Thursday, October 28, 2010
Spooktacular Piano Concert
Join us for a "Spooktacular Piano Concert" on Saturday, October 30 at 6:30 p.m. at the JSO building. Piano students of Carol Ivkovich will be presenting this recital. It's our first recital of the year. This is a great opportunity for students to experience performing in front of others in a fun, safe atmosphere - hiding behind costumes is always a big hit! Join us for a fun evening!
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Greg Sandow's Blog
From Greg Sandow's blog:
Go to his blog at http://www.artsjournal.com/sandow/ for comments and further posts about the JSO.
Something new
Still catching up. I want to talk about my visit to Jackson, MI a couple of weeks ago (and apologies to my old and new friends there, who might have expected to see something about them here earlier).
The outline: Stephen Osmond, an old friend of mine from graduate studies at the Yale School of Music (he was a tenor, I was a composer), is both music director and executive director of the Jackson Symphony. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, but no way. Steve is outstanding in both roles. And fearless, I must say, in confronting his orchestra's future. Like most orchestras, they face diminished funding as they look at their future. Steve faces that manfully, and brought me out to help with what seems to be needed, a new way of engaging with the city of Jackson.
I'll have more to say on what happened at my visit, and, how, exactly, an orchestra might engage the community. But since time is tight today, I'll start with something really terrific that the orchestra is doing, something I've never encountered before.
Like many orchestras, they have a composer in residence, Jonathan Bruce Brown, chair of the music department at Spring Arbor University, near Jackson. Bruce (whom I enjoyed meeting during my visit) is a good choice, I think. His expertly crafted music is a pleasure to hear, and I'd guess goes down well with both the orchestra and the audience.
But get this -- the way the orchestra is introducing the piece they've commissioned from Bruce this year. It'll be premiered on the last concert of the season. And at each concert before that, Bruce will come on stage and present his work at whatever stage it's reached. That won't mean performing the entire work in progress (which might, at any stage, be a work in fragments). But Bruce will talk about the piece, and maybe the orchestra (or individual musicians) will play parts of it.
I think this is a fabulous idea. I heard the first installment, at the first concert of the year (an engaging glimpse at various aspects of romantic music, featuring Ian Hobson making his expert way through the Schumann piano concerto). All Bruce did was talk about what he was going to do -- what the piece would be, and what the preview process would be like. He was hard to resist, and I'm sure he drew everyone in. At the next concert, I'm sure all the subscribers will be wondering what he'll have to show them.
As I said, I've never run into this idea before. Has anyone else ever done it? If so, I'd love to hear about it. Certainly it's an idea that others should steal.
Go to his blog at http://www.artsjournal.com/sandow/ for comments and further posts about the JSO.
Something new
Still catching up. I want to talk about my visit to Jackson, MI a couple of weeks ago (and apologies to my old and new friends there, who might have expected to see something about them here earlier).
The outline: Stephen Osmond, an old friend of mine from graduate studies at the Yale School of Music (he was a tenor, I was a composer), is both music director and executive director of the Jackson Symphony. Sounds like a recipe for disaster, but no way. Steve is outstanding in both roles. And fearless, I must say, in confronting his orchestra's future. Like most orchestras, they face diminished funding as they look at their future. Steve faces that manfully, and brought me out to help with what seems to be needed, a new way of engaging with the city of Jackson.
I'll have more to say on what happened at my visit, and, how, exactly, an orchestra might engage the community. But since time is tight today, I'll start with something really terrific that the orchestra is doing, something I've never encountered before.
Like many orchestras, they have a composer in residence, Jonathan Bruce Brown, chair of the music department at Spring Arbor University, near Jackson. Bruce (whom I enjoyed meeting during my visit) is a good choice, I think. His expertly crafted music is a pleasure to hear, and I'd guess goes down well with both the orchestra and the audience.
But get this -- the way the orchestra is introducing the piece they've commissioned from Bruce this year. It'll be premiered on the last concert of the season. And at each concert before that, Bruce will come on stage and present his work at whatever stage it's reached. That won't mean performing the entire work in progress (which might, at any stage, be a work in fragments). But Bruce will talk about the piece, and maybe the orchestra (or individual musicians) will play parts of it.
