The Cleveland Orchestra presents second ’ÄúMusically Speaking’Äù concert of the season, focusing on Tchaikovsky’Äôs Symphony No. 4, at Severance Hall on Jan

Narrator Gerard McBurney

Beyond the Score^® program narrated by Gerard McBurney illuminates music through multimedia approach

Dutch conductor Jaap van Zweden makes his Cleveland Orchestra debut with week of subscription concerts

CLEVELAND, December 10, 2009 ’Äì The Cleveland Orchestra will perform the second concert in its ’ÄúMusically Speaking’Äù series of Sunday afternoon concerts on January 10, at 3:00 p.m. Jaap van Zweden (pronounced YAP van ZVAY-den), music director of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, will conduct the program, which focuses on a single work: Tchaikovsky’Äôs Symphony No. 4 in F minor, Opus 36. Mr. van Zweden makes his Cleveland Orchestra debut with concerts on January 7, 8, 9, and 10.

This Musically Speaking concert will be a Beyond the Score^¬Æ event, a series launched by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra during the 2005-06 season. As written and created by the CSO’Äôs creative director, Gerard McBurney, Beyond the Score^¬Æ shares the illuminating stories found ’Äúinside’Äù the music, through narrative and video, calling on the orchestra to provide live musical examples that illustrate the structure of each composition. Mr. McBurney has commented, ’ÄúAbove all else, I want to give listeners a sense that this music is there for them and that there are thousands of different ways to listen to it.’Äù

The first half of the January 10 program will feature a multi-media presentation of Tchaikovsky’Äôs Symphony No. 4, allowing the audience to learn the work’Äôs rich context in history, how it fits into the composer’Äôs output of works, and the details of the composer’Äôs life that influenced its creation. When Gerard McBurney presented this program in Chicago one year ago, The Chicago Tribune wrote that his exploration ’Äútook apart Tchaikovsky’Äôs music movement by movement, theme by theme, examining it in light of the composer’Äôs melancholy personality, his repressed homosexuality, his brief and disastrous marriage and, above all, his deeply rooted belief in fate’Äôs implacable hold over human existence.’Äù

Gerard McBurney will appear as narrator at this concert, in his Cleveland Orchestra debut. Actor Terence Cranendonk will read from Tchaikovsky’Äôs letters. Mr. Cranendonk made his Cleveland Orchestra debut in the first Musically Speaking concert of the season, on November 29. He has appeared with the Cleveland Play House, Cleveland Public Theatre, and New World Performance Lab. After intermission, the Orchestra will perform the Symphony No. 4 in its entirety, straight through. Listeners are invited to stay after the concert for a question-and-answer session with guest artists and musicians. Click here to watch or download Beyond the Score^¬Æ on Tchaikovsky’Äôs Symphony No. 4.

The third and final ’ÄúMusically Speaking’Äù concert of the 2009-10 season will take place on Sunday, March 7, 2010 (’ÄúWolfgang ’Äì Mozart the Man’Äù).

FREE PRELUDE CONCERT

Another aspect of the ’ÄúMusically Speaking’Äù series, which The Cleveland Orchestra inaugurated during its 2005-06 season, is the Prelude Concert of chamber music performances given by members of the Orchestra in Reinberger Chamber Hall beginning at 2:00 p.m. These extremely popular programs highlight interesting connections with the music on the program for that afternoon’Äôs Orchestra concert. The January 10 Prelude Concert features Chul-In Park, Sae Shiragami, Patrick Connolly, Joanna Patterson, Paul Kushious, and David Alan Harrell performing the first movement (Allegro con spirito) from Tchaikovsky’Äôs Souvenir de Florence, Opus 70 (for two violins, two violas, and two cellos), and Peter Otto and Eli Matthews performing Eugˆ®ne Ysaˆøe’Äôs Sonata for Two Violins, Opus posthumous.