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CSO, with Milanov, navigates Bruckner’s swiftly shifting Fourth

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The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra performs Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 4 in E-flat major under the baton of Maestro Rossen Milanov Tuesday in the Amphitheater. HG Biggs/Staff Photographer

Andrew Druckenbrod
guest critic

Rarely are artistry and personality as ill-fitted as with composer Anton Bruckner.

If you asked 1,000 musicians or music lovers which composer they would pick to travel back in time to meet, this 19th-century Austrian might not get a vote. Most accounts paint him as an odd bore — a country bumpkin who struggled mightily to transition from humble small-town organist to the sophisticated concert halls of Vienna. He fawned over musical luminaires (most oddly the bombastic Richard Wagner), and was conservatively devout (in the midst of that cosmopolitan society) and painfully insecure (as person and composer) — yet his music belies these qualities. Many of his works, and in particular his symphonies, possess a sonic grandeur that can sweep a listener away. Under the baton of Music Director and Principal Symphonic Conductor Rossen Milanov, the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra performed one of his most famous, Symphony No. 4, Tuesday evening in the Amphitheater.

This is a difficult work to conduct because it is inherently uneven. It juxtaposes the boisterous and the sublime, often with no transition. It’s as if Bruckner approached the symphony like an organ, writing blocks of music for sections of the orchestra. One can imagine him manipulating stops for horn, flute, oboe, strings and the like. Most of the groupings combine sonorously with each other, as was the case Tuesday. But pulling the brass drawknob (separate from that of the horns) can be another story. It carries the risk of overpowering the rest of the forces, which was the case at times Tuesday.

The symphony starts almost in mid-conversation, with the strings whispering in quiet tremolo below a pensive horn, which entered as if from a distance intoned by Roger Kaza with tranquil beauty. Milanov allowed this first subject to grow organically, joined by the woodwinds. But this magic was cut shot with the entrance of the brass. While the rest of the orchestra essentially accompanies them in the fortissimo statements, you still need to hear it all.

If one could single out the brass statements as a track on a recording, it would be stunning. Every chord blended in extraordinary fashion. But you couldn’t hear much else. Pugnacious timpani strikes compounded the situation, but it was the arrival of the second theme that made this obvious by subtraction. As dainty strings evoked bird calls, it was as if a chamber orchestra had arrived on stage. Precision is a watchword of the CSO, and Milanov employed that as he tended to the delicacy of the music. In the development, the brass finally had its stage in the form of an exquisite chorale, and here the volume was fitting, accentuating their fusion. The recapitulation found the horn returning, this time paired with floating flute tones (played with appealing fullness), eventually reaching full force in the concluding moments with the entire horn section almost venting the first theme in grand strokes amid potent hammer chords.

HG Biggs/Staff Photographer

Lacking, as it does, the same intense interplay with the trumpets, trombones and tuba, it’s not surprising that the second movement was the highlight. Here, after his meager attempt at a “program” in the opening, Bruckner settles down and simply writes gorgeous music. With burnished timbre, the cellos captured that rich first melody in relaxed form before passing it on the woodwinds. Here and throughout, Milanov allowed this music to breathe. The swells were unhurried and that mournful, almost languid, viola line hovered with oaken tone.

The third movement burst back with the orchestra handling the abrupt shifts, from galloping rhythms to lyrical reflection. Perhaps not as playful as the composer thought he had achieved, the country dance in the trio was appropriately lighthearted, with excellent interplay between the woodwinds and strings. The finale was, well, a finale, with weighty pronouncements and energized lines alternating with subdued and searching music. At times, the brass again pushed the rest of the orchestra to the side, but in the end it sounded inevitable as, yes, Bruckner pulled out all the virtual stops.

Andrew Druckenbrod is a former classical music critic of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. He studied musicology at the University of Minnesota and is an adjunct professor at the University of Pittsburgh.

CSO to present ‘cultural capsule’ of classical Paris

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The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Music Director and Principal Symphonic Conductor Rossen Milanov, performs Bruckner’s Symphony No. 4 Tuesday in the Amphitheater. HG Biggs/Staff Photographer

Sarah Russo
Staff writer

Paris may be nearly 4,000 miles away from Chautauqua Institution, but tonight, the city and its history can be experienced just steps away. 

The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra’s program for this evening features three pieces each with a connection to the City of Lights during “a very turbulent time of its history,” said Rossen Milanov, music director and principal symphonic conductor for the CSO, which will begin its performance at 8:15 p.m. tonight in the Amphitheater. 

He said pieces for tonight’ program, particularly Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Symphony No. 31 in D Major, and Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 82, were composed and “custom tailored to the taste of the audience at the time.”

During the late 1780s, Paris was considered “the style capital of Europe” representing “the way people would dress … and all the extravagant tastes (and) lifestyle.” 

The pieces were still developing and changing when first composed, so it made sense for composers to alter the piece for every performance. And some audiences may have been “a little bit more extravagant in taste” which would require adjustments. 

“Both Mozart and Haydn created symphonies that perhaps are a little bit more fitting into that particular expectation of brighter, bigger orchestras than what they had used before in Vienna,” Milanov said, “and perhaps even more use of musical contrast as the way the musical themes were put together in each one of these works.”

As a songwriter or performer might workshop something in front of a live audience, then alter it based on the reactions, in their time, composers would also account for the way their music was received.

“The ink was still fresh on the stage, because the idea of classical music was very different from what we understand now,” Milanov said. “We refer to classical music (as) something that was composed 100 years ago … (and) has a certain museum quality, rather than reflecting the times in which we live.”

The program features a smaller chamber-like CSO ensemble, partly because of the compositions, but also because other CSO musicians will be performing alongside Chautauqua Opera Company for La Tragédie de Carmen.

To begin the evening, the CSO will open with Joseph Bologne’s L’amant Anonyme Overture.

Not only was Bologne a “fantastic composer,” but he was also a Parisian celebrity in a way as a “spectacular violin player, a fencer, a philosopher and a type of a Renaissance man that had quite a bit of an impact on his time,” Milanov said. 

Of the six operas he composed, Bologne’s L’amant Anonyme Overture is the only surviving composition. Originally a play adapted to opera and set to music, the story includes an unusual love triangle with only two characters: the heroine Léontine and her friend Valcour, who is also her secret admirer.

Next, the CSO will perform Hadyn’s piece, later nicknamed “The Bear,” for its finale, featuring droning bass and country carnival atmosphere reminiscent of dancing bears.

Popular with Europeans in 1786, when Symphony No. 82 was written, ensuing traditions endured, even through Milanov’s own childhood in Bulgaria.

“Normally, a bear handler would pass through town and play some sort of a string instrument and the bear would just (be trained to) dance,” he said. 

Finally, the program will conclude with Mozart’s piece also referred to as the “Paris” symphony. At 22 years old in 1778, he composed Symphony No. 31 at the request of the director of a public concerts series, and each of the three movements capture Parisian taste and style through its score.

An ode to the history of Paris during a particular period of about 10 years, Milanov thinks of this program as “a little cultural capsule.”

