Connies perform outside Oberlin
By Douglass Dowty
The Cleveland Museum of Art has been a welcome performing ground for Conservatory
musicians and composers for nearly a decade. Students relish the idea of escaping Oberlins
cornfield-bounded campus to perform in the real world.
Paul Cox, OC 82, CMAs Assistant Curator of Musical Arts, has actively sought musicians
from his alma mater to perform.
Students dont have time to play outside Oberlin, Cox said. The contemporary music
ensembles and chamber groups on campus are a valuable resource for the museums musical programming,
he said.
Sometimes Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert can seem like beating a dead horse, he said.
There is a wealth of experimental repertoire that is hard to find ensembles traveling around
the country doing. He added that Oberlin students excel in performing this new music.
The collaboration between Conservatory and museum took off when Cox was hired as assistant curator
in 1994. Cox stated that he quickly formed ties within the Conservatory, both from connections
he had as a former student and others formed later in the composition and conducting departments.
Explaining the process, Cox said: You just go out for a beer and start talking, and the next
thing you know, you have a relationship.
Its kind of like building a business, he said. The conductor of the Contemporary
Music Ensemble, Tim Weiss, has had a longstanding relationship with the museum, Cox said.
Weekly concerts held in the museums concert and exhibition halls have attracted a slew of
Oberlin alumni and students, performing everything from 15th century Josquin to avant-garde Ligeti.
This weekend, the Erato Quartet will play a concert at the museum featuring Haydns String
Quartet in D-flat major, Surprise and Dvoraks String Quartet in D-flat major,
American. The concert will begin at 2:30 p.m. in the museums Gartner Hall. The
musicians of the quartet are seniors Julia Sakharova, violin, Jacob Adams, viola, Elias Suarez,
cello, as well as junior Gared Crawford, violin.
The museums Musical Arts division was formed in 1920. As one of the few performing arts divisions
of any U.S. art museum, the CMA program is a Curatorital Department, putting it on
equal par with the visual arts displays in the nationally acclaimed museum.
Most museums use live performances just to get people through the door, Cox said.
The Musical Arts Division of the museum presents concerts in the Gartner Hall that seats 765, the
Inner Garden Court as well as in the various display galleries around the museum.
Ursula Oppens and Eliot Carter have performed concerts at the museum, and the Pacifica Quartet
will play in fall 2003.
Cox understands that the start times of the concerts on weekend nights make it hard for students
to attend. But he said many Oberlin students show up for the larger events, like the semiannual
Aki festival of new music.
When we do the new music festival, we always have a large Oberlin contingent, Cox
noted.
The next Aki festival, planned for this fall, will include a large volume of works
by John Cage. The eclectic event will span 16 days and over 60 composers are expected to participate.
The festival, whose name translates to Autumn in Japanese, will be held in galleries
throughout the museum.
The Contemporary Music Ensemble and smaller chamber groups also play in the museums concert
series. The museum presents dozens of concerts throughout the year. All events not part of the
Musart Mondial and Gala Concert series are free and open to the general public.
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