I think this is a fabulous idea. I heard the first installment, at the first concert of the year (an engaging glimpse at various aspects of romantic music, featuring Ian Hobson making his expert way through the Schumann piano concerto). All Bruce did was talk about what he was going to do -- what the piece would be, and what the preview process would be like. He was hard to resist, and I'm sure he drew everyone in. At the next concert, I'm sure all the subscribers will be wondering what he'll have to show them.
As I said, I've never run into this idea before. Has anyone else ever done it? If so, I'd love to hear about it. Certainly it's an idea that others should steal.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Program Notes for Nov 13 Concert - Not Just for Kids
Program Notes
November 13, 2010
By Composer in Residence
Bruce Brown
November 13, 2010
By Composer in Residence
Bruce Brown
Tonight’s program of music is truly “Not Just for Children.” Many stories are written so that children can read them at one level while adults recognize deeper meaning. In the same way, many pieces of music are both entertaining for children and rich for adults, and grownups might even savor them as a memory from their own childhood.
J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books certainly appeal to readers of all ages! They have sold over 400 million copies and been translated into at least 67 languages.
Benjamin Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra is a wonderful introduction to orchestral instruments, but it is a very effective concert piece without the explanatory narration. Saint-Saëns Carnival of the Animals depicts beasts and birds in a very entertaining way, but the music is beautiful and colorful on its own merits. Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf weaves a spellbinding tale of the courage of impetuous youth. Its memorable themes have made the piece a perennial favorite of orchestral audiences all over the world.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
Several composers have been involved in writing music for the enormously popular Harry Potter movies, but the first three were scored by John Williams (b. 1932), the composer of many of the most memorable themes in Hollywood history.
In his illustrious, six-decade career, Williams has won five Academy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and 21 Grammy Awards. His enormous output includes music for dozens of films, four Olympic Games, the NBC Nightly News and the rededication of the Statue of Liberty, and he has also written several concert works. Williams is the laureate conductor of the world famous Boston Pops orchestra and regularly makes guest conducting appearances with the finest orchestras in the United States and Europe.
On June 30, 1997, J.K. Rowling introduced her phenomenally successful series of books with Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (or “the Philosopher’s Stone” outside the United States). Rowling sold the film rights for her first four books to Warner Brothers in 1999, reportedly for 1 million British pounds. That’s the equivalent of 1,982,900 American dollars! Filming began in October of 2000, and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was released in London on November 14, 2001.
In his score, Williams fashioned two themes for the diabolical Voldemort; two themes for the stately school, Hogwarts; a theme for Diagon Alley, the off-kilter marketplace; a tune for the sport of Quidditch, played on flying brooms; a flying theme; a friendship theme; and the main theme – representing the bumbling, lovable Hedwig – which has been used in all films so far.
Peter and the Wolf
The brilliant, irascible Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) entered the St. Petersburg Conservatory when he was only thirteen and proceeded to give his teachers fits. “I didn’t show my compositions to Liadov,” he once said, “because, if I did, he probably would expel me from the class.” When admirers expressed pleasure at meeting him, he would curtly reply “On my part there is no pleasure!”
Prokofiev left Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, and he was an internationally famous composer when he returned in the 1930s. By an odd coincidence, he died on the same day as Joseph Stalin, March 5, 1953. Prokofiev’s funeral took place with paper flowers and a recording of the funeral march from his ballet Romeo and Juliet; the real flowers and live musicians were all taken for Stalin’s state funeral!
Natalia Satz, the director of the Moscow Children's Musical Theater, asked Prokofiev to write a musical symphony for children in 1936. Her aim was to encourage "musical tastes in children from the first years of school." Satz and Prokofiev agreed the music would tell a story and themes heard in instrumental solos would represent animals and characters in the tale. One of Satz’s friends wrote a text, but Prokofiev rejected it immediately saying it had too many rhymes. It only took him four days to write his own text and a piano version of "How little Peter fooled the Wolf!” The orchestral score was finished a week later.