CSO, Milanov to present Bruckner’s ‘epic’ Symphony No. 4

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The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Rossen Milanov, performs Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 1 last Thursday in the Amphitheater. At 8:15 p.m. tonight in the Amp, the CSO and Milanov will present Bruckner’s Symphony No. 4. Brett Phelps/Staff Photographer

Sarah Russo
Staff writer

Many symphonic concerts pair composers and selections together for a performance of multiple works. But there’s one selection that can stand alone: Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 4 in E Flat Major. 

Bruckner’s will be the only piece played at 8:15 p.m. tonight in the Amphitheater by the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Rossen Milanov, music director and principal symphonic conductor. For Roger Kaza, principal horn for the CSO, the piece holds special nostalgia: He chose to play a portion of it many years ago to audition for the CSO. 

“I remember being very nervous about it because I’d never played the first part at that point,” Kaza said. “But I love this piece … because it’s got so much horn and so much brass and it’s a very epic work.”

Also referred to as “A Knight’s Tale” with a subtitle of “Romantic Symphony,” Bruckner’s Symphony No. 4 tells the story of knights, the magic of nature and the mystical call of the horn all with ancient hunting connotations.

Composed in 1874, the full piece contains four parts, which the CSO will play in its entirety. 

Kaza said Brucker’s composition style isn’t as “connected” as his peers, which sometimes leaves Kaza to wonder: “I don’t know how he got from here to here.” However, he said that may be his only criticism in this piece.

“It’s a little loose, but I find the best way to enjoy it is just be in the moment and then just look at these incredible chord progressions and these beautiful, kind of timeless long stretches of melody,” Kaza said. “It’s a piece you don’t want to be in a hurry for.”

In Symphony No. 4, it’s “almost like (Bruckner’s) improvising on a gigantic orchestral organ … and these amazing, really brilliant chord progressions that ventured pretty far outside of the so-called traditional harmony,” Kaza said.

As Brucker’s symphony takes listeners on a journey throughout nature, Kaza said it made sense Bruckner composed the piece with heavy brass and the French horn, in particular. 

“The horn, when you think about it, was really kind of one of the most quintessential Romantic instruments,” Kaza said. “Any time (a composer) wanted to evoke a noble or woodsy or forest scene, they’d always use the horn.”

Bruckner can be a “very polarizing composer” with some critics opining that Brucker’s music is “boring” and “tedious,” Kaza said. On the other side, there are those who “worship” Bruckner’s work as a composer and musician; Kaza, however, fits in a different space. He said Bruckner’s work can be heard all over the world. 

“I did a trip down the Grand Canyon and those towering walls all around,” Kaza said. “At one point I thought, ‘This canyon is like a Bruckner symphony in geology.’ … It’s got that same sense of spaciousness and grandeur and just timelessness, which Bruckner evokes.”

Putting together a piece that’s nearly an hour long is no easy task. However, Kaza said, after taking solos or chorale tunes separately, at the end of it all — when the musicians achieve a “cohesive, beautiful sound,” particularly with Bruckner returning to the opening theme — there’s nothing quite as rewarding as a musician.

“It’s satisfying to nail all that stuff,” he said. “It’s just fun to hear how everything culminates at the end of the symphony and he’s finally bringing it home where he started. … Any time we play pieces like that, it’s rewarding just because you’re not going to see it for a while.”

With saxophonist Banks, CSO to present new, co-commissioned Childs work of poetry, jazz in exploration of Black experience

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Rossen Milanov, music director and principal symphonic conductor of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, leads musicians in a bow at the close of the CSO’s opening concert of the season June 30 in the Amphitheater. Carrie Legg/Staff Photographer

Sarah Russo
Staff writer

Principal Symphonic Conductor Rossen Milanov and the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra are looking forward to saxophonist Steven Banks’ visit to the grounds for several reasons. Together, Milanov, the CSO and Banks will embark on a work so new, this evening’s concert will be one of its very first performances.

That work is composer Billy Childs’ Concerto for Saxophone and Orchestra, written for Banks and co-commissioned by Chautauqua Institution, and it’s on the program for the CSO’s concert at 8:15 p.m. tonight in the Amphitheater.

Since Childs’ concerto exploring aspects of the African American experience is so new, Milanov said, the orchestra has no recording to reference, only the score.

Banks

“I just have to wait for (Banks) to come here and see what he does with the piece,” Milanov said, adding that the CSO will have the opportunity to make changes and interpretations together at rehearsal. “It’s still a living piece.”

Concerto for Saxophone and Orchestra is the centerpiece of tonight’s program, which opens with Sergei Prokofiev’s Overture on Hebrew Themes and closes with Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 1, Op. 13.

Composed in 1919, Overture on Hebrew Themes premiered to positive reactions, making Prokofiev known as one of the few non-Jewish composers to capture the essence of Eastern-European Yiddish music.

The piece includes a playful dance tune, introduced and expanded by the clarinet, before featuring a second melody, a melancholy lament by the cello. 

Next, the program fast-forwards to this century, showcasing the Concerto for Saxophone and Orchestra.

With an “ambitious blend of feelings and sounds,” Banks’ playing portrays a “deep intimacy” and “sense of vulnerability,” according to The Cleveland Classical.

This performance will bring Milanov and Banks together for the first time, even though the pair have two other future collaborations already planned for the fall.

Milanov is “really looking forward to making music with (Banks)” and “establishing a collaboration,” he said.

“It’s kind of a unique species on its own to have the collaboration of a jazz composer and a saxophone that is sort of used in a less traditional way in the orchestra,” Milanov said.

A musical poem, the piece explores the paradigm of the forced Black American diaspora through the experience of a Black man in America. 

When Banks approached Childs, a five-time Grammy-winning jazz pianist, about creating this piece, the first thing they discussed was the narrative for the work, according to Childs in his program notes for the piece’s world premiere in February with the Kansas City Symphony. 

Inspired by the work of poet Aloysius Bertrand in Ravel’s “Gaspard de la Nuit,” the concerto also follows three separate movements: Motherland, If We Must Die then And I Still Rise.

Motherland, based on “Africa’s Lament” by Nayyirah Waheed, creates a sense of well-being and security, felt by Africans living on the continent, before the saxophone takes an urgent tone as a battle begins. 

The second section, If We Must Die, is based around the poem of the same name by Claude McKay, and imagines the journey of people now forced to become slaves. For example, a back-and-forth between the alto saxophone and orchestra aims to convey confusion, rage and terror as families are broken apart. At the same time, themes of self-love, self-worth and self-determination are still present.

To close the Concerto for Saxophone and Orchestra, the Maya Angelou-influenced And I Still Rise, represents Black empowerment. A focal point for black political and cultural activism, the church is a “sanctuary providing psychological and emotional relief from the particular hardships of Black life in America,” Childs wrote. So, the final section begins with a hymn-like phrase similar to one heard in the first section’s melody. 

As the third section continues, a march featuring “victorious fanfare” concludes the concerto and signifies, as Childs wrote, that “Black people cannot and will not be held to a position of second class citizenship – we will still rise.”

To close the program, the CSO will perform Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 1, which premiered in 1897 but was not heard again for 48 years. Milanov said this is a lesser-known symphony by a familiar composer meant to complement the “symmetry” of the other two.

