WHAT’S INSIDE
CONCERTS Masterworks Pops 41 Bach’s Brandenburg 46 From Russians with Love 50 Conrad Tao Plays Brahms 62 Ranky Tanky with the CSO 57 Scheherazade 65 Mendelssohn’s Scottish Symphony 75 Charleston and the New World
Chamber Special Events 73 All Roads Lead to Vienna 55 Magnetic South
Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestras 70 Side by Side Concert with the Charleston Symphony
4 House Notes 19 From the Orchestra 8 Musicians 20 CSO Chorus 10 Musician Roster 23 Membership Benefits 11 Guest Musician Sponsors 24 Donor Recognition 12 Board of Directors 27 In Honor/In Memory 13 Administration 30 Letter from President 15 Letter from Executive Director 34 Educational Programs 16 Music Director 80 Guest Musician Hosts/ 18 Principal Pops Conductor In-Kind Gifts
ADVERTISING: Onstage Publications This playbill program template is published in association with Onstage Publications, 1612 Prosser 937-424-0529 | 866-503-1966 Avenue, Dayton, Ohio 45409. This playbill program template may not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher. Onstage Publications is a division of Just Business!, e-mail: [email protected] Inc. Contents © 2020. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. www.onstagepublications.com
CharlestonSymphony.org 3 HOUSE NOTES
Thank you for attending this performance of the Charleston Symphony. Here are some tips and suggestions to enhance the concert experience for everyone.
TICKET INFORMATION STUDENT DISCOUNTS Students ages 6-22 may take advantage of the following discounts. Some concerts are excluded INDIVIDUAL CONCERT TICKETS or have special pricing noted on the Charleston Online: Symphony website. Purchase student discount www.CharlestonSymphony.org tickets at the Charleston Symphony box office (not Gaillard). College students must show their In Person: valid college ID card. Charleston Symphony Office: 2133 N. Hillside Drive (West Ashley) Monday thru Thursday, 9am $80 Gold Student Membership to attend to 5pm and Friday 9am to 12pm and beginning two 8 Masterworks, 4 Pops, and 3 Chamber hours prior to a performance at the concert venue. Music concerts. Half Price Student Tickets when purchased in Gaillard Center Box Office (for Masterworks advance. Available by phone only. and Pops concerts only): Monday through Friday, $10 Student Rush Tickets (subject to availability, 11am to 6pm and beginning two hours prior to at the box office on night of concert only.) a performance.
Will Call closes 30 minutes after FOR THE ENJOYMENT OF ALL performance begins. ELECTRONIC DEVICES By Phone: Please refrain from using personal electronic devices Charleston Symphony...... (843) 723-7528 during the performances. The Gaillard Center Box Office..... (843) 242-3099 LATE SEATING In consideration of both artists and audiences, latecomers will be seated at the discretion of the staff. Doors open one hour before the beginning of concerts and Will Call closes 30 minutes after concert starts.
As an added benefit for our subscribers, if you are unable to attend one SUBSCRIBER of your subscription concerts, visit the Charleston Symphony offices at 2133 N. Hillside Drive no less than 48 hours prior to the performance to EXCHANGES exchange tickets for a future concert (subject to availability).
4 CharlestonSymphony.org FOR YOUR COMFORT, CONVENIENCE, & SAFETY IMPORTANT INFO
PARKING CHARLESTON SYMPHONY Two paid parking garages are located near the PATRON SERVICES Gaillard Center: the Gaillard Parking Garage (843) 723-7528, ext. 110 (flat $5 fee) adjacent to the hall and the parking garage located at the end of Calhoun Street near ADDRESS the South Carolina Aquarium. Mail: PO Box 30818 Charleston, SC 29417 Physical: 2133 N. Hillside Drive Charleston, ACCESSIBILITY SC 29407 To purchase wheelchair-accessible tickets, please call Patron Services at (843) 723-7528 x110. OFFICE HOURS Monday–Thursday: 9am – 5pm RESTROOMS Friday: 9am – 12pm All restrooms in The Gaillard Center are handicap accessible. Restrooms are available on all levels, WEBSITE with the exception of the Dress Circle. www.CharlestonSymphony.org
FOR YOUR SAFETY DEVELOPMENT (843) 723-7528, ext. 115 In the event of an emergency, please use the exit nearest your seat. This is your shortest route out of CHARLESTON SYMPHONY E-NEWS the hall. Charleston Symphony staff members are Receive the latest news, information and special onsite at all performances. pricing opportunities by signing up for the CSO’s e-news at www.CharlestonSymphony.org. PLEASE HELP US RECYCLE SOCIAL MEDIA Please keep your program guide if you wish. Facebook: www.facebook.com/ We also encourage patrons to place your program CharlestonSymphony guide in the recycle baskets outside the entrances Instagram: CharlestonSymphonyOrchestra to the hall as you leave this performance for use Twitter: @ChsSymphony at future performances. YouTube: www.youtube.com/user/ChasSymphony Concerts, performers, dates, times, and locations are Use hashtag #CharlestonSymphony throughout subject to change. the season!