The reaction to the first performance, on May 6, 1936, disappointed Prokofiev, but the piece quickly became enormously popular.
The Carnival of the Animals
The history of music is full of astounding child prodigies, but Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) was certainly one of the greatest. He wrote his first composition when he was three, and when he gave his first recital at the age of ten, he offered to play any one of Beethoven’s thirty-two piano sonatas as an encore! Saint-Saëns toured as a virtuoso pianist, and Franz Liszt called him “the greatest organist in the world.”
Saint-Saëns wrote his Carnival of the Animals (Le carnaval des animaux) in 1886 while he was vacationing in Austria. The menagerie of musical portraits is full of humor and playfulness, and Saint-Saëns includes wryly-distorted quotes from famous composers – Rameau, Offenbach, Berlioz, Mendelssohn, Rossini and himself – to add to the fun.
Saint-Saëns refused to allow the music to be performed during his lifetime, thinking such “frivolous” music would damage his reputation as a serious composer. Only one movement, Le cygne (“The Swan”) was performed and published while he was alive. The first public performance of the full suite was given on February 26, 1922, about two months after his death.
Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra
Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) was another child prodigy who began to compose at age five, started piano lessons when he was eight and took up the viola two years later. By the time he was fourteen he'd written ten piano sonatas, six string quartets, three piano suites, an oratorio and "dozens of songs." Britten became famous when his opera Peter Grimes premièred in London in June of 1945. That November he wrote to a friend “I have a small film to write for the Board of Education.” The goal of the project was to create a piece of music that would entertain schoolchildren and teach the instruments of the orchestra at the same time.
Britten started work on The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra in mid-December, 1945 and finished at midnight on New Year’s Eve. The piece was first performed in concert the following October by the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, and the film debuted on November 29, 1946. Britten dedicated the piece to the four children of his friends John and Jean Maud for their “edification and entertainment.”
The work is subtitled “Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Henry Purcell.” The theme is taken from Purcell’s incidental music for the 1676 play Abdelazar, or “The Moor's Revenge,” by Aphra Behn. Britten greatly admired Purcell and later wrote “I had never realized, before I first met Purcell’s music, that words could be set with such ingenuity, with such colour.”
Britten adapted Purcell’s theme ingeniously to exhibit the unique capabilities of each instrument, and just to show off, he crafted it into a rollicking fugue that puts the orchestra back together and ends the piece with thrilling energy and enthusiasm.
November 13 Concert - Not Just for Kids!
Second Subscription Concert - 61st Season
Not Just for Kids
8 p.m. Nov. 13, 2010 at Jackson Community College
For further information, contact:
Joan Cummings 517-782-3221, 517-782-3268 (Fax), joan.cummings@jacksonsymphony.org
Delight the kids, delight yourself at JSO concert
The second concert in the Jackson Symphony Orchestra’s 61st season could be dubbed a “happening” rather than a symphony concert. The program, Not Just for Kids, features popular classical works written principally for the delight of children but equally enjoyed by adults. Besides the impressive music, there will be projected visuals and the participation of Broadway, Hollywood and TV actor Craig Richard Nelson, a college friend of Maestro Stephen Osmond.
On the program are:
• Sergei Prokofiev’s playful Peter and the Wolf;
• Camille Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals (written almost as a joke for his friends and performed publicly only after he died in 1921);
• The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra;
• and selections from John Williams’ movie scores for the Harry Potter series.
Craig Richard Nelson, who starred in Paper Chase and My Body Guard (to name only a couple of films), will be on hand to narrate the story of Peter and the Wolf, inject humor into Carnival of the Animals, a zoological fantasy, and guide the audience through the orchestra during Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. Pianists Audie Heydenburg and Anita Fobes are guests for Carnival. Assistant JSO conductor David Schultz will conduct Peter and Harry Potter.
“This is not your grandfather’s average symphony orchestra concert,” Osmond said. “I like to think of it more as an event rather than a concert. The music is rather classical, although all the music is written in the 20th Century. There will be visuals and lots of them. Projected images during all the pieces will enhance the experience, especially for the first-time listener.”