“The third piece is just like an archaeological discovery,” he said. “(This) particular work is sort of like a little hidden treasure.”

CSO presents ‘explosion of flavors and colors’ with ‘Scheherazade,’ Sibelius

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Illustration by George Koloski / Design Editor

Sarah Russo
Staff writ
er

Two imaginative pieces — one inspired by death and the other by storytelling — diverge in mood, but not in skill, for tonight’s Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra program.

Under the baton of Rossen Milanov, music director and principal symphonic conductor, the CSO will perform at 8:15 p.m. in the Amphitheater. 

The program opens with Finnish composer Jean Sibelius’ Valse Triste, or “sad waltz,” which is paired with Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, Op. 35. 

While Sibelius’ Valse Triste creates a mysterious and eerie feeling, the final selection of Scheherazade provides a contrast, Milanov said.

“Once we get to the second piece on the program, I think that explosion of flavors and colors would be something that would be in a very good contrast with somewhat darker and brooding piece such as Valse Triste,” Milanov said. 

Originally composed for a 1903 production of the play Kuolema, or “Death” in Finnish, by Arvid Järnefelt, the piece captures the sense of haunting memories recollected in old age.

Valse Triste originated as the first of six numbers Sibelius composed as incidental music for the play written by his Sibelius’ brother-in-law. The plot revolves around a denial of death by the play’s protagonist, Paavali, whose dying mother tells him she dreamed of attending a ball. 

When the son falls asleep, Death enters and the mother dances with him, thinking it is her deceased husband. Then the son wakes up to find her dead. 

In the premiere in 1903, Kuolema’s six pieces were originally scored for strings including bass drum and church bells. In 1904, Sibelius revised Valse Triste, and added one flute, two clarinets, two horns, and timpani to the score. 

“The bigger weight of the piece falls on the string section, because it has a relatively smaller size ensemble without that much, I would say, flavors. … You have only a flute, a clarinet, two horns and timpani,” Milanov said. 

Valse Triste features many efforts of resolution and a sense of unsettled harmony. Patterns in the rhythm also blur the meter to produce the effect of a hesitation waltz, Milanov explained. Sibelius’ Valse Triste presents a false sense of celebration immediately with the opening waltz theme. An eerier section begins to drown out the other themes, leading to a dramatic climax. The melody eventually dies away in a dark cadence for solo string quartet, Milanov shared. 

While Sibelius’ Valse Triste creates a mysterious and eerie feeling, Scheherazade is distinctly different.

 , Op. 35 is based on the tales of The Arabian Nights, originally portrayed by Rimsky-Korsakov’s as general and atmospheric. But, it evolved into storytelling in musical form with each movement of the suite bearing the name of one of the tales.

“It’s very intriguing work … and also a beautiful symphonic work that has its own symphonic logic and uses these recurring themes,” Milanov said. 

As the story of The Arabian Nights goes, Scheherazade is the young bride of the Sultan. After one of his wives cheats on him, he decides to take a new wife every day and have her executed the next morning. But it all stops with Scheherazade. 

She marries the Sultan in order to save all future young women from this fate. She tells the Sultan fascinating stories, leaving him in such suspense each night that he can’t execute her the next morning for fear of not hearing the end of the story. After 1,001 of these well-told tales, the Sultan relents. 

“It features great instrumental solos for almost any instrument in the orchestra … and there will be something very difficult and very beautiful and challenging,” Milanov said. “So it’s kind of a great groundbreaking piece because it was conceived not only as a piece of storytelling with music, but also to display a purely virtuosic nature of what the instrument could do.”

Jamestown native Merchant to perform songs from latest album with CSO

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Sarah Russo
Staff Writer

Not only does Chautauqua County hold a special place for singer-songwriter Natalie Merchant as a Jamestown native – Chautauqua Institution was the first exposure she had to orchestral music.

She said it is a “thrill” to be able to perform again on the same stage, for the first time in 10 years, that she admired as a child.

“My mother would take me to the symphony all the time,” Merchant said. “Just sitting on those yellow benches, my little heart exploding with emotion … from the time I was 7 ‘til probably 20.”

Merchant

Under the baton of Principal Pops Conductor Stuart Chafetz, Merchant will join the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra at 8:15 p.m. Saturday in the Amp.

Released in April, Merchant’s newest album, Keep Your Courage, features many songs with orchestral arrangements. And Merchant is no stranger to orchestras. She played her first show like this back in 2008 with the Boston Symphony and has since performed nearly 80 shows with orchestras. 

Merchant said she wants to be “faithful to the record” and perform with symphonies as much as possible. And when she’s not doing that, she’s performing with her own string quartet. 

When she was 17 and a student at Jamestown Community College, Merchant joined a band that went on to become 10,000 Maniacs. The group released four top 50 albums before Merchant left in 1995 to begin a solo career, which has included numerous accolades and awards including Billboard Hot 100 hits and multiple platinum records. But she said it has all led up to this moment and, Keep Your Courage, her eighth studio album, might be the best work she’s done yet.

“I feel like this album and this tour is the culmination of 40 years of experience as a songwriter, as a recording artist, as a performer,” Merchant said. “I feel like I’m kind of at the height of my skills. … I still have lots of energy and vitality.”

Saturday’s performance will feature new songs from Keep Your Courage and “gorgeous arrangements” played by the CSO. Merchant hopes the audience will be inspired by the program. 

“Even if people are familiar with the material, I think the way that the arrangements are constructed, there are just many passages that are just achingly beautiful,” Merchant said. “If you do know the music, then the combination of the words and the music will be very moving.”

Deborah Sunya Moore, senior vice president and chief program officer at Chautauqua, said Merchant’s cerebral approach to songwriting should appeal to Chautauquans.

“She’s just a perfect match for Chautauqua: A really sensitive songwriter, a beautiful musician and someone that’s also very committed to social justice, making the world a better place,” Moore said. “Hearing that all on stage is going to be spectacular.”

While the set list for the performance is a surprise, Moore said songs from Keep Your Courage, such as “Sister Tilly,” showcases the singer-songwriter’s thoughtful approach, encouraging concertgoers to “think beyond ourselves, to think about what they went through for us and how we live that out and how we can celebrate their lives.”

In 2018, while Merchant was in London, she was diagnosed with a degenerative spinal disease and needed to have emergency surgery. The six-hour operation involved making an incision below her throat and shunting her vocal cords to the side while surgeons removed three bones from her spine. Once Merchant was awake from the surgery, she discovered she could no longer sing.

 “It took me to a place of panic,” Merchant told The Guardian in an interview in April. “It made me wish I had made more records.”

Luckily for Merchant, singing has become just one of many passions in her life. She has also worked for more than three years fighting fracking across New York State and made a protest film about it. Merchant also spent a full year working on domestic violence issues in the Hudson Valley, producing and directing a film about that as well. She also curated a 10-disc box set and recorded a collection of songs based on old poems. 

Through it all, she has been raising her teenage daughter as a single mother. Writing new music and touring was not necessarily at the top of her to-do list. 

