The Society for Seventeenth-Century Music

The Society for Seventeenth-Century Music

2023 Annual Meeting, April 20-23

The Society for Seventeenth-Century Music will hold its Thirty-First Annual Conference from Thursday through Sunday, 20-23 April 2023, at the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH, hosted by the Music Department of Case Western Reserve University in partnership with the Baker Nord Center for the Humanities

Conference Menu

 

Welcome to University Circle, Cleveland, OH

The city of Cleveland was founded in 1796 by General Moses Cleaveland. Some hundred years later and four miles to the east, University Circle began to emerge in its current form as a cultural center and counterbalance to downtown. In 1883 the Western Reserve University (so-called because much of the land around the city was designated as the Western Reserve of the State of Connecticut) moved its campus from Hudson to this site, known at that time as Doan’s Corners. (The Doan Brook still runs through the lagoon in front of the art museum.) Joined a few years later by the Case School of Applied Science and the Western Reserve School of Design for Women (later the Cleveland Institute of Art), the area soon began to be known as University Circle, after the circular tram stop and road intersection on Euclid Avenue.

By the early 20th century, University Circle was acting as a magnet for cultural institutions, many of them endowed and supported by a small network of philanthropists, in particular members of the Wade, Severance, Mather, Stone, and Harkness families. The Cleveland Museum of Art opened the doors of its marble neo-classical building in Wade Park in 1916 with its mission to offer free admission “for the benefit of all people, forever,” a mission it still follows. In the following years the Natural History Museum, the Botanical Gardens, the Western Reserve Historical Society, and many others made this district their home. The Cleveland Institute of Music (CIM) was founded in 1920 by Ernest Bloch, and eleven years later the Cleveland Orchestra moved from its home in downtown Cleveland to a new hall, Severance Hall, supported by a large donation from John Long Severance in honor of his late wife Elizabeth. Ever since that time, CIM and The Cleveland Orchestra have enjoyed a close relationship, with a substantial proportion of CIM faculty being members of the orchestra.

With the arrival of University Hospitals, also in 1931, and the Cleveland Clinic nearby in 1921, University Circle continued to expand. In 1967 the Case School of Applied Science and the Western Reserve University joined forces as (the somewhat unwieldy) Case Western Reserve University (CWRU). In the subsequent years fewer institutions have relocated here, but a striking new building for the Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art was opened on Euclid Avenue in 2012, a stunning extension added to the Cleveland Museum of Art in 2013, and Severance Hall extensively renovated in 2000. Most recently, the Cleveland Institute of Art left its longtime home right next to the art museum (a site that is now the park you walk through to approach the art museum) and relocated to a futuristic building just along Euclid Avenue.

The Music Department at Case Western Reserve University and the Cleveland Institute of Music operate in a so-called Joint Music Program, now in its 54th year. CWRU BA students take their applied lessons at CIM, while CIM BM students take their general education classes at CWRU. CWRU students perform in the historic Harkness Chapel and in the striking new Maltz Performing Arts Center, just beyond the art museum and identifiable by its huge dome. Historical Performance has also long been a feature of CIM/CWRU. Arriving in the 1960s, the harpsichordist Doris Ornstein made her debut at Severance Hall in 1966, joining the faculties of both CIM and CWRU around that time and founding the Cleveland Baroque Soloists. Other faculty with historical performance interests such as John Seuss (who arrived 1968 and was instrumental in founding the historical performance program), Stephen Hefling, Quentin Quereau, and Ross Duffin made enormous contributions in subsequent decades, and the program now thrives both in its collaboration with CIM, and with strong connections to Apollo’s Fire, the Cleveland Baroque Orchestra.

The conference hotel, the Courtyard by Marriott, Cleveland University Circle, is situated just a stone’s throw from the art museum and other institutions. The weather in April is unpredictable, although by the middle of the month we should be clear of the possibility of snow. Nevertheless, it is probably wise to come prepared for either cold weather or rain.