Ravinia 2025 Issue 3

Breaking Barriers Festival For the 2025 edition of Breaking Barriers, Alsop and the CSO invite audiences to embark on a sonic journey across the globe. With a ticket add-on the first night, Breaking Barriers guests can enjoy food inspired by the program—created by guest ce- lebrity chefs Maneet Chauhan , Jacqueline Eng , Sarah Gruen- eberg , and Mika Leon —at pre-concert tasting stations, as well as attending presentations with the chefs in a casual setting. For the second program, Chauhan and Eng are joined by Chica- go-area chefs Grace Goudie , Beverly Kim , and Sarah Stegner in creating small bites to pair with the musical selections; tast- ings are included with the concert ticket. During both of those programs, the chefs will explain their culinary pairings in intro- ductions to the works. The first performance explores the intersection of global adventure, music, and culture. Rimsky-Korsakov’s Sheheraza- de opens the program, drawing inspiration from the Middle Eastern folk-tale collection One Thousand and One Nights . Re- ena Esmail’s RE|member , a work blending Western and Indian traditions, celebrates the beauty of returning home. An excerpt from Chicago-based composer Tim Corpus’s Great Lake Con- certo follows, featuring soloists Vadim Karpinos (CSO assistant principal timpani and percussion) and Ed Harrison (principal timpanist of Lyric Opera of Chicago) and evoking the spirit of an iconic landscape. Gershwin’s Cuban Overture , inspired by the composer’s two-week trip to Havana and love for the sounds of Afro-Cuban music, rounds out the program ( July 25 ). The second performance is conceived as a smorgasbord of bite-sized chamber works, with co-curators Marin Alsop and Food Network star Molly Yeh introducing French and pan-American pieces performed by CSO musicians and guests. The Greek god Pan was the inspiration for both Debussy’s Syr- inx and Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun . Showcasing prin- cipal flutist Stefán Ragnar Höskuldsson and other winds; the latter work also features Yeh herself on percussion, in a cham- ber-ensemble arrangement by Néstor Bayona. Copland’s bluesy Quiet City features cinematic English horn and trumpet solos; Piazzolla’s Libertango combines jazz with the Argentine dance; and Victoria Bond’s Bridges —a work written for assistant prin- cipal clarinetist John Bruce Yeh and his ensemble Birds and Phoenix —is a lively East-West fusion of folk and jazz. At the program’s center is Bernstein’s La Bonne Cuisine , a cycle of hu- morous songs set to recipes from a French cookbook, sung by Steans Institute Singers Program fellow Kaylyn Taylor Baldwin along with program director Kevin Murphy on piano ( July 26 ). Capping both her three weeks at Ravinia and the 2025 Break- ing Barriers Festival, Marin Alsop leads a program embracing the richness of life and the people one meets on the journey. She and the CSO capture the spirit of the Mediterranean with Mendelssohn’s “Italian” Symphony, and are joined by Principal Clarinetist StephenWilliamson for Copland’s Clarinet Concer- to—a work inspired by jazz and travels in Brazil. The program culminates with Elgar’s Enigma Variations , a series of musical portraits of the composer’s closest friends ( July 27 ). Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Ravinia The CSO begins its 89th summer season at the Ravinia Festi- val under Alsop’s baton, opening with American composer and Grammy nominee Carlos Simon’s Amen , inspired by the traditions of Black gospel music and capturing the energy and spiritual fervor of a Pentecostal church service. Pianist Bruce Liu —praised by Le Monde for his “magician’s fingers and soul of integrity”—makes his Ravinia and CSO debut on the program with Rachmaninoff ’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini , and the evening is rounded out by Stravinsky’s revolutionary 1913 ballet score The Rite of Spring ( July 11 ). The following night, Alsop and the CSO are joined by pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet for a performance of Gershwin ’s jazz- and blues-inflected Concerto in F. In praise of Thibaudet, the Chicago Tribune noted: “There’s no mistaking his understand- ing of [Gershwin’s] blues-based melancholy [and] Impression- ism.” Alsop also leads the CSO in Jessie Montgomery’s Strum , an American folk tradition-inspired work originally conceived for string quartet that the composer later expanded for string orchestra, and Tchaikovsky’s “Pathétique” Symphony concludes the program ( July 12 ). Molly Yeh, star of Food Network’s Girl Meets Farm and author of the award-winning memoir/cookbook Molly on the Range: Recipes and Stories from an Unlikely Life on a Farm , as well as Home Is Where the Eggs Are and Sweet Farm! , co-curates Breaking Barriers withMarin Alsop, tapping back into her musical roots as a Juilliard School-trained percussionist. The opening weekend of the CSO’s residency features pianists Bruce Liu (left; July 11) and Jean-Yves Thibaudet (right; July 12). RAVINIAMAGAZINE • JUNE 30 – JULY 20, 2025 8 CHANTELL&BRETTQUERNEMOEN(YEH)