“The reason I didn’t do a lot of original writing was I require a lot of solitude and usually in a very foul mood,” Merchant said. “When I have to write, it takes just a lot of focus, and I have to put myself into a self-induced trance to really do the kind of writing that I want to do. Once my daughter was off to college, I had the time and space to both write the record and record it and now tour.”

During the pandemic, when Merchant wasn’t able to sing, a close friend gave her a book of narrative poetry called The Long Take by Scottish poet Robin Robertson.

“I remember opening the book, reading the first chapter and writing to him immediately,” Merchant told The Guardian. “I then sent him a copy of my box set, he sent me some of his other books, and I just fell in love with language again.” 

Soon after, Merchant regained her voice, and she began to write again, penning songs inspired by those conversations with Robertson. 

Focused on love in many forms, the songs on Keep Your Courage combine traditional folk with chamber pop, orchestration and soul.

“It’s almost as if I have to invent a new word to describe the music on this album,” Merchant told The Guardian. “I don’t even know what to call it.”

Moore said Saturday’s performance will impart a valuable message, particularly during a time when the COVID-19 pandemic is still affecting people, who may still be processing its emotional effects.

“When I think of Keep Your Courage, I think it’s a message of strength and courage,” she said. “ … It is a message of love.” 

The universal language of music, paired with Merchant’s lyrics, allow her to speak volumes, Moore said. Merchant’s songs are something to be cherished and listened to with a close ear and open mind.

“With artists like Natalie, she draws us to really look … and own where we are broken, and own where we are hurt and encourages us to lift ourselves out of that,” Moore said. “So many of her songs are about acknowledging where we are and encouraging us to meet each other there, and then encouraging us to lift each other out of that with love and connection.” 

While Merchant is visiting her native Chautauqua County, she will also be meeting nominees for the YWCA’s Women of Achievement awards, which recognize women who have demonstrated extraordinary achievements throughout their career and community involvement.

Under Muffitt’s baton, CSO to shine ‘spotlight’ on overlooked composer

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Members of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra play during their show on June 30, 2023, at the Amphitheater. CARRIE LEGG/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Sarah Russo
Staff Writer

During the early 20th century, the influence of African American culture and jazz grabbed the attention of composers such as Maurice Ravel and George Gershwin.

“The world had never seen such a broad range of musical styles as what emerged at this time,” said Timothy Muffitt, artistic director of the School of Music and conductor of the Music School Festival Orchestra.“I enjoy concerts that highlight that feature, that do a little bit of a time capsule look at the early 20th century.”

Muffit will help highlight this transformative time, leading the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra in its performance of pieces by Florence Price and Igor Stravinsky at 8:15 p.m. tonight in the Amphitheater. 

“It’s about the broad range of musical styles,” Muffitt said. “(These are) just two dots on the plot of many others. I think this is just an interesting program in that it takes a look at a couple of very influential elements of the evolution of music in the first half of the 20th century.”

The program will open with Price’s Symphony No. 1 in E minor, premiered by the Chicago Symphony in 1933, making it the first symphony composed by a Black woman to be performed by a major American orchestra. 

For decades, it was nearly impossible to hear a piece of price’s music. Despite her immense talent and drive, many classical music performers and gatekeepers put her aside, and her work failed to gain traction with the large, almost exclusively white institutions that had the power to catapult her to the mainstream. 

As Price herself wrote in a letter to famed conductor Serge Koussevitzky, “I have two handicaps — those of sex and race.”

“Certainly Florence Price was a pioneer, to put it mildly, and she was an inspired musician — an inspired, prolific composer,” Muffitt said. “Naturally, she had a hard time getting her music played. People wouldn’t look at it, they wouldn’t even consider it, but she’s a composer of just extraordinary historical significance.” 

As an African American female composer of the 20th century, Price comes from a different background than her fellow composers of the time period. She uses her own individual perspective, while integrating a well-known and well-established musical vocabulary. 

“I think that’s where a lot of the interest in her music lies,” Muffitt said. “It’s not like she’s inventing a whole new musical language. She’s using a language that’s already established. How that comes through in her music, … she’s speaking a language we recognize, but it has an inflection and a spirit that is fresh still today, even though this piece is almost 100 years old.” 

Born in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1887, Price wrote four symphonies: Symphony No. 1 in E minor won first prize in the Rodman Wanamaker Competition in 1932; Symphony No. 2 in G minor is presumed lost; Symphony No. 3 in C minor; and Symphony No. 4 in D minor. 

Fortunately, in recent years, there has been renewed interest in her work. A recording of her symphonies performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra was nominated for a Grammy in 2022. Her music has been performed by the San Francisco Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and now the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra. 

“We definitely hear her heritage in the music,” Muffitt said. “Her heritage is very much at the forefront of the music, but that isn’t what it’s all about either. I thought (Symphony No. 1) was the one that would have the most immediate impact on (Chautauqua) who perhaps aren’t familiar with her works.”

The program concludes with Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. Stravinsky, born in Oranienbaum, Russia in 1882, has become an influential and well-known composer of classical music.

Muffitt said the influence of a “masterpiece” like Stravistky’s Firebird means that no matter how many times musicians perform it, they relish the experience. 

“It’s a work that we as professional musicians have performed probably countless times in our careers and it never gets old,” he said. “I’m excited to be sharing this music with Florence Price. She has had quite a renaissance and much deserved.”

Even with such differing backgrounds, pairing pieces from a white Russian man and a Black American woman works for many reasons, Muffitt said.

“They were both pioneers in their own way,” he said. “Stravinsky invented a new musical language. … Price is using a language that’s already established, but she’s coming from a completely unique perspective as an artist.”

CSO to take audience on musical fairy tale adventure featuring narration, ‘stunning’ anime-style visuals

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Merregnon Land of Silence

Sarah Russo
Staff writer

The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra is taking traditional concerts to the next level with this weekend’s performance of Merregnon: Land of Silence, a symphonic fairy tale.

The CSO holds the honor of being the first orchestra to present the English-language version of the piece at 7:30 p.m. Saturday in the Amphitheater. The program will open with Edvard Grieg’s Peer Gynt Suite No. 1, Op. 46.

Music by internationally renowned composer Yoko Shimomura and story by popular German children’s author Frauke Angel combine to create a concert experience that takes audiences on a magical journey using music, art and narration.

Laura Savia, vice president of performing and visual arts at Chautauqua Institution, called the score “incredible” and agreed with Rossen Milanov, the CSO’s music director and principal symphonic conductor, that it would be a good fit for Chautauqua.

“Maestro Milanov and I both found the score to be really sophisticated enough for our seasoned orchestra patrons, but also accessible enough for kids and family audiences,” she said. 

The piece includes anime-style images that Savia called “stunning,” along with live storytelling.

Broadway and award-winning film actress Tina Benko, who will also appear with the Chautauqua Theater Company later this season, serves as the narrator.

“It is a piece that uses the entire symphony orchestra beautifully,” Savia said.

Shimomura created a melody for each of the story’s characters. The score showcases a diversity of sound, penned to complement the various orchestral sections as well as their soloists.

