FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE UPDATED October 2, 2013 September 27, 2013 Contact: Katherine E. Johnson (212) 875-5718; [email protected]

NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC BEGINS NEW SEASON OF YOUNG PEOPLE’S CONCERTS WITH AN EXPLORATION OF BEETHOVEN’S SYMPHONY NO. 9 THE FIRST OF THE SEASON’S POINTS OF ENTRY CONCERTS Saturday, October 12, 2013

Assistant Conductor Case Scaglione To Conduct Philharmonic Vice President, Education, Theodore Wiprud To Host “Ode To Joy” To Be Sung by Soprano Raquel González, Mezzo-Soprano Lacey Jo Benter, Raul Melo, Bass-Baritone Aubrey Allicock, and Manhattan School of Music Symphonic Chorus

The 92nd season of the Young People’s Concerts (YPCs) will be launched on Saturday, October 12, 2013, at 2:00 p.m. Philharmonic Assistant Conductor Case Scaglione will lead selections from all four movements of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9. This is the first program in this season’s series, Points of Entry, in which each concert explores facets of music and the orchestra itself through a single, influential score. The performance will feature soprano Raquel González (in her Philharmonic debut), mezzo-soprano Lacey Jo Benter, tenor Raul Melo (Philharmonic debut), bass-baritone Aubrey Allicock (Philharmonic debut), and the Manhattan School of Music Symphonic Chorus, , director. Ms. González, Ms. Benter, and Mr. Allicock are current students in Juilliard’s Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts.

Designed for ages 6 to 12, the series is hosted by Philharmonic Vice President, Education, Theodore Wiprud, The Sue B. Mercy Chair, and written and directed by Tom Dulack.

All YPCs are preceded by Kidzone Live!, an interactive music fair at which children meet Philharmonic musicians, create and hear their own music, try out orchestral instruments, and learn new technologies on the Grand Promenade and upper tiers of Avery Fisher Hall at 12:45 p.m. Beginning one week before each YPC a special podcast for children is made available, at nyphil.org/ypc, as is TuneUp, the children’s concert program, complete with activities related to the event.

The other YPC programs in the 2013–14 season’s Points of Entry series are Mozart’s Symphony No. 41, Jupiter (December 7, 2013); Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra (February 1, 2014); and Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 1 (April 12, 2014). (more)

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Artists American-born conductor Case Scaglione began his tenure as Assistant Conductor of the New York Philharmonic in September 2011. That same year he was named a Solti Fellow by the Solti Foundation U.S. He has served as music director of the Young Musicians Foundation Debut Orchestra of Los Angeles, and founded 360° Music, which took that orchestra to inner-city schools. His programs spanned works from Beethoven and Wagner to the Los Angeles premiere of John Adams’s Doctor Atomic Symphony, which was supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. He was a student of David Zinman at the American Academy of Conducting at Aspen, where Mr. Scaglione won the James Conlon and Aspen Conducting Prizes, which led to his Cleveland Orchestra debut in July 2010. He then served as assistant conductor of the Aspen Music Festival and School. A frequent guest assistant and cover conductor with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and David Robertson, Mr. Scaglione also assisted at the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and Baltimore Opera. He also conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl with Bramwell Tovey. In the summer of 2011 Mr. Scaglione was one of three Conducting Fellows at Tanglewood, chosen by and Stefan Asbury. A native of Texas, Case Scaglione received his bachelor’s degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music. He continued in post-graduate work at the Peabody Institute, where he studied with Gustav Meier.

Soprano Raquel González, from Lawrence, Kansas, is currently pursuing her master’s degree at The , where she recently completed undergraduate studies. At Juilliard, Ms. González has been seen as Arminda in Mozart’s La Finta Giardiniera, Dido in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Mélisse in The Metropolitan Opera and Juilliard production of Gluck’s Armide, and as The Rooster in Janacek’s Cunning Little Vixen. She will next appear at Juilliard as Tatiana in Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin. She has spent several summers at The Chautauqua Institution, singing Donna Anna in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Adina in Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore, Lauretta in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi, Barbarina in Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, and Une Pastourelle in Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortilèges. As a Gerdine Young Artist at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, she appeared in the world premiere of Terence Blanchard’s Champion, and she will be returning there in the summer of 2014 as a festival artist. She has appeared in concert with William Christie and Juilliard415, and received awards from The Liederkranz Foundation and the Gerda Lissner Foundation. She is a Toulmin Scholarship recipient. This performance marks her New York Philharmonic debut.

