“The Boston Symphony Orchestra isn’t the only orchestra in town building a bridge to Leipzig, Germany,” writes Zoë Madonna in Monday’s (4/15) Boston Globe. “At a Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras concert April 29, the Gewandhaus Youth Choir and Leipzig Opera Youth Chorus will join the top-level Boston Youth Symphony music director Federico Cortese onstage at Symphony Hall for Leonard Bernstein’s ‘Chichester Psalms.’ … In June, 60 musicians from the youth symphony will travel to Leipzig for a week and perform that piece on the choruses’ home turf. Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras spokeswoman Erin Keegan Ianni clarified that while the BYSO and the BSO have been partners for some years now, the youth orchestra’s Leipzig exchange was not a product of the BSO’s alliance with Leipzig’s Gewandhaus Orchestra.… In Leipzig, the students will perform music by Leipzig composers Bach and Mendelssohn as well as ‘Chichester Psalms.’ But this month at Symphony Hall, the rest of the symphonic menu is French: Messiaen’s shifty and colorful ‘Les offrandes oubliées’ and Ravel’s dramatic suites from ‘Daphnis and Chloé.’ ‘These kids tend to outperform their abilities, which is exactly why they love it,’ Cortese said.”
Posted April 20, 2018