“The journey that the protagonist goes on feels like an adventure,” Savia said. “And the music, while certainly not video game music, is composed by someone who has built her reputation on scoring beloved video games.”

Shimomura is known for her work on multimillion-selling video games, including Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy XV. With fans around the world, she holds the honor of being the highest placed female composer ever in the Classic FM Hall of Fame, the world’s largest annual poll of classical music tastes.

“To me, when I listen to her score, there is an elegance to it. There is a power to it,” Savia said. “She is adept at utilizing every section, every instrument in the orchestra. But there’s also a sense of play. There’s also a sense of wit and whimsy.”

In first performance of summer, Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra to set tone for season

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Nearly a year ago to the day, the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra and Music Director Rossen Milanov open their season June 30, 2022, in the Amphitheater. Georgia Pressley/Daily File Photo

Sarah Russo
Staff writer

It’s just the beginning for the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, a staple of the summer season at Chautauqua Institution. Under the direction of Music Director Rossen Milanov, the CSO will kick off its summer schedule tonight at 8:15 p.m. in the Amphitheater, with a program that is wide ranging, festive and beautiful. 

The evening, and the CSO’s 2023 season, as always, opens with Star Spangled Banner composed by John Stafford Smith and arranged by Walter Damrosch. 

The program is followed by Beethoven’s Leonore Overture No. 3, Op. 72b; Julia Perry’s Study for Orchestra; and two Elgar works —  Enigma Variations and Pomp and Circumstance March. 

“The program is quite varied, acting as a preview of the season as a whole which focuses on great classics (Beethoven),  new discoveries (Julia Perry) and majestic, sonic tapestries (Elgar),” Milanov said.

Lenelle Morse, a CSO musician of 31 years who sits in the first violin section, said that as the program unfolds with Beethoven and Elgar, the evening includes something for everyone with some recognizable movements like Nimrod, the slow movement in the middle of Elgar’s Enigma Variations

“It’s a wonderful program to grab the audience,” Morse said. “And opening night, the audience is always so appreciative, and we love hearing that.” 

Perry’s piece is the first of the “new discoveries” the CSO will present this season. It is a new piece for the CSO, at a tightly structured seven minutes. Perry was an African American composer, born in Lexington, Kentucky in 1924, who pushed the boundaries of gender and race during a time when few composers of her background gained recognition. 

Throughout the summer season and its many performances, the CSO is the foundation of “not just the entertainment, but the enrichment of this community,” Morse said. “There are plenty of people on the grounds who come to Chautauqua partly because of the orchestra and to have us in residence for the entire summer, it’s a wonderful thing for this community.” 

For Morse, her work with the CSO has become a lot more than just performing. 

“I’ve played in this orchestra longer than any other orchestra and it’s home,” she said. “I love playing here. It’s a wonderful orchestra and these are some of my dearest friends.”

Milanov, who hopes Chautauquans feel “elated and happy to be back in the wonderful Amphitheater,” calls Chautauqua his “summer-music home,” and is excited to be back.

“Performing on stage with the wonderful musicians of the CSO for first time in the season is always exciting and full of energy musical experience,” he said.

In evening including Mozart, Kaza to solo with CSO on Schickele’s ‘Pentangle’

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Peter Schickele is many things — a bassoonist, radio personality and a prolific composer of more than 100 works for everyone and everything, from classical music to television shows. But many likely know him by a different moniker: P.D.Q. Bach, and for his comedic compositions that range from satirical to charming, folksy to zany. 

Roger Kaza, principal horn for the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, has been a fan of Schickele’s work “forever,” and has even worked with the composer — who he described as a “soft spoken but hilarious guy” — once during a performance in St. Louis, where Kaza also serves as principal horn of the St. Louis Symphony. Now, the horn player joins his colleagues in the CSO as a soloist on Schickele’s “Pentangle: Five Songs for Horn and Orchestra” at 8:15 p.m. tonight in the Amphitheater. 

Under the baton of Music Director Rossen Milanov, the CSO’s concert is titled “Wit and Genius” — and with Mozart’s Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550, serving as the back half of the evening, it might be tempting to argue that Schickele is the “wit” and Mozart the “genius,” but Kaza was quick to point out Schickele’s prowess.

“Schickele comes from a time when there was such widespread musical literacy, that when you talked about (the composer’s) ‘Iphigenia in Brooklyn,’ or ‘The Abduction of Figaro’, everyone would get the joke,” Kaza said (alas, despite fervent research, this writer still doesn’t get the joke). “It was a rarified, sophisticated humor, but incredibly funny to music lovers. He has very thorough composing chops. He could have gone ‘serious’ but that wasn’t his calling.”  

Schickele used “pentangle” to refer to a group of five songs, Kaza said — the piece has five moments — but also as a reference to the 1960s folk rock group of the same name.

“The work indeed has sections that rock and jam, and the final song is reminiscent of an English ballad that a folk rock group might sing,” he said.

In the third movement, Kaza must play multiphonic chords on his horn — a tradition that goes way back.

“The German composer Carl Maria von Weber wrote them into his horn concertino; they are definitely challenging to pull off,” he said. “Another thing (Schickele) requires, in the last of the five songs, is that the performer actually sing the song. OK — I’m not a trained singer, but everyone can sing, right?”

Typically performed with a healthy dose of ham, “Pentangle” is a concerto for orchestra and horn, and while Kaza said Chautauquans can certainly expect some fun, not everything Schickele composes is “one constant joke.”

“‘Pentangle’ has contemplative moments, exuberant moments, wistful moments, but no tragedy or pathos. It’s music that doesn’t take itself too seriously,” Kaza said. 

In comparison, pathos and poignancy abound in the Mozart, making the evening balanced in a way audiences may find restorative.

“It’s going to be a lot of fun,” Kaza said, “and I think it’s just what Chautauqua needs about now.”

 

Pops conductor Chafetz, with Jenkins, Williams, to pay tribute to iconic Aretha in special Jamestown show, 1st-time off-grounds CSO concert in 91-year history

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The Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra will bring its unmistakable sound and artistry to downtown Jamestown’s Reg Lenna Center for the Arts with a performance featuring the music of Aretha Franklin. 

The concert is at 8 p.m. tonight at the Reg Lenna Center for The Arts in nearby Jamestown, New York, and titled “Aretha: A Tribute.” Under the baton of the CSO’s Principal Pops Conductor Stuart Chafetz, the evening features all-star singer and Broadway favorite Capathia Jenkins, who first performed at Chautauqua in 2018, along with Darryl Williams. The program includes iconic hits such as “Respect,” “Think,” “A Natural Woman,” “Chain of Fools,” “Amazing Grace,” and many more.

Best known for her work on Broadway, Jenkins has appeared in such shows like Caroline, or Change, Newsies, and Martin Short’s Fame Becomes Me. Williams has toured extensively in the Broadway hit Smokey Joe’s Cafe with the legendary Gladys Knight, and has performed in the Off-Broadway shows Mama I Want to Sing and Big Mama Stringbean: the life of Ethel Waters

This performance represents a first-time undertaking for the 91-year-old symphony, the resident orchestra of Chautauqua Institution. It follows the Institution’s vision to expand its impact in the region and beyond by taking Chautauqua’s celebrated mission and programs beyond the grounds of the Institution.

