By Jonathan Abarbanel
Chicago loves music: the summer season hardly ends before the 2006-2007 season explodes.
The Ravinia Festival closes its classical music season with two wonderful events: a Labor Day Spectacular of classical 'pops' such as Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture, with Erich Kunzel leading the orchestra, and then the stellar pianist Garrick Ohlsson performs in two programs of Beethoven's sonatas. On Sept. 5 Ohlsson traverses sonatas Nos. 6, 8, 15, 22 and 27. The next evening he performs Nos. 30, 31 and 32.
The Ravinia Festival continues for another 10 days after with a series of pop music attractions, among them Lyle Lovett and His Large Band ( Sept. 8 ) and Audra McDonald ( Sept. 10 ) . The week also includes pianist/actor Hershey Felder performing his one-man musical theater work, Monsieur Chopin ( Sept. 7 ) and Chicago's Luna Negra Dance Theater in a dance- and vocal-filled evening with Brazilian jazz and Rachmaninoff ( Sept. 12 ) . Phone 847-266-5100.
Mere days later, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra ( CSO ) and Lyric Opera of Chicago crank up the new musical year in high style.
The CSO jumps from the starting gate with two free concerts in Millennium Park, both part of Chicago's year-long Silk Road Chicago cultural focus. The Sept. 13 concert offers more Tchaikovsky plus works by Berlioz and Asian composers He and Chen. The Sept. 14 concert kicks off the World Music Festival 2006 with the CSO, Radio Maqam Ensemble and pipa soloist Yang Wei. What? You don't know what a pipa is? Both free concerts are at 6:30 p.m. Forming a segue between the summer and fall seasons, both concerts will be repeated at Symphony Center, respectively, on Sept. 15 ( tickets $30-$109 ) and Sept. 16 ( free, as part of Macy's--nee Marshall Field's--annual Day of Music ) .
For Lyric Opera, the season opener is a revival of Puccini's orientalist fantasy, Turandot, in a production famously designed in the early 1990s by David Hockney. His lavish costumes are too gorgeous for words and his sets are dazzling, even though they create traffic nightmares for the chorus. Yours truly was at the first performance of this production way back when—as a guest of Hockney's guest, the late cult film director Paul Bartel—and it was quite an occasion, let me tell you. One hopes, however, Lyric has improved on the dismal lighting design of this Turandot, the one area in which Hockney failed. Lyric's opening gala is Sept. 16, with additional performances Sept. 20, 24, 27 and 30 as well as Oct. 3. Gluck's Iphigenie en Tauride enters the repertory Sept. 30 with Susan Graham in the title role. FYI: single tickets for Lyric's opening night gala are available at $150-$400, including a lavish reception in the opera house lobbies before the performance and during each intermission. Dress is formal. Call 312-332-2244, ext. 5600 for details or to purchase. The gala begins at 6:30 p.m., and the Lyric Opera always begins on the dot.
A third major musical organization swings into the season in September, as the chorus, orchestra and soloists of Music of the Baroque offer Handel's Judas Maccabeus, Sept. 17 and 18. The Sept. 17 concert is at the First United Methodist Church, Evanston, and the Sept. 18 concert is at Chicago's Harris Theater. The redoubtable Jane Glover remains musical director of Music of the Baroque for the 2006-2007 season, although the Handel performances will be under the baton of Nicholas Kraemer. Ticket info: 312-551-1414.
The McAninch Arts Center ( MAC ) at the College of DuPage in Glen Ellyn never goes on hiatus whether it is summer, fall, winter or spring, so it's not really kosher to define this performing-arts powerhouse as ending one season and beginning another. For the record, the MAC's first programs in September are concerts by the New Philharmonic Orchestra under Kirk Muspratt on Sept. 15 and 16 at 8 p.m. Works by Wagner ( his mighty prelude to Act III of Lohengrin ) , Brahms and Prokofiev are offered, with violin soloist Judith Ingolffson and narrator Henry Fogel ( whose voice you will certainly know if you ever listened to a CSO radio fundraiser on WFMT ) . 630-942-4000; $23-$33.
Finally, we don't know what this has to do with classical music, but it sounds like a whole mess o' fun, and too good not to mention. Millennium Park hosts Great Performers of Illinois, Sept. 6-9, a free program of the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, the Illinois Arts Council and the Illinois Department of Economic Opportunity, Bureau of Tourism. They will present more than 200 of the finest performers from across Illinois in some 75 performances that feature folk music; traditional and alternative country music; indie rock and blues; square dancing; drumming circles; a noted Abraham Lincoln impersonator and a yodeling; trick-roping cowboy. Watch out! He may rope you! Yeeha! You can enjoy regional foods, too, such as Illinois corn sausage chowder, Abe Lincoln pound cake, brownies, Illinois wines and the state snack, popcorn. We didn't know Illinois had an official state snack, either. Info: 877-CHICAGO or www.877chicago.com .