s Naked Music Series which provided more than 300 gigs for well- and lesser-known musicians. She is an active performer and producer with New York’s Ukelele Cabaret.
McCoy worked with Gretchen Cryer, Evelyn Page, and Lesley Gore as founder, producer, and performer in Pillow Fight Theatre Festival: Hot Chicks of Substance" at 45 Bleecker in 2007. She wrote, performed, and produced her rock musical Cube Rat which tells the story of a superstar stuck in a cubicle. The musical was workshopped at New York’s SIR studios, the Green Room, and the Pillowfight Theater Festival and was presented at the Edinburgh Film Festival in 2011. Colin Quinn of Saturday Night Live called the musical “amazing.” Reviewers at the Fringe said of the work that “it fascinates, thrills and the songs are rhythmic, original and catchy. Beautiful sounds and ideas from a beautiful person.” The musical was included in the York Shakespeare Company's 10th Season.
Cellist Amit Peled and His New Vernon Virtuosi Open Chamber Music Festival
Cellist Amit Peled.
Photo credit: Melissa Golden
On Monday, June 10, Donald Enos launched the 46th season of the Meeting House Chamber Music Festival in collaboration with one of the most brilliant and colorful figures on the global music stage today, Grammy-nominated conductor, cellist, and pedagogue Amit Peled. The season premiere featured works by Tchaikovsky, Stutchewsky, and Mozart.
Amit Peled is no stranger to fans of the Meeting House Chamber Music Festival. Enos spotted the young Israeli-American cellist more than a dozen years ago, not long after Peled moved to the US to assume his teaching position at Johns Hopkins University’s Peabody Conservatory. Peled brings to the June 10 event his profound musicianship and larger-than-life personality and, adding to the usual high level of excitement, Peled will also conduct the Mount Vernon Virtuosi, the orchestra he founded to be an important platform for young performers.
On Monday, July 1, another virtuoso—violinist Irina Muresanu, whom critics have acclaimed as “dazzling” and “spellbinding” will headline a program that also exemplifies the cultural diversity of the festival.
Violinist Irina Muresanu
The offerings will range from folk airs from Muresanu’s native Romania to the lush artistry of French composer Gabriel Fauré.
And on each Monday through July 29, the festival will continue its presentation of traditional and contemporary repertoire from around the world performed by top-flight international and regional talent. Artists this year will include Elisabeth Remy Johnson, Clark Matthews, Heather Goodchild Wade, Laura Manko Sahin, Bo Ericsson, Joyce Hammann, Matthias Naegele, Katie Lansdale, and Megan Koch. A complete season listing is available here or visit Meeting House Chamber Music Festival
Donald Enos, the festival’s founder, artistic director, and pianist, welcomes all to experience the great music he has in store for this summer. In his words, the festival offers “live music that everyone can love—music that emerges naturally almost like a conversation among musicians, expressing raw, authentic human emotion. Join us and see why chamber music is known as the ‘music of friends!’”
The Meeting House Chamber Festival is grateful for the support of the Massachusetts Cultural Council, the Cape Cod 5 Foundation, and the Mary-Louise and Ruth N. Eddy Foundation.
Concerts are held at 7:30 pm on Monday evenings at Church of the Holy Spirit in Orleans. The Monday, July 15, program will also be presented at 7 pm on Sunday, July 14, at 1717 Meetinghouse in West Barnstable.
Internationally Acclaimed Violinist Performs with the Meeting House Chamber Music Festival, Monday, July 3
On Monday, July 3, at Church of the Holy Spirit, the Meeting House Chamber Music Festival presented “Musical Portraits,” an exciting evening of music to delight not only classical music lovers. A good deal of the sparkle was provided by the internationally acclaimed violinist Irina Muresanu, known for her passionate, elegant, and moving performances. Muresanu performed with Donald Enos—the festival's founder and artistic director, and the superb pianist who holds the Wesley Delacy Chair with the Cape Symphony.
A centerpiece of the concert was Beethoven's “Kreutzer” Sonata, Op.47, a work so captivating and monumental that great writers such as Tolstoy were inspired by it. The program also included Ravel's Tzigane rhapsody and J.S. Bach’s Baroque masterpiece, The Chaconne for solo violin, among other works.
Tickets are available at the door or in advance. Single ticket: $25 (under 18 free). 7-Concert Series: $110. Ticket contact: Donald Enos, Director, at 508.896.3344 or [email protected].
Church of the Holy Spirit is located at 204 Monument Road, Orleans, MA 02653.
Previews and Reviews
Keith Powers previews the season in the Cape Cod Times
Keith Powers reviews premiere concert in the Cape Cod Times
Jacob Sears Memorial Library Welcomes Spring with a Cabaret Performance by Tradewinds
On Sunday, April 27, the Jacob Sears Memorial Library presented a joyous evening of uplifting music and delicious fare after the endless winter of 2013-14. The event featured Tradewinds, a top-notch a cappella group that delighted the audience with selections from the Great American Songbook, plus traditional, jazz, and pop tunes, mostly in the “barbershop" style. Tradewinds began its career as the School Committee barbershop quartet in The Music Man on the Cape in the late 1990s.
Performing were: Bill Mock, lead; Michel Perrault, bass; Peter Clark, tenor; and Chuck Woringer, baritone.