Admission to this performance is not included in the Traditional Gate Pass; tickets can be purchased through the Reg Lenna Center for the Arts box office at 716-484-7070 or in person at the Reg Lenna Center for the Arts Box Office at 116 East 3rd Street in Jamestown, up until the time of the show.

In addition to support from The Chautauqua/Jamestown Fund for Education, Religion and the Performing Arts, this concert is made possible by the Fund for Downtown Programming awarded through the Jamestown Local Development Corporation and made possible by the Downtown Revitalization Initiative.

 Editor’s note: This event did not take place as scheduled, as many Institution events were canceled following an incident in the Amphitheater on Friday, August 12.

In evening of ‘Passion and Struggle,’ Alexander Gavrylyuk to join CSO for Prokofiev concerto

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One of the most important composers to Alexander Gavrylyuk — a composer he grew up listening to, in fact — is Sergei Prokofiev.

“Since he was born in Ukraine, same as myself, there was always this special link,” said Gavrylyuk, a Ukrainian-born Australian pianist. “My father’s side of the family comes from the very region (Prokofiev) was born in. Prokofiev’s music, I find, is always very theatrical, very charismatic, very satirical.”

At 8:15 p.m. Thursday, July 7, in the Amphitheater, Gavrylyuk will perform Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Flat’s major, op. 10, alongside the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Music Director Rossen Milanov. Following Prokofiev, the CSO takes on Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 8. Together, the evening’s performance is titled “Passion and Struggle.” 

“(The Prokofiev concerto) is a work that he composed when he was only 20 years old, and he performed it at the graduation for his conservatory in St. Petersburg,” Gavrylyuk said. “What’s interesting about Prokofiev is that he was actually born where some of the fiercest fighting is happening right now, in the Donbas area.”

For Gavrylyuk, the concerto is an optimistic work, one with plenty of musical jokes peppered throughout the piece that he said he’s excited for Chautauquans to experience.

“There’s a lot of humor in this piece,” he said. “But there are also quite a few daring musical ideas that Prokofiev purposefully included in defiance of the conservatory’s teachers. It’s a daring work that was very successful, in fact.”

As a performer, Gavrylyuk said one of his most important goals is to find the artistic truth behind a given piece of music.

“By learning about the background and history for a composition like this, I can more easily achieve that goal,” he said. “And by trying to get inside Prokofiev’s mind and inside his emotional world, and by imagining the reasons and inspirations that he had at the time, I can more accurately play his music.”

Performing with the CSO, Gavrylyuk said, is “a gratifying experience,” in part because of how in tune the two musical entities are.

“We’ve only had one rehearsal, but because we’ve performed together so many times, we really know each other’s way of playing,” he said. “It’s a really organic kind of process every time we play together. It’s a wonderful orchestra with a truly positive psychology and approach to rehearsing. They share the Chautauquan mindset: a nice, really inspiring energy that occurs on stage, that you can feel.”

Gavrylyuk said that even though he performs constantly with many different orchestras, playing with the CSO is “very personal.”

“I’m so excited to share this music with everyone,” he said.

Under Timothy Muffitt’s baton, MSFO opens season

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After a summer of virtual courses through CHQ Assembly in 2020, and a shorter season with a smaller orchestra due to COVID-19 protocols last summer, at long last the Music School Festival Orchestra is back to its full form, and set to have their opening performance at 8:15 p.m. Tuesday, July 5, in the Amphitheater under the baton of Maestro Timothy Muffitt.

Following a week of rehearsals, “the orchestra is showing remarkable promise,” said Muffitt, MSFO artistic director, and he anticipates that tonight’s performance won’t just be a “spectacular program, but a great start to an exciting season.”

Opening night is also a long-awaited opportunity for repertoire that’s been planned since before the COVID-19 pandemic. The evening opens with Zhou Tian’s “Gift,” and then segues into Bartók’s Piano Concerto No. 2, “a pre-pandemic holdover,” Muffitt said, with pianist Chengcheng Yao, who is an alum of the School of Music, and the winner of the 2019 Sigma Alpha Iota Piano Competition.

But looming large among the planned pre-pandemic repertoire is the closing number: Saint-Saën’s Symphony No. 3 in C Minor, op. 78 — known simply as the “Organ Symphony.”

“In 2020, we intended to play it in memory of Chautauqua’s long-time and beloved organist Jared Jacobsen, whom we lost in 2019,” Muffitt said. “We are staying with that plan, and dedicated the performance to Jared’s memory.”

At the Massey Memorial Organ, with the full backing of the MSFO, will be Josh Stafford, director of sacred music and the first-ever holder of the Jared Jacobsen Chair for the Organ, named so in honor of his mentor. 

“It’s always a thrill to play the Massey alongside an orchestra,” Stafford said. “An instrument known well for its ability to lead hymn singing, accompany choirs and play solo repertoire, it is equally well suited to functioning as a concert hall organ with orchestra.”

For the organ’s part, the Saint-Saëns piece is best known for one particular chord, Stafford said — “a glorious C Major chord on full organ that comes seemingly out of nowhere. … But for me, the best moments are the softer ones, when the Massey has the chance to accompany and blend with the various colors of the orchestra.”

It’s not the first time this season Stafford has collaborated with students in the MSFO; several members joined him and Nicholas Stigall, this year’s organ scholar, for the first Sunday Service of Worship and Sermon in the Amp. For that morning, they performed Strauss’ Feierlicher Einzug TrV 224 “Solemn Entry.” To share the stage, in any capacity, with the musicians of the MSFO, Stafford said, is “such a joy.”

“Joy” is a recurring theme among School of Music administration, including both Muffitt and Schools of Performing and Visual Arts Manager Sarah Malinoski-Umberger.

“The fact that we have gotten everyone here, and on stage together, is monumental,” Malinoski-Umberger said. “These musicians are incredibly talented, and by far, the most impressive pool of applicants we have ever fielded.”

This is the first time that many of the students have played in a full orchestra since the pandemic began, she said, which meant that the School of Music planning for 2022 was “an ambitious plan that took many, many months, and many amazing people to pull off.”

“Having the full group back allows us to return to our full summer of programming, including two full chamber music sessions, and collaborations with our School of Dance and our Opera Conservatory,” she said. “And getting to introduce them all to Chautauqua on opening night? It’s a joy.”

Stuart Chafetz, Dee Donasco reunite for CSO Independence Day Celebration

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It’s been three years since Principal Pops Conductor Stuart Chafetz stood at his stand in front of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra for the annual Independence Day Celebration, before a full audience and the sweeping, unfurling of the American flag as the evening’s grand finale.

With a truncated season in 2021, and the talents of the Music School Festival Orchestra and School of Music Voice Program taking the patriotic reins instead, this summer Chafetz is back, with the full contingent of the CSO and soprano Dee Donasco, for this year’s Fourth of July festivities. They take the stage at 8:15 p.m. Monday, July 4, in the Amphitheater.

