FOR PIANIST DENNIS LEWIN, music of all types is a consuming passion. Anyone who listened to Cleveland rock radio in the mid-'80s remembers the elegant ballads Lewin composed for his band Beau Coup, with their soaring, inexorable melodies and thrilling vocal harmonies. Tunes like “Somewhere Out in the Night,” “Sweet Rachel” and “Still in my Heart” became standards of the Cleveland rock repertoire.

The band had faded away by the early '90s, but Lewin hasn't faded at all. He's a fixture at area restaurants and nightclubs (currently he performs at Moxie at Chagrin and Richmond in Beachwood every Friday and Saturday), where he plays a repertoire that ranges from Beethoven and Satie to the Beatles, Stones, Pink Floyd and Hank Williams. He's also well-versed in Broadway, blues and pop standards. In the past year, he's released his first CD of solo piano music, called Crossing Chagrin , launched a Web site, www.dennislewinmusic.com, and scored an indie film, called Filmic Achievement , by Clevelander Kevin Kerwin, slated for film festival appearances in 2005.

Lewin started taking lessons from his grandfather when he was four or five, and then went on to study at the Cleveland Music School Settlement and the Cleveland Institute of Music. He majored in piano and music theory at Cleveland State University, but by that time, he was playing in rock bands, which he continued to do throughout the '80s.

“But I always gravitate back to classical music,” he says. “Right now I'm working on Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto, because my goal is to record that [in] the next three or four years. It's been a goal for me since I was a little kid, but I got sidetracked with Beau Coup, I got sidetracked playing blues, I keep getting sidetracked. I like ‘Somewhere Out in the Night.' I think ‘Sweet Rachel' was a good rocking tune. But I can't just play that stuff. It's not stimulating enough. That's why I have to work on Rachmaninoff piano concertos. All I've ever wanted to do is be the greatest musician that I possibly can become.”

Lewin offers a taste of what he can do on Crossing Chagrin , which includes a series of shorter classical pieces such as Erik Satie's Trois Gymnopedies , Debussy's Clair de Lune and Bach's “Little” Prelude and Fugue in E Minor , as well as selections from Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera .

“People would always ask me, ‘Do you have any CDs of you playing by yourself?' So I said, ‘OK, I'll make one. I took my six-foot Yamaha piano to the studio and recorded them all, about 40 times each, until I got it. For my first solo CD I wanted to do something that's not too off-the-wall. I wanted to make something that everybody could find something on it that they would like.”

Lewin also shares his musical passions on his weekly radio program that's heard on WERE 1300 AM on Fridays from 10 a.m. to noon. It's an eclectic mix of classical music and biography and talk on various topics with a local slant.

“It's an outlet for me to teach what I was taught to people who never had time to really learn about music,” he says. “I get people who have worked at blast furnaces; people who never heard of Prokofiev or Debussy. They call me or leave an e-mail and they say, ‘I never knew that.' Because when you talk about classical music, people think, ‘These people shit marble,' like Mozart said in the movie. But they were average, common people. These were not wealthy people. People think, ‘Beethoven, oh, that's that snooty music.' It's the most common music that ever was. I think I've turned a lot of people onto this who never really listened to it.”

He describes music as a sort of addiction and says he hears the same impetus underlying the best of all types of music.

“When you hear the C sharp minor prelude by Rachmaninoff, you can hear the same thing that's in Mozart, not the same notes but it's the same longing,” he says. “Every great composer, whether it's the Beatles or Gershwin, Bernstein, Bach, Mozart, it doesn't matter — that is there. In heavy metal, it's there. There's no formula to it; you can't teach it to anybody. It's almost like alcohol or cigarettes, that longing. I wake up at four o'clock in the morning and I start practicing the piano even now, because I wake up and I want to see if I can do that. It's like an addiction, and it's just as strong as any other substance there is.” Romey Rome
Rome Wasn't Built In a Day
(self-released)

Romey Rome is one of the more promising local gangsta rappers. The track, “Gotta Get Mine,” for example, is a high-powered collaboration with popular rap star Lil Flip. The tightly produced song lives up to its promise even though Lil Flip sleepwalks through the track. “Cheers” is clearly the best song on the six-track CD. Utilizing the theme song from the television show of the same name, the track is outstanding and features a beat so good, Romey Rome doesn't have to do too much lyrical heavy lifting. The piano and gentle muzak are downright inspired when used as background music for gangsta rap. Romey Rome is an adequate lyrical talent who has a good, interesting delivery; his charisma on the mic helps him rise above sometimes average lyrics. This is the area in which Rome could most improve. Almost 15 years after the emergence of legendary gangsta rap pioneers like NWA, stories about the horrors of the hood are so commonplace they're cliché. Clearly, Rome can write rhymes that are entertaining and clever, but the lyrics lack depth.

— Michael Oatman

1/2 Mile Home
Movement
(self-released)

Like most genres, gospel has it own set of stars that shine brightly in the tightly confined world of Christian music. But they rarely cross over into secular music. 1/2 Mile Home, a homegrown group, might become a notable exception. With strong, well-harmonized singing voices and slick production, this album is a genuine find. Like the popular gospel duo Mary, Mary, which has found some crossover success, 1/2 Mile Home straddles the chasm between R&B and gospel. On songs like “Leave Me Alone,” the group seamlessly weaves the two musical styles together to form a successful hybrid. “I Know It's Hard” is also a strong, pop-friendly track that could attract secular listeners. “I Wanna Marry You” is a surprisingly effective ballad that manages to express love for a woman and God at the same time. The production on this CD is top-notch. While this group is destined for gospel stardom, it might also find a place in the world of R&B. This professional, well-organized group might be one of the few to escape Cleveland's orbit.

— Michael Oatman