Jay Harvey Upstage

Mihaela Martin displayed her sustained mastery.   After a late-night arrival as the monumental winter storm hit the city , Mihaela Martin sounded fully up to the task of recalling another monument — her gold-medal victory in the initial International Violin Competition of Indianapolis — with a fresh exhibition of her winning ways in recital Tuesday at the Indiana History Center . I heard it on livestream, an access taken advantage of by many IVCI patrons, according to the organization's executive director, Glen Kwok. Her performance, ably supported by Chih-Yi Chen at the piano, glowed with the stylistic romanticism of the competition's founder, Josef Gingold.                                                                                      The short and the subs...

 With the musical warmth making the Hilbert Circle Theatre cozy and welcoming, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra patrons at Friday's first concert of the weekend could shrug off the frigid weather they had just escaped from temporarily. The contrast stirred memories of one of Robert Frost's most famous poems, "Fire and Ice." Courtney Lewis worked this week with the ISO.  The New England poet's lines pose the eventual triumph of both elements on equal terms, with fire being linked to desire, ice to hate. Without stretching that metaphorical breadth to the news from the Twin Cities (it's hard to resist entirely), there's a plausible application to the two works on the program, their significance, and how they were played under the skillful baton of guest conductor Courtney Lewis . Hate as a force lies behind the difficult attractiveness of Tchaikovsky's "Manfred" Symphony, op. 58. Inspired by a Lord Byron poem well-known in the early 19th century...

Violinist Marleen Wester and violist Marie-Louise de Jong predominate in this group portrait.  John Failey's impeccable stewardship of the Ensemble Music Society includes his cultivated acquaintance with chamber-music groups online. It culminates repeatedly whenever he is able to schedule a visit here by an ensemble, whether a return engagement or a local debut. Wednesday night was a sterling example of the latter sort of husbandry. The Dudok Quartet Amsterdam, with its alluring representation online, became eligible for inclusion on the EMS schedule when it acquired North American representation by Maestro Arts .  So a large audience gathered at the Indiana History Center to become acquainted with the far-sighted Dutch string quartet in a program of Schubert, Shostakovich, and Bushra El-Turk, a contemporary British composer of Lebanese extraction. "The music we play is never old or new, but always relevant and present," the group proclaims on its website. El-Turk's...

Friday night was the first opportunity I've taken to see and hear Rob Dixon again revisit John Coltrane's epic suite, "A Love Supreme." Of all the recorded landmarks in the saxophonist's prematurely ended career, "A Love Supreme" is the most ambitious and the top seller. Like many saxophonists since Coltrane's time (1926-1967), Dixon has built his apprehension of the music on the master's example of stamina and technical knowledge. The suite's triumph always carries the surprising element of being a popular long-form composition in a musical genre familiar for more compact pieces. But Coltrane was famous for going long in his solos, extending a given form spontaneously. When he was a member of Miles Davis' group in the 1950s, he gently complained that he didn't know how to end his solos. The trumpeter-bandleader said something like, "You take the horn out of your mouth, John." Part of what makes the four-movement suite signi...

The highlighted style of ensemble performance typical of Beef & Boards Dinner Theatre works to manic Trotter has assembled the snowbound residents for interrogation.   perfection in its season-opening production of "The Mousetrap," the famous Agatha Christie whodunit known for its continuous London run since 1952. Eddie Curry's direction of the eight-member cast allows for thrilling individualism in portrayals of characters drawn to a rural guest house as British life settles down after the Second World War. Seen Saturday night at the durable Northwestside institution, "The Mousetrap" maintains a nimble pace among the refurbished rooms of Monkswell Manor, a vacation haven under the recent management of newlyweds Giles and Mollie Ralston. Newlyweds, in business together, have a wee spat.  The couple, played with adorable eagerness to please by Jae Woo and Malia Munley, find their inexperience as hoteliers challenged to the utmost, first by a severe snowstor...

Kevin John Edusei first appeared as the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra 's podium guest twice in 2022. It was an unusual kind of double debut for an invited conductor, fueling speculation that he might be on the short list for the ISO's next music director. That turned out to be Jun Märkl, a fellow German who had gone over well for many years as guest conductor here and official adviser near the end of a long interim period. Kevin John Edusei has triumphed in recent ISO engagements.  Edusei is back to launch the resumption of the 2025-26 Classical Series this weekend. The program has just two works, representing two of the most popular Russian composers (the other being Tchaikovsky, whom we'll hear from in two weeks): Sergei Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp minor  and Dmitri Shostakovich's Symphony No. 10 in E minor. On Friday night, Hilbert Circle Theatre welcomed a significant youth contingent to the audience: about 150 members of the concert band a...