DONASCO

“I think the most exciting thing is that it’s been three summers to get back to this tradition of just a good time, and fun, and having the whole family be able to enjoy this,” Chafetz said. 

“We’ve been waiting so long to enjoy this wonderful, festive weekend here. There’s not any other place like it. Chautauqua — it’s the greatest.”

The evening is packed with Chautauqua favorites, from Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes Forever,” the “Armed Forces Salute” and “God Bless America,” to the paper-bag-popping bonanza of Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture.” (If that’s not enough of a bonanza, fittingly, the evening also includes David Rose’s theme to the long-running television hit “Bonanza.”)

The rest of the line-up features Jager’s “Esprit de Corps,” Sousa’s “The Liberty Bell” march, “Ah! Je Veux Vivre” from Gounod’s opera Romeo et Juliette, and some musical theater favorites: “Seventy-Six Trombones” from The Music Man, and “I Could Have Danced All Night” from My Fair Lady. The theme from “Bewitched” is also on deck, as is beloved American composer John Williams’ “Can You Read My Mind?,” the love theme from “Superman.”

But Chafetz and Donasco have a few tricks up their sleeves for the program, and the audience will just have to wait to hear for themselves.

“They’re meant to be surprises, so we’ll just crank it out and have a party,” Chafetz said.

Donasco is no stranger to Chautauqua, or to performing with Chafetz. In fact, the two were just in Ohio on Saturday for the Columbus Symphony’s Patriotic Pops concert. On Sunday, the duo drove from Columbus, where Chafetz is also principal pops conductor, to Chautauqua. For both of them, it’s a bit of a homecoming.

“The beautiful part of all of this is that we met at Chautauqua in 2012,” Chafetz said. 

Donasco was a Chautauqua Opera Company Apprentice Artist and a featured soloist in the CSO, where Chafetz was timpanist — a percussive presence he held at Chautauqua for 22 years.

“She was singing this beautiful, classical aria, and then later in the summer we did Opera Pops,” Chafetz said. “And I couldn’t believe it was the same person — the ability to come from a legit opera tune, and then a pops performance like nobody’s business? It blew me away.”

In the years since leaving Chautauqua, Donasco has performed with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Chattanooga Symphony & Opera, Nashville Opera, North Carolina Symphony and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, including several engagements with Chafetz.

“She’s just terrific, and to be able to have her back where we met — it’s full circle,” he said.

Music is a way to bring everybody together, Chafetz said, especially now that he and the CSO are “back, after all this wild time.”

“I’ve missed Chautauqua in its capacity,” he said. “The July 4 concert is going to be one of those wonderful experiences that we’ve missed, to have together. I’m just so excited to be back.”

CSO, under Rossen Milanov’s baton, returns for sweeping start to ‘22

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After a year of virtual-only performances in 2020, and a shorter schedule with smaller groups of musicians in 2021, summer 2022 represents a full return to the Chautauqua Institution’s largest stage for the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra — and it all begins tonight.

Under the baton of Music Director Rossen Milanov, now in his eighth season at the helm of the orchestra, the CSO will kick off their summer at 8:15 p.m. Thursday, June 30, in the Amphitheater, with a program that is both timely and sweeping but, most of all, joyful.

“This celebratory opening of the CSO is particularly joyful as we return to a full season of soloists and repertoire selected to inspire, comfort, engage, introduce, challenge and most importantly — to gather us together to listen and enjoy in a shared space,” said Deborah Sunya Moore, senior vice president and chief programming officer. 

The evening, and the CSO’s 2022 season, opens with the National Anthem, composed by John Stafford Smith and arranged by Walter Damrosch. “The Star-Spangled Banner,” penned first in 1814 by Francis Scott Key, was officially made the anthem in 1931; but it was President Woodrow Wilson’s U.S. Bureau of Education that tasked a small group of musicians, Damrosch among them, to agree upon a standardized version and official designation. Even earlier, it was one of Key’s relatives who realized the cadence of the poet’s stanzas fit the melody of an already-popular tune from the late 1700s: Smith’s “The Anacreontic Song.”

The composition the CSO will play tonight draws on all of these sources. Immediately following the playing of the National Anthem, those sources feed into yet another, with composer Jessie Montgomery’s 2014 work “Banner,” which is a tribute to both “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and the Black National Anthem: “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” by J. Rosamond Johnson and James Weldon Johnson. The two songs share the same phrase structure, Montgomery has noted.

It’s a program coupling Milanov is eager for Chautauqua to experience.

“I’m so much looking forward to the drumroll of the National Anthem,” Milanov said, and then noted the shift the program represents. “Jessie Montgomery’s ‘Banner’ reimagines ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ by infusing it with multi-cultural elements that pretty much mirror the rich tapestry of cultures in present-day America.”

Montgomery is an acclaimed composer and violinist, whose honors include the ASCAP Foundation Leonard Bernstein Award and the Sphinx Organization’s Medal of Excellence. 

Long affiliated with frequent Chautauqua program collaborator, The Sphinx Organization, Montgomery served as composer-in-residence for the organization’s touring ensemble, the Sphinx Virtuosi. 

In 2009, she was commissioned by the Providence String Quartet and Community MusicWorks to write “Anthem,” to mark the 200th anniversary of Key’s poem, and as a tribute to President Barack Obama’s election. That work is among numerous other commissions, and Montgomery told Cincinnati Public Radio — following the 2022 Cincinnati May Festival, where another piece, “I Have Something to Say,” was performed — that her booked schedule “represents an overall interest and investment in American music, and what young American composers have to offer.”

Following “Banner,” the CSO’s evening concludes with Finnish composer Jean Sibelius’ Symphony No. 2, which Milanov called a “defiant” work that is “patriotic and triumphant.”

“It’s a fitting opening, displaying the power, virtuosity, and emotional depth of our orchestra,” he said.

In a later addition to the evening’s program, the CSO will perform Edward Elgar’s Nimrod Variation, in honor of several CSO musicians who have passed in the last year, including percussionist Ron Barnett, who was with the CSO for 56 years; Fred Boyd, tuba player of 35 years; clarinetist Ray Schroeder, whose tenure was 44 years; Marie Shmorhun, cellist for 49 years; and Chaim Zemach, cellist of 44 years. 

Milanov said the CSO can’t wait to share a full schedule of “meaningful musical experiences” with Chautauqua this summer. 

As it prepares to open its summer season, Moore had one wish for both the orchestra, and Chautauqua.

“May this opening night,” she said, “begin a season of orchestral music that makes our lives more complete and more beautiful.”

An American celebration: Honoring Fitzgerald, American songbook, CSO closes season with Jenkins, Chafetz

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NICHOLE JIANG – STAFF WRITER

Capathia Jenkins performs her show “From Brooklyn to Broadway” on July 30, 2018, in the Amphitheater. Jenkins returns for the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra’s final performance of the 2021 season at 8:15 p.m. Saturday in the Amp. RILEY ROBINSON/DAILY FILE PHOTO

“The Great American Songbook,” consisting of songs that transcend time, was the foundation of jazz music from the 1920s and 1930s. Saturday’s performance is not only a celebration of music and musical legends, but it marks the end of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra’s 2021 season. In a tribute to Ella Fitzgerald, “The First Lady of Song” and iconic American music, the CSO, led by Principal Pops Conductor Stuart Chafetz, will be joined by Capathia Jenkins at 8:15 p.m. Saturday in the Amphitheater. 