Your attendance constitutes consent for use of Concerts, performers, dates, times, your likeness and/or voice on all video and/or audio and locations are subject to change. recordings and in photographs made during Charleston Symphony events. Your attendance constitutes consent for use of your likeness and/or voice on all video and/or audio recordings and in photographs made during CSO events.
CharlestonSymphony.org 5
MUSICIANS CONDUCTORS
Ken Lam Yuriy Bekker Kellen Gray Music Director Principal Pops Conductor Assistant Conductor Sponsored by Herzman-Fishman Charitable Fund Sponsored by Valerie and John Luther Sponsorship Available and Carol H. Fishman CORE MUSICIANS
Yuriy Bekker Micah Gangwer Asako Kremer Alexander Boissonnault Concertmaster Assistant Concertmaster Assistant Principal Violin Co-sponsored by Mrs. Andrea Volpe and Sponsored by Dr. James and Claire Allen Second Violin Sponsored by Albert and Caroline Thibault Gerald and Gretchen Tanenbaum Sponsored by Dr. and Mrs. Mariano La Via
Jan-Marie Joyce Alexander Agrest Norbert Lewandowski Damian Kremer Principal Viola Assistant Principal Viola Principal Cello Assistant Principal Cello Sponsored by Ted and Joan Halkyard Sponsored by Dr. Jeffery and Sponsored by The Gray Foundation Sponsored by Barbara Chapman Mrs. Tammy Dorociak Principal Cello Chair permanently endowed by the CSOL®
8 CharlestonSymphony.org Auditioning Spring 2020 Antonio Marti Brandon Nichols Anne Holmi Principal Bass Principal Trumpet Prinicipal Horn Second Horn Sponsorship Available Sponsored in honor of Helen Faress Savard Sponsored by Cindy and George Hartley Sponsored by Ted and Tricia Legasey
Christopher Lindgren Thomas Joyce Beth Albert Ryan Leveille Principal Trombone Bass Trombone Principal Timpani Principal Percussion Sponsored by Dr. Cynthia Cleland Austin Sponsored by Robert and Helen Siedell Permanently endowed by Sponsored by Anne P. Olsen Dr. S. Dwane Thomas
Jessica Hull-Dambaugh Regina Helcher Yost Zachary Hammond Kari Kistler Principal Flute Second Flute & Piccolo Principal Oboe Second Oboe & English Horn Sponsored by Roger and Vivian Steel Sponsored by Paul and Becky Hilstad Co-sponsored by Miriam DeAntonio and Sponsored in loving memory of Nicholas and Eileen D’Agostino, Jr. John Frampton Maybank
Charles Messersmith Gretchen Roper Quinn Delaney Katherine St. John Principal Clarinet Second Clarinet Principal Bassoon Second Bassoon Sponsored by Ilse Calcagno Sponsored by Ann and Henry Fralix Sponsored by Dr. and Mrs. Sponsored by Rajan and Suman Govindan William T. Creasman
CharlestonSymphony.org 9 MUSICIAN ROSTER
VIOLIN Lynn Laplante FLUTE/PICCOLO TROMBONE Yuriy Bekker* Melissa Melendez Jessica Hull-Dambaugh* Chris Lindgren* Alexander Boissonnault* Nicole Moler Regina Yost* Ben Dickinson Micah Gangwer* Taliaferro Nash Tacy Edwards Brian Santero Sadie Nichols Asako Kremer* OBOE Adam Hanna Karel Abo Scott Rawls Steven Osborne Zac Hammond* Kathleen Beard Michael Resetar Kari Kistler* BASS TROMBONE Corine Brouwer Kirsten Swanson Erin Lensing Thomas Joyce* Chi-Yin Chen Daniel Sweaney Lydia Chernicoff Eve Tang ENGLISH HORN TUBA Alex Dzyubinsky Benjamin Weiss Kari Kistler* Chris Bluemel David Edwards CELLO Justin Clarkson Andrew Emmett CLARINET Norbert Lewandowski* Seth Gangwer Charles Messersmith* TIMPANI Damian Kremer* David Goist Gretchen Roper* Beth Albert* Erin Ellis Christen Greer Christian Schubert Christopher Glansdorp PERCUSSION Catherine Hazan Hilary Glen BASSOON Ryan Leveille* Pam Hentges Ismar Gomes Quinn Delaney* Robert Burrows Frances Hsieh Yuriy Leonovich Katherine St.John* Michael Haldeman Tomas Jakubek Johnny Mok Jeffrey Handel Ha-Young Kim CONTRABASSOON Daniel Mumm Ray McClain Nelly Kim Nicholas Ritter Elizabeth Murphy Jesse Monkman Gloria Lee Daniel Pereira HORN Nate Lee Lenora Leggatt Peter Sachon Brandon Nichols* Diana Sharpe Mayumi Nakamura Dusan Vukajlovic Anne Holmi* HARP Liviu Onofrei AnneMarie Cherry Cameron Williams Abigail Kent Anastasia Petrunina Michael Daly Jacqueline Marshall Nina Sandberg BASS Alex Depew Stephanie Silvestri Michael Ashton Vincent Kiray KEYBOARD Marius Tabacila Mark Chesanow Nicolee Kuester Julia Harlow Mary Taylor Joseph Farley Grace Salyards Chee Hang See Jenny Weiss Zach Hobin Debra Sherrill-Ward Ghadi Shayban Shr-Han Wu Ben Jensen Christian Zamora John Krause TRUMPET Antonio Marti* VIOLA Josh Lambert * Core Musician Tod Leavitt Timothy Hudson Jan-Marie Joyce* Jan Mixter Eric Berlin Alex Agrest* Dylan Reckner Alex Freund Rachel Gangwer Cody Rex Cameron Handel Fitz Gary Paul Sharpe Susan Messersmith Stephen Goist Jeremy Keinbaum