”Families with small children, who are worried that their youngsters might get restless, are invited to the Dress Rehearsal at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 12 at JCC’s Music Hall. Because of a sponsorship from Spring Arbor University, there is no charge for this dress rehearsal. The Nov. 13 concert also is sponsored by Spring Arbor University.
“We have never produced an event with such variety and appeal,” Osmond said. “If you are a first-time attendee or wanted to introduce your family to a symphony orchestra and you were to pick one concert to attend in the next 5 years — this is it!”
The 2010-2011 year, A Season for All Ages, continues Feb. 5 and Feb. 6 with Going Baroque, March 19 with Flavors of France and May 7 with Our Own Backyard.
Individual tickets for the Nov. 13 concert are $18, $27, $32. They may be purchased online at www.JacksonSymphony.org; by phone at 517-782-3221; or in person at the JSO Box Office, 215 W. Michigan Ave., downtown Jackson.
All JSO ticket holders are invited to attend a free pre-concert lecture hosted by Dr. Bruce Brown, JSO Composer-in-Residence. This lecture series, titled Backstage Glimpses, takes place at 7 p.m. in the Federer Rooms off the main Floor Lobby in the Potter Center.
NOTE: The Jackson Symphony Orchestra is a community resource providing performances of the classics and popular music, a community music school with private and group instruction and numerous educational programs for students of all ages. The organization owns a 30,000-square-foot facility in the heart of downtown Jackson which not only serves as an administrative, rehearsal, and recital performance space for the orchestra but also is home to the Jackson Youth Symphony, the Jackson Chorale and Children's Choir, the Michigan Shakespeare Festival and JSO Community String Ensemble. The orchestra primarily performs at the world-class Music Hall of the Jackson Community College Potter Center and other venues in town including several churches, the County Fairgrounds and Michigan Theatre.
Not Just for Kids
8 p.m. Nov. 13, 2010 at Jackson Community College
For further information, contact:
Joan Cummings 517-782-3221, 517-782-3268 (Fax), joan.cummings@jacksonsymphony.org
Delight the kids, delight yourself at JSO concert
The second concert in the Jackson Symphony Orchestra’s 61st season could be dubbed a “happening” rather than a symphony concert. The program, Not Just for Kids, features popular classical works written principally for the delight of children but equally enjoyed by adults. Besides the impressive music, there will be projected visuals and the participation of Broadway, Hollywood and TV actor Craig Richard Nelson, a college friend of Maestro Stephen Osmond.
On the program are:
• Sergei Prokofiev’s playful Peter and the Wolf;
• Camille Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals (written almost as a joke for his friends and performed publicly only after he died in 1921);
• The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra;
• and selections from John Williams’ movie scores for the Harry Potter series.
Craig Richard Nelson, who starred in Paper Chase and My Body Guard (to name only a couple of films), will be on hand to narrate the story of Peter and the Wolf, inject humor into Carnival of the Animals, a zoological fantasy, and guide the audience through the orchestra during Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. Pianists Audie Heydenburg and Anita Fobes are guests for Carnival. Assistant JSO conductor David Schultz will conduct Peter and Harry Potter.
“This is not your grandfather’s average symphony orchestra concert,” Osmond said. “I like to think of it more as an event rather than a concert. The music is rather classical, although all the music is written in the 20th Century. There will be visuals and lots of them. Projected images during all the pieces will enhance the experience, especially for the first-time listener.”
”Families with small children, who are worried that their youngsters might get restless, are invited to the Dress Rehearsal at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 12 at JCC’s Music Hall. Because of a sponsorship from Spring Arbor University, there is no charge for this dress rehearsal. The Nov. 13 concert also is sponsored by Spring Arbor University.
“We have never produced an event with such variety and appeal,” Osmond said. “If you are a first-time attendee or wanted to introduce your family to a symphony orchestra and you were to pick one concert to attend in the next 5 years — this is it!”
The 2010-2011 year, A Season for All Ages, continues Feb. 5 and Feb. 6 with Going Baroque, March 19 with Flavors of France and May 7 with Our Own Backyard.