Jenkins, a Brooklyn-born actress and singer, has performed all over the world with orchestras such as Hong Kong Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony and Cleveland Orchestra. She has also been featured in several Broadway roles including Medda in Newsies and Harriet Jackson in The Civil War. Jenkins proves she can do it all as she can also be heard on film soundtracks like “Nine,” “Chicago” and “Legally Blonde 2.” 

Jenkins has performed at Chautauqua twice in the past, and she enjoys coming back each and every time. 

“The very first time I was up in Chautauqua, I was so blown away by it. It just feels like a place that’s sort of back in time. It really felt like this nostalgic and really happy place,” Jenkins said. “I think that this sets it apart from other places in the country. And then particularly to perform here, I think that the Amphitheater is so beautiful.” 

“It’s such a lovely venue, and then the audience is just so appreciative, warm and kind. So for me, it’s like standing onstage and just having a big ol’ warm hug.”

Jenkins is also excited to be back performing live with the CSO and Chafetz. 

“Stuart’s one of my favorite people in the world,” Jenkins said. “He’s one of my favorite conductors and it’s just an honor to share the stage with (the CSO).”

The excitement runs both ways — the CSO can’t wait to create music with Jenkins again. 

“I’ve been waiting for Capathia Jenkins to come back since she was here a few years ago. She just tore the roof off of the place. She impressed every one of us,” said Beth Robinson, harpist. “She’s a phenomenal musician, and playing with Stu is also such a high for us because he’s at the top of his game with pops concerts. To have this concert end this season is very exciting for us.”

Saturday’s concert will be memorable, Chafetz said, not just because of the music being performed but because of the ability Jenkins has to make a lasting impression on whatever stage she sets foot on. 

“I’m actually the most excited about this concert because she’s just so good at this. She’s good at everything, but this in particular, it’s right in her wheelhouse,” Chafetz said. “She’s also a beautiful person inside and out. She can sing. She can blow the roof off the place because she’s just a powerhouse, and that’s the cool thing that she just brings everybody in with her abilities. She’s that kind of a performer, and she sings with so much passion, emotion and musicality and quite frankly, I get chills whenever I work with her, because she’s so gifted. And we just have a really wonderful connection.”

The CSO performing live with Jenkins is a perfect merging of talent where each side elevates the other in a way that will captivate the audience. 

“A lot of my career was on Broadway, so that’s a different feeling when you have an orchestra that’s typically in the pit. But the thing about a symphony is that you’re on stage with them, and it’s typically 60, 70, 80 pieces,” Jenkins said. “And at the heart of who I am is this little Black girl from Brooklyn, New York, and so I get on stage and I’m standing there, in my pretty dress, and this orchestra begins my intro, and it’s just like, oh my god, I get to do this. It really is exciting and thrilling and it’s like nothing else. The live orchestra is just wonderful and glorious.”

The performance will begin with “The Star Spangled Banner” and will then jump right into familiar tunes from composers like George Gershwin that make up The Great American Songbook, as well as songs honoring jazz and Ella Fitzgerald. 

“I always look forward to playing Gershwin’s music. Some of his songs and melodies are so beautifully written,” said Lars Kirvan, cellist. “He’s a jazzy composer, but he was also very melodic in his writing, with very catchy tunes that people can easily relate to and sing along to. It’s familiar, just as Beethoven is to the classical repertoire.”

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Iconic songs on the program include “Goody Goody,” “A-Tisket, A-Tasket,” “Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered” and “Strike Up The Band.”

“I personally love ‘Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered.’ That is absolutely the most gorgeous thing that I have conducted with Capathia,” Chafetz said. “I love it all, but that one in particular is extremely beautiful, slow and sensuous. It’s pure velvet.”

Jenkins is also looking forward to not just performing these legendary songs and honoring Fitzgerald, but putting pieces of herself in as well. 

“It’s about Ella, but it’s also about The Great American Songbook. They don’t write songs like this anymore, and when you get a person like Ella Fitzgerald singing that music, she would sing the ink off the page, as I like to say. Then she would take it and make it her own so she made a little flourish, or she might scat a little bit,” Jenkins said. “Often people say to me, ‘Oh, are you trying to imitate her?’ and that is certainly not what I’m trying to do — but I think we are kindred spirits. I do have a pure joy for this music.”

Jenkins has always looked up to this music and the musicians of this time and can’t wait to bring the audience back to this era of jazz and catchy tunes. 

“You hear this music, and people in the audience are thrust back to this time when they were younger, or when they used to go out dancing. So, it really is this magical time capsule — and it’s the reason why these songs have stood the test of time,” Jenkins said. “Some of the arrangements that we will do are original Ella Fitzgerald arrangements, so it’s really an honor and a pleasure. I have such a reverence for Ella and for The Great American Songbook. Jazz music and this whole era means the world to me. I get to stand on their shoulders, and it’s really amazing.”

Saturday’s music has a special meaning for Chautauqua, as well. 

“Gershwin composed his piano concerto in F in one of those practice shacks. So there’s that connection with Gershwin (and) Chautauqua,” Chafetz said. “ The American Songbook as we know it is from that time where a melody was everything. It represented music in a very pure way. There were no synthesizers, there were no sound effects, everything that was made came from an instrument, and that’s a huge thing for me. I think that we’re going back to our roots and going back to the great American song, and the joy that Capathia brings to it is infectious.”

The orchestra will be joined by a guest pianist and saxophones, completing the whole experience and transforming the Amp into a jazz club. 

“We’re going to have a whole rhythm section with piano, bass, guitar and drums, so we’re going to be swinging,” Chafetz said. “It’s going to add a completely different color to the ensemble, and really get that color that all these arrangements were so famous for.”

Robinson said there will be a recognizable tune on the program for everyone. 

“The music is familiar and people are going to be tapping their toes. If everyone isn’t dancing out of the Amp at the end, then we’ve not done something right,” Robinson said. “I just think this is going to be one of the most memorable concerts of the season.”

The concert is bittersweet for the CSO, as it is their last of the condensed season. 

“It’s sentimental when this orchestra gets together, and when we leave, because we’re like a family,” Robinson said. “It’s like saying goodbye to relatives. But we never really say goodbye; we say, ‘See you next year.’ It’s the end in a way, but it’s also exciting because it’s going to be a great concert.”

Chafetz said the CSO is both grateful and proud for what they accomplished in a season full of obstacles. 

“I feel thrilled as really my first official season as principal pops conductor here. I felt like we’ve had some pretty amazing performances with two incredible films, and some beautiful opera,” Chaftez said. “To end with this it feels like a true triumph for us, especially after what we’ve been through, and the symphony in general having the opportunity with Rossen (Milanov) to make such beautiful music, with all that’s been going on in the world. It certainly gives us hope for the future. This was a really amazing season, and I feel so happy to have been a part of it.”

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