Morse Theatre an inviting spot for new chamber series
Deciding on which of the area’s many chamber music spaces to visit is a welcome predicament to have. For an authentic, old European parlor experience, you might go to Music in the Loft, Fredda Hyman’s living room-style chamber series in the West Loop. For museum-like opulence, any one of the Chicago Cultural Center’s weekly lunchtime concerts at Preston Bradley Hall hits the spot. And the University of Chicago’s historic Mandel Hall and Ravinia’s Martin Theatre bring us some of the world’s most recognizable musicians at close range.
The new Morse Theatre — a lavishly renovated nickelodeon and vaudeville house that first opened the year the Titanic sank — prides itself on an altogether different kind of feel. The building is on Morse Avenue in Rogers Park, a warm, working-class district that’s slowly seeing more bohemian development. The theater, which just opened on Oct. 9, plans to book mostly jazz, blues and American acoustic roots music.
(Richard A. Chapman/Sun-Times)
Sunday morning, the space proved to be an excellent alternative for classical music, as it kicked off an 11 a.m. series, which will be broadcast weekly on WFMT’s new program, “Live From the Morse.”
While waiting for the show to begin, WFMT-FM (98.7) executive producer Steve Robinson told us he was so impressed with the artist renderings for the theater nine months ago that he was skeptical they’d be able to live up to their promise. But they have. Encouraged by the theater’s potential, the radio station even helped design its state-of-the-art sound booths.
The Morse generously decided not to charge for its inaugural classical music presentation, and a nominal $10 admission fee kicks in next Sunday.
Mirroring the neighborhood’s rich immigrant history, chatter was heard in Russian and various Eastern European tongues as folks of all ages strolled around the lobby beforehand. The theater offered a complimentary buffet with donuts and fruit, and patrons could even bring their coffee into the performance room. For classical music, the Morse is as casual and inviting as anywhere in town.
Duo pianists Irina Kotlyar and Gregory Shifrin played mesmerizing four-hand music from Brahms, Debussy, Stravinsky, Liszt and others on the house’s Steinway grand. When the Taj Mahal blues trio played on opening weekend, the sounds of electric guitars and basses fit the room to a T. The unplugged version Sunday was just as vivid, and the room’s acoustics naturally temper anything that seems too trebly. The Ondas Ensemble will be the first to test out the acoustics for wind instruments such as clarinets and flutes when it performs there this Sunday.
Venue manager Andy McGhee considers the theater fair game for anything from film festivals to sporting events, but he also wants to keep music as its main attraction. He told us, “In soup kitchens, they used to make you pray before you got your food. Here, we could offer up a piano concerto before they watch the Sox.”
Bryant Manning also writes for Time Out Chicago magazine.