10 CharlestonSymphony.org GUEST MUSICIAN SPONSORS
he Charleston Symphony is very fortunate to have talented guest musicians from across the country who join our core orchestra to provide you with the best Tsymphonic experience. For a gift of $5,000 or more, you can help us by sponsoring one of these available guest musician chairs.
Flute In loving memory of Merinda Smith Violin William and Corinne Khouri
Available Michael and Barbara Moody
Clarinet Available Tracy and Billy Grooms
Oboe Ms. Katherine M. Huger Available x 4
Available Viola Ann and Lee Higdon
Bassoon Available Available x 2
Horn Ike and Betsy Smith Cello Mr. and Mrs. Wayland H. Cato, Jr.
Available Friend of the CSO
Trumpet MacDonald Carew Family Fund Sue and Ken Ingram
Available Elizabeth Rivers Lewine
Trombone Available Available x 2
Tuba Jon Olson and Anne Regan Bass Frank and Kathy Cassidy
Harp Available Dr. and Mrs. Fritz Lorscheider
Percussion Available Available
Piano Mr. David Savard
To participate, please contact the Developmet Office at (843) 723-7528 ext. 115.
CharlestonSymphony.org 11 2019-2020 BOARD OF DIRECTORS EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE President: Robert Siedell – President, Japan and Australia/New Zealand Region Head, American Express International, Inc. (Retired) Treasurer: Michael Moody – Chairman and CEO, Force Protection, Inc. (Retired) Vice President, Development: Lee Higdon – President of Connecticut College (Retired) Vice President, Nominating & Governance: Carol H. Fishman – Attorney (Retired) and Community Volunteer Vice President, Artistic: Jerry Hudson Evans – Partner Attorney, Richardson, Patrick, Westbrook & Brickman, LLC Lenna Macdonald – Chairman/CAO, MedTrust Holding, Inc. Alex Boissonnault, Violin, Charleston Symphony Orchestra Lyn Magee – President, Charleston Symphony Orchestra League, Inc. DIRECTORS Clyde Hiers – Partner Emeritus, Daniel Island CPAs Wendi Huff – Strategic Partnership Professional and Community Volunteer Ann Hurd Fralix – Fundraising Professional (Retired), Charleston Symphony Advocate Natalie Ham – General Counsel, Charleston County School District Eddie Irions, M.D – Partner, Charleston GI Elizabeth Rivers Lewine – Community Advocate Cynthia Mabry – Charleston Symphony Advocate Jon W. Olson – Sr. Vice President & General Counsel, Blackbaud, Inc. Roy Owen – Partner, Deloitte Consulting (Retired) Jodi Rush – Management Consultant (Retired), Arts Advocate, Community Volunteer David Savard – Charleston Symphony, Charleston Symphony Orchestra League, Inc., and Artistic Community Advocate, Eaton Corporation (Retired) Susan Sullivan – President, Wright Communications, Inc. (Retired) VOTING EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS Robert G. Hill, Jr. – Banker (Retired) NON-VOTING EX-OFFICIO MEMBERS Mark Lazzaro – President, Charleston Symphony Orchestra Chorus Kyle Lahm – Cultural Arts Director, City of North Charleston Jennifer Luiken – Professor of Voice, Charleston Southern University Valerie Morris – Dean, School of the Arts, College of Charleston Kathleen Reid – Past President, Charleston Symphony Orchestra League, Inc. Mike Whack – Special Assistant to the Mayor, City of Charleston LIFE MEMBERS James Allen Max Hill, Jr. Marianne Mead Burt Schools Ted Halkyard Ted Legasey Eloise Pingry HONORARY TRUSTEE Ellen Dressler Moryl
12 CharlestonSymphony.org ADMINISTRATION
Executive Director FINANCE OPERATIONS MARKETING Michael Smith Director of Finance General Manager Director of Marketing Jeff Irwin Kyle Lane Vacant Executive Assistant and Board Liaison DEVELOPMENT Personnel Manager Marketing Manager Karen Piraneo Director of Development Thomas Joyce Mandie Ronick Alana Morrall PATRON SERVICES Production Manager EDUCATION Director of Patron Development Coordinator Mason Wills Director of Education Services Hannah Charney and Community Cynthia Branch Music Librarian Engagement Rachel Gangwer Mitsuko Flynn
CharlestonSymphony.org 13