Mezzo-Soprano Lacey Jo Benter is completing studies in the Artist Diploma program in Opera Studies at The Juilliard School, studying with Marlena Malas. Ms. Benter received her master of music degree from Juilliard in 2011, and attended Lawrence University as an undergraduate. She was seen last season in the Juilliard Opera production of Vaughan Williams’s Riders to the Sea, and previously in Copland’s The Tender Land, Poulenc’s Dialogues des Carmélites and Les mamelles de Tirésias, and Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi. She also has sung at Virginia’s Castleton Festival and Central City Opera in Colorado. In June 2011 she made her Philharmonic debut appearing as the Woodpecker in Janáček's The Cunning Little Vixen, led by .

Tenor Raúl Melo has performed at The Metropolitan Opera as the Duke in Verdi’s Rigoletto and Pinkerton in Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. He was most recently seen with Arizona Opera in the title role of Godunov’s Faust and with the Astoria Music Festival as Pollione in Bellini’s Norma. Other appearances include Puccini’s La Bohème in Shanghai, Naples, and Palermo; Madama (more)

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Butterfly and Puccini’s Tosca with Opera and New Orleans Opera; Bizet’s Carmen in Salerno and Leipzig; Rigoletto in Bologna; Verdi’s La Traviata in Palm Beach and Oslo; Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera with Seattle Opera; and Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor in Zurich. In concert he has appeared with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and in the title role of Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust with the Utah Symphony. Mr. Melo has performed with Berlin’s Deutsche Oper and State Opera, Hamburg State Opera, Stuttgart’s State Opera, Düsseldorf’s Deutsche Oper am Rhein, Frankfurt Opera, and Dresden State Opera, among others. In the United States he has sung with Washington Opera, Cleveland Opera, Minnesota Opera, Des Moines Opera, Connecticut Opera, and Fort Worth Opera, among others. This performance marks his New York Philharmonic debut.

Bass Aubrey Allicock joined The Metropolitan Opera roster in the 2010–11 season, covering the roles of Astarotte in Rossini’s Armida and Marullo in Verdi’s Rigoletto. In 2011 Mr. Allicock made his role debut with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis as Mamoud in John Adams’s The Death of Klinghoffer. He has also performed with the Wexford Festival Opera, Phoenix Symphony, South Bohemian Chamber Philharmonic, and with Concerts-Austria, where he was a soloist in Mozart’s Coronation Mass at Karlskirche. Recent performances include the title character in the world premiere of Terence Blanchard’s Champion with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, and soloist in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the Phoenix Symphony. In the 2014–15 season he will make his Met Opera stage debut in a company premiere. Mr. Allicock received his master of music degree from Indiana University and he holds a bachelor of music degree from Grand Canyon University. He is currently a second year Artist Diploma candidate at The Juilliard School, where he studies with Dr. Robert White and Stephen Wadsworth. This performance marks his New York Philharmonic debut.

The Manhattan School of Music Symphonic Chorus is made up of students and alumni of the Manhattan School of Music, and is dedicated to performing the masterworks of the choral/orchestral repertoire. The Symphonic Chorus has recently performed Haydn’s The Creation, Brahms’s A German , Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky, Mozart’s Requiem, Schubert’s Mass in G major, Poulenc’s Gloria, and Mendelssohn’s Elijah, and premiered David Briggs’s transcription for organ, chorus, and soloists of Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, Resurrection. Members of the Symphonic Chorus joined New York City Opera in a performance of Rossini’s Moses in Egypt at City Center in April 2013. In the spring of 2014 the Symphonic Chorus will perform Bach’s Mass in B minor and Honegger’s King David. Kent Tritle, director of choral activities at the Manhattan School of Music, is also director of cathedral music and organist at The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine in New York City. The 2013–14 season marks his ninth as music director of the Oratorio Society of New York and his seventh as music director of Musica Sacra, the longest continuously performing professional chorus in New York City. He is the founder of Sacred Music in a Sacred Space, the concert series at New York’s Church of St. Ignatius Loyola; a member of the graduate faculty of The Juilliard School; and the organist of the New York Philharmonic. Mr. Tritle was the host of the weekly radio show The Choral Mix with Kent Tritle and, from 1996 to 2004, music director of the Emmy-nominated Dessoff Choirs; under his direction the group performed with the New York Philharmonic, The Cleveland Orchestra, , and Czech Philharmonic, as well as on a nationally telecast Live From performance of Mozart’s Requiem. Kent Tritle has made more than a dozen recordings on the Telarc, AMDG, Epiphany, Gothic, VAI, and MSR Classics labels. (more)

