Author: bfc-admin

“The Muncie Symphony Orchestra has added two members and promoted another into positions that have been open for a little more than a year,” writes Audrey J. Kirby in Thursday’s (1/19) Indianapolis Star. “Muncie native Noelle Tretick Gosling is the organization’s new concertmaster, a position formerly held for 13 years by Mary Kothman. Tim Tan is associate concertmaster, and Nataliya Nizhalova is assistant concertmaster.” Gosling “attended the North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston-Salem and then the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University, where she earned violin performance degrees. Gosling has played numerous years with the Indianapolis Symphony and is a recording studio artist who has toured with notable artists such as Stevie Wonder, Natalie Cole, Harry Connick Jr., Josh Groban and Andy Williams.… Tan lives in Fort Wayne, and also is personnel manager with Fort Wayne Philharmonic. Meanwhile, Nizhalova has played in MSO since 2011, moving up to the assistant concertmaster position after finishing her doctorate in violin performance at [Muncie’s] Ball State [University].” She was formerly associate concertmaster in Russia’s Nizhniy Novgorod State Academic Opera and Ballet Theater.  

Posted January 23, 2017

“The Detroit Symphony Orchestra got its Mozart Festival started Thursday, and the Detroit Tigers were the first organization to help kick things off,” reports Josiah Turner in Thursday’s (1/19) ESPN.com. “The three-week festival ‘takes a look at the famously light-hearted 18th century composer [Wolfgang Mozart] who challenged the status quo of European music,’ according to the festival’s website. Composer and director of the orchestra, Leonard Slatkin, gave Tigers veteran Miguel Cabrera a crack at leading the charge. Cabrera did his best conductor impression, then gave Slatkin a thank-you pat on the backside. The 11-time All-Star slugger displayed some finesse in swinging that baton. He might not have much of a future conducting symphonies, but the 33-year-old proved his personality can help light up a room.” A brief video of Cabrera leading the orchestra is included.

Posted January 23, 2017

“I’ve been working as an occupational therapist with stroke patients for the past three years,” writes Maisie Reynolds in Thursday’s (1/19) Guardian (London, U.K.). “In December 2014, I was asked to go to a workshop with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, which was coming to run music sessions with us … We met Tim Steiner from the RPO to brainstorm…. At the first session with the patients, none of us … really knew what we were doing or what was going to happen.… By the end of the session, we’d structured this incredible piece of music…. Over the course of the project, Strokestra, I saw all these people go on a similar journey. At first, they felt embarrassed to pick up an instrument and make a sound. But after six months we did a performance of the work they had done in the city hall.” During a task involving clapping in rhythm, “A lot of people told us this was the first time they had belly laughed since their stroke…. We’re running our own groups using music in one of our rehab units…. [Having] an orchestra come and show us the potential of it has given us the confidence to carry on.”

Posted January 23, 2017

“The enthusiasm spills from Adrian Fung,” writes Robert Harris in Saturday’s (1/21) Globe and Mail (Toronto, Canada). “Fung is an award-winning musician, the founding cellist of Toronto’s Afiara Quartet [and] vice-president of innovation for the Toronto Symphony Orchestra…. Fung has spent the past year or so putting together the details of [Canada Mosaic], a complicated national partnership that involves 40 different orchestras [and] upwards of 60 new commissions…. The first concert in the Canada Mosaic project takes place Saturday…. The concert will begin with a two-minute opening fanfare by [conductor Alain] Trudel—one of 40 … that Fung and the Canada Mosaic team have commissioned across the country [including] a triple concerto … from famed Canadian composer Alexina Louie to feature the concertmasters of the TSO, Montreal Symphony Orchestra and National Arts Centre Orchestra. The world premiere … will be in September in Toronto…. And around the TSO’s annual New Creations Festival this spring, there will be new works by Owen Pallett, Tanya Tagaq, Nicole Lizée, Cassandra Miller and Jordan Pal…. There are educational components to Canada Mosaic as well, including new uses of technology to allow listeners to … observe an orchestra from many different viewing angles of their choice.”

Posted January 23, 2017

“The Dallas Chamber Symphony is proving classical music is not just for the concert hall,” reports Kimberly Richard on Thursday (1/19) at NBCDFW.com (Fort Worth-Dallas, TX). “DCS’s ‘Taking It to the Streets,’ a series of 22 free informal concerts performed in public spaces over 18 months … consists of DCS Live! ensembles of up to twelve musicians performing at hospitals, homeless shelters, parks and other public venues.” Following a concert at the Bridge Homeless Recover Center where musicians recently performed, “DCS will use metrics to measure the impact of the concerts, but the Bridge staff has already [noted] high levels of verbal and physical engagement, development of social and leisure skills and the extension of those effects beyond the actual concert…. More spring concerts are planned for the Bridge Homeless Recovery Center, Dallas County Juvenile Department programs and Pegasus Plaza…. The ensembles will play at the Akard and Victory DART stations.” Says DCS Principal Flute Margaret Fischer, “I want to grow as a musician and push myself to try things I’ve not done. I’m open to being flexible with the programming and talking with the audience, jamming to a certain degree. I am having fun.”

Posted January 23, 2017

“Somewhere between a chamber music concert and a casual hang lies ‘Scribing the Void,’ an off-center offering by the Hartford Symphony Orchestra at Real Art Ways in Hartford on Thursday,” writes Michael Hamad in Sunday’s (1/22) Hartford Courant (CT). “ ‘Scribing the Void’ stages musicians around the various spaces of the Arbor Street gallery, surrounded by eye-popping works of art…. Newer works—’Pale Blue Dot,’ by British composer Roger Goula, RSM’s ‘Void’—rub up against older ones [by J.S. Bach and Stravinsky].… There’s food and drink…. One of several new efforts to ‘diversify and expand our audience,’ says HSO executive director Steve Collins, ‘Scribing’ adds a new flavor…. [Music Director Carolyn] Kuan says. ‘You play the [Bach Cello Suite] and people respond: “Oh, yeah, I know that!” … But I bet nobody has experienced it with the sound coming from different places.’ … Kuan, who listens to rock music, likens the experience to going to club shows…. The unpretentious vibe will likely please HSO subscribers drawn to the popular Classical Conversations series, which ran from 1985 to 2000…. ‘We have all of our existing music lovers in mind,’ Kuan says. ‘At the same time, we want to reach new people.’ ”

Posted January 23, 2017

Pictured: Hartford Symphony Orchestra Music Director Carolyn Kuan and Executive Director Steve Collins. Photo by Lauren Schneiderman

Oregon’s Eugene Symphony is partnering with McKenzie River Trust and Travel Lane County for a multimedia project called The Four Seasons of the McKenzie River that will culminate in a public performance of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons on February 15, 2018. During the performance, images of the river and its environs will be projected above the stage as the orchestra plays Vivaldi’s music live. Members of the public are invited to submit high-resolution photographs and video through November 22, 2017. Winning artists will be invited to a dress rehearsal and will be acknowledged during the concert and on web and social media platforms. Travel Lane County markets and promotes Oregon’s Eugene, Cascades and Coast region, and McKenzie River Trust is a nonprofit land trust formed in 1989 to protect habitat and lands in the McKenzie basin. For more information click here.

Posted January 20, 2017