A summer of classics, old and new

The world is in a state of upheaval and uncertainty at the moment. But to borrow a line from that classic song in Porgy and Bess –the remarkable opera by the Gershwin brothers (and DuBose Heyward)–it’s “Summertime…and the livin’ is easy.”

Head to any or all of the events at the Ravinia Festival in Highland Park, or the free concerts in Chicago’s Millennium Park, or catch a play by Harold Pinter at Steppenwolf Theatre. Or simply turn on your air conditioner and listen to a new recording, “Contemporary American Composers,” performed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on its in-house label, CSO-Resound. The album features works by two contemporary Jewish composers–Philip Glass and Max Raimi, as well as by Jessie Montgomery, named the CSO’s Mead Composer-in-Residence in 2021. The offerings will, at least temporarily, distract you from the global chaos. Here’s a closer look at some of your many choices this summer:

Orchestra Hall
Let’s start with Raimi, a violist who has been with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra since 1984 (when he was hired by conductor Sir Georg Solti), and who also is a prolific composer and teacher. In addition, as anyone who happened to hear his pre-concert chat about Gustav Mahler’s “Symphony No. 9” this past June will attest, he also is an immensely engaging lecturer.

Born into a Jewish family in Detroit, Rami earned degrees at the University of Michigan and Juilliard. His 2018 work, Three Lisel Mueller Settings (with guest artist mezzo-soprano Elizabeth DeShong), is now out on the CSO-Resound recording.

The powerful poems by the German-born Mueller, whose family fled the Nazi regime in 1939, (and who died at the age of 96 at her home in Lake Forest), are intense. And for each of the three poems Raimi chose a particular musician from the orchestra to be in dialogue with the singer.

For “The Story,” the tale of a broken marriage, it was principal clarinet Stephen Williamson. For “The Unanswered Question,” the tragic tale of an aboriginal Tasmanian woman displayed in a cage in 19th century London, he chose principal bassoon Keith Buncke. And for “Hope,” about “the singular gift we cannot destroy in ourselves,” it was double-bass player Alex Hanna.

Also on this CSO-Resound disc is Glass’ “Symphony No. 11,” a fascinating work that he composed in 2017 for his 80th birthday. It was brilliantly performed by the CSO in 2022. The composer, whose family’s roots are of Latvian and Russian-Jewish heritage, studied math and philosophy at the University of Chicago (starting at the age of 15), went on to Juilliard, and then to Paris (where he studied with the fabled Nadia Boulanger), before finally settling in New York in the late 1960s, where he drove a cab, and ran a moving company.

Glass was clearly thrilled by the CSO’s performance last year of his “Symphony No. 11,” which marked the first time world renowned conductor Riccardo Muti had ever conducted his work. And when Muti returns to Orchestra Hall this fall (bearing his new title of Music Director Emeritus), he will conduct the world premiere of Glass’ “The Triumph of the Octagon,” a CSO Commission.

The concerts are scheduled for Sept. 28, 29, and 30. For tickets, visit cso.org .

Ravinia Festival

*Aug. 10: Catch a concert that includes “Heirloom,” a concerto for piano and chamber orchestra by composer and singer-songwriter Gabriel Kahane. His father, Jeffrey Kahane, will play the piano. The CSO will also perform Prokofiev’s “Symphony No. 5.” at the concert.

Aug. 17: Conductor Joshua Weilerstein will lead the CSO in a program featuring Shostakovich’s “Symphony No. 5,” and Edward Elgar’s “Cello Concerto,” featuring his sister, cellist Alisa Weilerstein.

Aug. 27: Pianist Misha Dichter was born in Shanghai to Polish-Jewish parents who had fled there during World War II. He eventually moved to Los Angeles where he began piano lessons at age five. Dichter will perform works by Debussy, Liszt, Brahms, and Beethoven.

For tickets to all three concerts, visit Ravinia.org .

Grant Park Orchestra at Pritzker Pavilion

Meanwhile, on Aug. 16, at Pritzker Pavilion, conductor Carlos Kalmar will lead the Grant Park Orchestra in a program of works by Mendelssohn, Liszt, and, most intriguingly, a rarely heard piece titled “From Foreign Lands,” by Moritz Moszkowski (1854-1925), a German-born composer/pianist of Polish-Jewish descent. In 2013, choreographer Alexei Ratmansky used this score for a work danced by the San Francisco Ballet.

Steppenwolf Theatre
Last, but not least is the Steppenwolf Theatre production of Harold Pinter’s play No Man’s Land . The show chronicles the strange encounter among two aging men and two younger ones that unspools in a posh English living room. The play runs through Aug. 20.

For tickets, visit steppenwolf.org .

Hedy Weiss, a longtime Chicago arts critic, was the Theater and Dance Critic for the  Chicago Sun-Times  from 1984 to 2018, and currently writes for  WTTW-TV’s website and contributes to the  Chicago Tonight  program.