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Theodore Wiprud, Vice President, Education, The Sue B. Mercy Chair, has directed the Education Department of the New York Philharmonic since 2004. The Philharmonic’s education programs include the historic Young People’s Concerts, the Very Young People’s Concerts, the School Partnership Program (one of the largest in-school programs among U.S. orchestras), Very Young Composers, adult education programs, and many special projects. Mr. Wiprud has also created innovative programs as director of education and community engagement at the Brooklyn Philharmonic and the American Composers Orchestra; served as associate director of The Commission Project; and assisted the Orchestra of St. Luke’s on its education programs. He has worked as a teaching artist and resident composer in a number of New York City schools. From 1990 to 1997, he directed national grant-making programs at Meet the Composer. Prior to that position, he taught at and directed the music department for Walnut Hill School, a pre- professional arts boarding school near Boston. Mr. Wiprud is also an active composer, whose Violin Concerto (Katrina) was recently released on Champs Hill Records. His music for orchestra, chamber ensembles, and voice is published by Allemar Music. Theodore Wiprud holds degrees from Harvard and Boston Universities and studied at Cambridge University as a visiting scholar.

Tom Dulack is an award-winning playwright, novelist, and director. His play Incommunicado won a Kennedy Center Prize for New American Drama, and Friends Like These won the Kaufman and Hart Prize for New American Comedy. Among his other plays, which have appeared on and Off-Broadway as well as in leading regional theaters around the country, are Breaking Legs, Diminished Capacity, Francis, York Beach, Just Deserts, Solomon’s Child, 1348, Shooting Craps, The Elephant, and Mrs. Rossetti. His novels include The Stigmata of Dr. Constantine and the forthcoming The Misanthropes. He is also the author of the theater memoir In Love With Shakespeare. He has written and directed the scripts for the YPCs since 2005. He is also professor of English Literature at the University of Connecticut.

* * * Credit Suisse is the Global Sponsor of the New York Philharmonic.

* * * MetLife Foundation is the Lead Corporate Underwriter for the New York Philharmonic’s Education Programs.

* * * Additional support from The Theodore H. Barth Foundation.

* * * Programs are supported, in part, by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, and from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and the National Endowment for the Arts.

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Tickets Subscription tickets for the Young People’s Concerts are $44 to $144 (limited availability); individual tickets are $12 to $39. All tickets include admission to Kidzone Live! Tickets may be purchased online at nyphil.org or by calling (212) 875-5656, 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. daily. Tickets may also be purchased at the Avery Fisher Hall Box Office. The Box Office opens at 10:00 a.m. Monday through Saturday, and at noon on Sunday. On performance evenings, the Box Office closes one-half hour after performance time; other evenings it closes at 6:00 p.m. To determine ticket availability, call the New York Philharmonic’s Customer Relations Department at (212) 875-5656.

For press tickets, call Lanore Carr in the New York Philharmonic Communications Department at (212) 875-5714, or e-mail her at [email protected].

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New York Philharmonic Young People’s Concerts®

Avery Fisher Hall

Points of Entry: Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9

Saturday, October 12, 2013, 2:00 p.m. Kidzone Live! — 12:45 p.m.

Case Scaglione, conductor Raquel González, soprano* Lacey Jo Benter, mezzo-soprano Raul Melo, tenor* Aubrey Allicock, bass-baritone* Manhattan School of Music Symphonic Chorus Kent Tritle, director Theodore Wiprud, host Tom Dulack, scriptwriter and director

BEETHOVEN Selections from Symphony No. 9

*denotes New York Philharmonic debut

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