Individual tickets for the Nov. 13 concert are $18, $27, $32. They may be purchased online at www.JacksonSymphony.org; by phone at 517-782-3221; or in person at the JSO Box Office, 215 W. Michigan Ave., downtown Jackson.
All JSO ticket holders are invited to attend a free pre-concert lecture hosted by Dr. Bruce Brown, JSO Composer-in-Residence. This lecture series, titled Backstage Glimpses, takes place at 7 p.m. in the Federer Rooms off the main Floor Lobby in the Potter Center.
NOTE: The Jackson Symphony Orchestra is a community resource providing performances of the classics and popular music, a community music school with private and group instruction and numerous educational programs for students of all ages. The organization owns a 30,000-square-foot facility in the heart of downtown Jackson which not only serves as an administrative, rehearsal, and recital performance space for the orchestra but also is home to the Jackson Youth Symphony, the Jackson Chorale and Children's Choir, the Michigan Shakespeare Festival and JSO Community String Ensemble. The orchestra primarily performs at the world-class Music Hall of the Jackson Community College Potter Center and other venues in town including several churches, the County Fairgrounds and Michigan Theatre.
JSO on WKAR
Thursday, Oct 21, about 10:15am - BIZET: "Jeux d'enfants" played by the Jackson Symphony, Stephen Osmond conducting. Recorded March 2008 at Jackson Community College.
Sunday, Oct 24, about 1:30pm - HANSON: Suite from "Merry Mount", played by the Jackson Symphony, conducted by Nathaniel Parker. Recorded at Jackson Community College, March 2008.
Sunday, Oct 24, about 1:30pm - HANSON: Suite from "Merry Mount", played by the Jackson Symphony, conducted by Nathaniel Parker. Recorded at Jackson Community College, March 2008.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
JSO "Mini-Series" Tickets Include All the Frills
With one concert down and four to go in the Jackson Symphony Orchestra's 61st season, it's not too late to score as a season ticket holder - and at significant savings.
Remaining concerts include Not Just for Kids on Nov. 13, Going Baroque on Feb. 5 or 6, Flavors of France on March 19 and Our Own Back Yard on May 7.
"Mini-series" tickets, which include admission to the four concerts and all regular season subscriber benefits, are now being offered at $100 for section A, $85 for section B and $55 for section C. Buyers will receive a two-for-the-price of one Meal Card that's good at area restaurants, an annual subscription to the newsletter Interlude, an invitation to attend pre-concert lectures (Backstage Glimpses), ticket insurance (loose them and we replace) and recycling (can't attend a concert, return them and we give you a donation receipt for the value).
These "mini-series" tickets may be ordered online at jacksonsymphony.org/tickets, by phone at 517-782-3221 x118 or by stopping by the JSO's downtown office 215 W. Michigan Ave.
Remaining concerts include Not Just for Kids on Nov. 13, Going Baroque on Feb. 5 or 6, Flavors of France on March 19 and Our Own Back Yard on May 7.
"Mini-series" tickets, which include admission to the four concerts and all regular season subscriber benefits, are now being offered at $100 for section A, $85 for section B and $55 for section C. Buyers will receive a two-for-the-price of one Meal Card that's good at area restaurants, an annual subscription to the newsletter Interlude, an invitation to attend pre-concert lectures (Backstage Glimpses), ticket insurance (loose them and we replace) and recycling (can't attend a concert, return them and we give you a donation receipt for the value).
These "mini-series" tickets may be ordered online at jacksonsymphony.org/tickets, by phone at 517-782-3221 x118 or by stopping by the JSO's downtown office 215 W. Michigan Ave.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Review: JSO Season Opener: Strange Bedfellows
The first weekend in October saw the first concert of the Jackson Symphony Orchestra's 61st season, presenting a program entitled "Strange Bedfellows." This rubric encompassed works by six composers who all were born within ten years of each other at the beginning of the 19th century, and who collectively helped establish what we often refer to as music's Romantic period. The opening work was by the oldest, and perhaps the strangest of the six, Hector Berlioz, the composer who, after Beethoven, was arguably the most significant figure in codifying the modern orchestra. His Roman Carnival Overture was lustily played by the ensemble, and featured excellent English horn solos by Matthew Yuknas as well as strong statements by the brass, led by first trumpet Joel Shaner. Berlioz's individual orchestration style also permitted the JSO viola section, led by Clyde McKaney, to shine in ways not often afforded by the standard repertoire.
