Venezuela's Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra to Tour US

By -

The internationally acclaimed Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela will perform this evening (Friday) at Jones Hall for the Performing Arts in downtown Houston. It will be the first concert in a US tour that will also include performances on Monday in Washington D.C. and Friday in Chicago, Ill., sponsored by CITGO Petroleum Corporation.

For 32 years, the orchestra has brought culture and opportunity to 240,000 Venezuelan children and given many impoverished young musicians the professional training to perform with some of the world’s best-known orchestras. This model has been so successful that it is now being replicated in other countries, including the United States. The orchestra was developed under the leadership of Maestro Jose Antonio Abreu who had a vision of creating a national system of youth orchestras in Venezuela dedicated to changing young lives through music.

Director Gustavo Dudamel is the most famous example of what this system of youth orchestras has accomplished, and he is passing on his enthusiasm and musical knowledge here in the United States. The work of the orchestra is a tribute to music as a universal language and what it can accomplish in terms of bringing different peoples and nations together for the common good.

Houston April 3:

Washington D.C. April 10:
Sold Out!

Chicago April 9-11:
Please note that space is limited and priority for reservations will be given to student groups. To reserve seats, call (312) 294-3044 or e-mail institute@cso.org.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Role of Music in Opera

By -
There are numerous books on the topic, and every composer, librettist, director, singer and audience member has their opinion as to what role the music should play in an opera. In a play without music, the words ought to support the meaning behind a character's actions. However, in the case of action movies, often times the action is what tells the story and there aren't words, just images to forward the plot. We might hear music to accompany action, build tension, but the action tells the story. Musicals tend to speak until the emotion of the moment just "has" to break out in song - unless it's something like "Mama Mia" where the dialog is the rails we travel on between songs; the songs themselves, written before the concept of the musical, are the focus of the production, while the story is secondary. Operas are a different beast. The music provides emotion to the words spoken, but it also plays the role of ambience when there is only action. In ...
Read more

Episode 210b: Joyeuse le départ

By -
Image
Podcast:  Play in new window  |  Download Subscribe:  Apple Podcasts  |  Android  |  Google Play  |  Stitcher  |  TuneIn  |  RSS Provost Cunningham has Transmigrated, but to where! What is Dr Sage going to do with his body? And how can she bring home her friends, Abigail and Erasmus, without also bring home Cunningham? What are they going to say when they find the “skeleton” she’s hiding in her closet? Cast: Eddie Louise Clark  as Dr Sage Chip Clark  as Professor Savant Justin Bremer  as the Narrator Emily Riley Piatt  as Abigail Entwhistle, Calypso & Dean Stewart Written by  Eddie Louise Theme music by  Unwoman Sound Design by  Chip Michael
Read more

Teaching Composition – What are we trying to achieve

By -
In the process of learning composition I have spent time with a number of instructors who have encouraged me to write twelve-tone, pitch-class, electro-acoustic and other forms of experimental techniques. No matter how much I might understand and appreciate the work of other composers in the genres, these are not forms of music I resonate with. They are simply not forms of music I listen to and I struggle with the idea of writing them. However, in a Master Class by Libby Larsen she made the comment, “Learn them all, because all forms of music have something to offer.” This I very much agree. There are elements of each of the above mentioned forms (and others) that I do resonate with. Berg’s Violin Concerto is a beautiful twelve-tone work, although it is possible to look at numerous sections of the music with a “tonal” analysis. Another composer friend, Gary Bachlund commented that using these techniques can narrow the choices for how to compose a piece of work. If you look at ...
Read more