Archive | Symphony RSS feed for this section
Guest conductor Noam Zur, making his North American debut, leads the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra through its final performance Tuesday evening in the Amphitheater. In 2013, the CSO will play its third summer under the batons of guest conductors as a search begins for a permanent music director. Photo by Eric Shea.

CSO looks forward to third season of guest conductors

August 25, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

This was the second season without the presence of a music director for the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, but based on the performances from the orchestra and the feedback from its audience, the absence is hardly noticeable.

While it is a challenge for the orchestra to perform under a new conductor almost every single concert — with the exception of a handful of conductors who joined the CSO for two performances — the orchestra has risen to the occasion.

“It keeps them on the edge of their seat, keeps things charged, keeps things interesting, and the majority of the orchestra likes that — they like that challenge,” said Marty Merkley, Institution vice president and director of programming.

Read more
Symphony
, , , ,

CSO’s biggest fan reflects on a lifetime of music

August 22, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

Warren Hickman’s earliest memory of listening to a musical group in the Amphitheater was in 1926, when his father brought his family to see John Philip Sousa and his band.

“It was such a crowd that we were about the third row of standees,” Hickman said. “I’ll always remember that he put me on his shoulders so that I could see over the crowd, and one of the percussionists for one of the marches took out a black pistol and shot it in the air three times.”

Sousa’s band was a memorable moment, but the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra has been the epicenter of a lifetime of memories at Chautauqua for Hickman and his family.

Read more
Symphony
, , ,
The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra performs its penultimate concert Saturday evening in the Amphitheater. The CSO closes the 2012 Season with its 21st performance at 8:15 p.m. tonight. Photo by Eric Shea.

CSO wraps up 2012 with final performance featuring Trifonov, Zur

August 21, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

During a safari in South Africa, guest conductor Noam Zur sat helplessly in a Jeep when a rhinoceros came hurtling toward the vehicle. In that moment, he knew the next time he told an orchestra to play dangerously, he would draw on that moment to remember how real danger felt.

The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra will perform its last concert of the season tonight at 8:15 p.m. in the Amphitheater. The concert will feature Zur conducting and guest pianist Daniil Trifonov performing Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2. Trifonov won the Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition in 2011, the only first-prize winner since Alexander Gavrylyuk in 2005.

Zur and Trifonov worked together last year, performing the same Chopin concerto, which they chose again for tonight because of the CSO’s notoriously fast rehearsal time.

Read more
Symphony
, , , , , ,
Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra principal cellist Chaim Zemach plays in Thursday’s CSO concert in the Amphitheater. Photo by Lauren Rock.

CSO principal cellist, inspiring musician, man of the world, retires

August 18, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

Chaim Zemach said his 44 years of coming to Chautauqua, watching people come and go, observing the changes in the community year after year, have been like an ongoing novel. For any who have met and spoken with Zemach, it could be argued that his life is a bit like a novel itself.

Zemach has been the principal cellist of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra for 44 years. Zemach will retire at the end of this summer, his 45th season playing with the CSO. Zemach has become an indisputable legend at Chautauqua and a source of admiration from within and outside the orchestra.

Read more
Symphony
, , , , , , , ,
Colina

A visit from Baba Yaga and the CSO

August 18, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

Saturday night, the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra will perform the world premiere of Michael Colina’s “Baba Yaga: Fantasia for Violin and Orchestra.” It will be guest conductor Ira Levin’s American debut, and violinist Anastasia Khitruk’s first time performing on the Amphitheater stage.

The piece is a product of a rare three-part collaboration, in which Colina did most of the creative heavy-lifting, but Levin offered suggestions on orchestration, and Khitruk was given a voice in the violin part, especially the cadenzas. The three also collaborated together on the recording of Colina’s “Three Cabinets of Wonder,” a violin concerto recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra in 2010. “Baba Yaga” has also been recorded with the London Symphony and is due to release this fall.

Read more
Symphony
, , , , ,
The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra performs during Tuesday’s pops concert featuring the music of film score composer John Williams. Photo by Lauren Rock.

CSO, Constantine, Walker prepare colorful program for tonight’s performance

August 16, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

Mozart is quoted as saying that he despised writing for the flute. Today, his Flute Concerto in G Major is perhaps the most performed piece in the advanced flute repertoire.

“We’re not sure whether he disliked the guys that were playing it, or he didn’t like the sound of the instrument, or didn’t like that he had to write something in order to survive,” said guest flutist James Walker. “Nobody knows.”

The Mozart concerto in tonight’s Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra concert at 8:15 p.m. in the Amphitheater, featuring Walker and conducted by Constantine, will be performed between Strauss’ Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche, Op. 28, and Elgar’s Enigma Variations, Op. 36.

Read more
Symphony
, , , , ,
Members of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra’s bass section perform in a concert earlier this season. Photo by Eric Shea.

CSO spotlights John Williams for night of movie music with Kaufman, Reagin

August 14, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

“I don’t think John Williams has ever been into outer space; I don’t think he’s ever ridden horses in the desert like Indiana Jones; I don’t think he’s ever been to Jurassic Park,” said Richard Kaufman, guest conductor of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra.

“I think that John is an incredible dramatist,” he said, “and he understands what it is to tell a story.”

Tonight at 8:15 p.m. in the Amphitheater, the CSO will play a pops concert titled “Salute to John Williams: Celebrating the 80th Birthday of an American Treasure.” The concert will be guest conducted by Kaufman and feature CSO concertmaster Brian Reagin on violin.

Read more
Symphony
, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Mei-Ann Chen guest conducts the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra in an August 18, 2011, performance in the Amphitheater. Daily file photo.

Made in Chautauqua: CSO returns to Gershwin’s Concerto in F with Parker, Chen

August 9, 2012 by The Chautauquan Daily 0 Comments

In a practice shack at the far end of Chautauqua’s grounds in 1925, George Gershwin sat in solitude and finished writing his Concerto in F Major for piano. The weight of the enormously popular “Rhapsody in Blue” was on his shoulders, and the concerto would be the first piece he would write for full orchestra on his own.

That it is still being performed 87 years later is a testament to the concerto’s resilient success.

Guest pianist Ian Parker will perform the concerto at 8:15 p.m. tonight in the Amphitheater with guest conductor Mei-Ann Chen, who will lead the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3 “Eroica” for the second half of the program. It will be Chen’s third time conducting at Chautauqua.

Read more
Symphony
, , , , , ,
Older Entries