**** Camerata Chicago opened its 23rd season with the theme of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” The first of three performances took place on Friday, October 16th inside the Buchanan Chapel at Fourth Presbyterian Church, off the Magnificent Mile in Chicago. A supremely powerful chamber orchestra of about forty musicians, led by Maestro Drostan Hall, grounded the concert. The program was largely based on fairy tales and traditional English folk tunes in a serendipitously entertaining musical presentation where the composers riffed on myth, sprites, and magic.
This world premiere composition was bookended by Felix Mendelssohn’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Overture and Incidental Music to Shakespeare’s Play.” The entire second half, while dedicated to a performance of the music, was also interspersed with Drostan Hall’s dramatic readings of Shakespeare’s original text. By means of introduction, Hall told us at first that Mendelssohn originally wrote this work when he was only seventeen years old, that is, in 1826 as a concert overture after reading a German translation of the Shakespeare. But sixteen years later, at the request of King Frederick William IV of Prussia, he created incidental music (Op. 61) to accompany a staged production. This suite expanded the original overture with additional pieces to draw on other scenes from Shakespeare’s text. Hall also explained the details of the story: that the setting was Athens, Greece, where lovers found themselves in a magical forest… and the story went on from there.
Today’s presentation of the Mendelssohn suite was enlightening. Every so often, Maestro Hall would turn away from the orchestra and towards the audience to give us the scoop on the leitmotifs of the various characters who were part and parcel of the fairytale. Then he would recite numerous passages from the text so that the audience could follow the story and understand where Mendelssohn was going with his musical interpretation. It was good to hear what the story was about before everything else. It was also good to hear Hall’s dramatic narration in situ in Elizabethan English. That being said, the Overture was majestic and then breezy. The Scherzo introduced us to Puck’s theme, and the narration described Puck and the fairy queen. Hall showed us examples of the music and how they tied in with the fairytale, creating a coherent plotline and theme. Yet it would have been easier to follow the whole thing had several other individuals read the dialogue in addition to Hall. The main issue I had, however, was that his remarks on the story combined with his reading of the text became somewhat too repetitive over time.
Sandwiched between two visions of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” was Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante for Four Winds in E-flat major, K. 297b, written in 1778. Today’s concert featured soloists Grace Hong (oboe), Elizandro Garcia Montoya (clarinet), Lee Shirer (horn), and Vincent Karamanov (bassoon). I loved listening to all these highly skilled instrumentalists! The tuneful Allegro movement is followed by an almost dreamy Adagio movement, where the melody moves from one instrument to the next. We see how Mozart is more interested in harmony and blend than in showcasing any one instrument, that is, until the Andantino movement, which features wonderful solos: from the bassoon to the clarinet to the oboe. It is interesting to note how the entire composition is simpler than Mozart’s later works, and it is in the third movement where the instruments begin to break out and presage his future accomplishments.
Maestro Hall was remarkable to watch. It was evident how well he feels the music and how brilliantly he conducts this magnificent chamber orchestra. Inasmuch as I enjoyed the performance, the Buchanan Chapel seemed too small for such a powerful mid-sized orchestra. Plus, the architectural layout of the room did not offer the best acoustics for an ensemble of this size and composition. In part, this was because of the slanted wall paneling behind the stage/altar, which made certain instruments predominate over others. Basically, the sound as a whole was somewhat different than what we might hear at a dedicated concert hall.
Yet the highlight of the evening could not have been any better as it built up to Mendelssohn’s Dan of the Clowns and then to his famous Wedding March at the very end. This spirited movement—live and in person—capped an amazing concert!
The Camerata Chicago Chamber Concert took place at Fourth Presbyterian Church, 126 E. Chestnut Street (at Michigan Avenue), in Chicago, on Friday, October 16, 2026.
Subsequent performances of the same repertoire took place at 3:00 p.m. on Saturday, October 17 at Armerding Concert Hall, 520 E. Kenilworth Avenue, in Wheaton, and at 3:00 p.m. on Sunday, October 18 at Union Church of Hinsdale, 137 S. Garfield Street, in Hinsdale.
Tickets were $50 – adults
$40 – seniors 65 and over
$10 – students
$2 – children 14 and under.
VIP tickets were $75.
Using online code CCPR provided a 15% discount.
Group discounts were available.
All venues were general seating with special front sections for VIP ticket holders with the exception of Armerding Concert Hall at Wheaton College, which had assigned seating.
For further information about these concerts and to learn about future offerings, visit: https://www.cameratachicago.org/ or phone 312-799-0916 or email: andiamo@cameratachicago.org
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