The rest of the first half featured the finale to Felix Mendelssohn's E minor Violin Concerto, played by Xie Min, the orchestra's concert master who led the orchestra on a merry chase with an energetic and expressive interpretation of the solo part, as well as selections by Verdi and Wagner, two dramatically contrasted giants of 19th century opera. Both composers dealt in these works with transgressive love, but while Verdi?s Duke from Rigoletto expresses a certain terse amusement about his conquests in the aria, Questa o quella, Wagner needs considerably more time and effort to move heaven, earth and a large orchestra, in justifying his couple's coupling in Tristan und Isolde. We were treated in the former to the wonderfully characteristic singing of tenor Richard Fracker, while the orchestra limned the latter in the opera's Prelude and Liebestod. Strong string playing, along with trenchant wind work, helped bring this music to life, and wonderful solo work from all the wind principals added extra emotional impact.
The second half of the program featured music by, about, and for, Robert Schumann and Frederick Chopin. Guest soloist Ian Hobson was front and center for the entire second half, opening with his solo performance of Chopin's second Ballade, a work dedicated to Schumann. The orchestra joined him for a performance of Schumann's A minor Piano Concerto, and Hobson closed with an encore by Schumann, entitled "Chopin," from his set of piano pieces, Carnival. Hobson's playing of all three works was shapely and compelling, drawing wonderful tone from the instrument in both soft passages and loud, and guiding us surely through the maze of key relationships relating the three works to each other. The orchestra matched him stroke for stroke, with excellent ensemble work, as well as striking solos in the winds. Clarinetist Andrew Sprung stood out in his lengthy solo at the beginning of the first movement's development section, and the horns, Stephen Foster and Jessica Pierce, contributed lively work at the recapitulation of the finale. Beautiful playing was heard throughout the concert, with moments made wonderful by Tess Miller, principal flute, and Heather Peyton, principal oboe.
Andy Mead
The rest of the first half featured the finale to Felix Mendelssohn's E minor Violin Concerto, played by Xie Min, the orchestra's concert master who led the orchestra on a merry chase with an energetic and expressive interpretation of the solo part, as well as selections by Verdi and Wagner, two dramatically contrasted giants of 19th century opera. Both composers dealt in these works with transgressive love, but while Verdi?s Duke from Rigoletto expresses a certain terse amusement about his conquests in the aria, Questa o quella, Wagner needs considerably more time and effort to move heaven, earth and a large orchestra, in justifying his couple's coupling in Tristan und Isolde. We were treated in the former to the wonderfully characteristic singing of tenor Richard Fracker, while the orchestra limned the latter in the opera's Prelude and Liebestod. Strong string playing, along with trenchant wind work, helped bring this music to life, and wonderful solo work from all the wind principals added extra emotional impact.
Andy Mead
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Stories Requested!
Fond memories, nostalgic feelings….
When and where did you first hear Peter in the Wolf, Carnival of the Animals, or Britten's Young People’s Guide to the Orchestra?
Monday, October 11, 2010
From the Studio of Carol Ivkovich
Stacy Robert, (15) was one of 16 entrants from across Michigan in the senior division of the Michigan Music Teacher's Association piano competition yesterday. Stacy performed beautifully, playing Dr. Gradus ad Parnassum by Debussy, and the Allego Movement of the f minor Beethoven Sonata. (op.2 #1). Stacy was the youngest entrant in her division. This was a great experience for Stacy.
Both Stacy and Michael Zeiler, students of Carol Ivkovich's, will be participating in Albion College's piano competition on October 22-24. This competition will provide them with great experience as well as the opportunities for private lessons and master classes with Drs. David and Lia Abbott.
Both Stacy and Michael Zeiler, students of Carol Ivkovich's, will be participating in Albion College's piano competition on October 22-24. This competition will provide them with great experience as well as the opportunities for private lessons and master classes with Drs. David and Lia Abbott.
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