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Michael Smith
hank you for joining us during the Charleston Symphony’s 2019- 2020 season. This is a particularly momentous time for the CSO, as we join our city and our community in commemorating the Tth 350 anniversary of Charleston’s founding. This anniversary marks a time for enjoyment as well as reflection. It is a time to ponder what kind of future we want going forward, and more importantly, how we lay the groundwork to get there.
I believe it is the unique responsibility of the artist to spark moments of thought and reflection during important times, and this is no exception. Be it through the powerful words of Abraham Lincoln set to music by Aaron Copland, the joyous rekindling of Gullah tradition by Ranky Tanky, or a brand new interpretation of Charleston’s history by composer Edward Hart, this season’s programming is intended to help you contemplate what growth and progress—as an individual as well as a community—mean to you.
I believe the future holds great potential for the city of Charleston as well as its symphony, but I know that we can only continue to provide the highest quality music with your support. Advocacy for the Charleston Symphony takes many forms beyond ticket sales and donations. By inviting your friends and family to join you at a concert, spreading the word about our performances on social media, or volunteering with the CSOL, you are helping ensure our future for years—hopefully generations—to come. We welcome and celebrate your support of any kind.
As I think about the Charleston my children and grandchildren will one day inherit, I can only say that I hope it continues to be filled with music. Only through your advocacy, your patronage, and your philanthropic support may we continue our work to unite the community in a way that entertains, heals, educates, inspires, and most importantly, provokes conversations about the sort of people and society that we want to be for the next 350 years.
Thank you for being here tonight. We hope to see you again soon.
Sincerely,
Michael Smith Executive Director
CharlestonSymphony.org 15 ABOUT THE MUSIC DIRECTOR Ken Lam
en Lam has been Music Director of the Charleston Symphony Ksince 2015. He has conducted throughout the U.S. and Asia. In recent seasons, he led performances with the symphony orchestras of Cincinnati, Baltimore, Detroit, Buffalo, Hawaii, Memphis, Meridien, as well as Hong Kong Sinfonietta, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Seongnam Philharmonic, Guiyang Symphony and the Taipei Symphony Orchestra, collaborating with many of the world’s leading artists including Leon Fleisher, Yo-Yo Ma, Stephen Hough, Sir James Galway, Ricky Skaggs, Neil Sedaka and Steep Canyon Rangers.
A keen supporter of living composers, Maestro Lam has commissioned several new works, notably an Oboe Concerto by the Greek composer Yiorgos Vassilandonakis (2019), a Charleston Concerto for string quartet and orchestra by Edward Hart (2020) and the tone poem Gate of Horn by Carl Schimmel (2019).
Winner of the 2011 Memphis Symphony Orchestra’s International Conducting Competition and a featured conductor in the League of American Orchestra’s 2009 Bruno Walter National Conductors Preview with the Nashville Symphony, Maestro Lam made his U.S. professional debut with the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center in June 2008 as one of four conductors invited by Leonard Slatkin. Maestro Lam first came to Charleston in 2012, when he directed the opera Feng Yi Ting by Chinese composer Guo Wenjing at the Spoleto Festival.
Maestro Lam also holds the posts of Music Director of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra, Resident Conductor of the Brevard Music Center in North Carolina, Artistic Director of Hong Kong Voices and Conductor Laureate of the Baltimore Symphony Youth Orchestras. Previous positions have included posts as Associate Conductor for Education of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Assistant Conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and Principal Conductor of the Hong Kong Chamber Orchestra.
Maestro Lam studied conducting with Gustav Meier and Markand Thakar at Peabody Conservatory. David Zinman and Murry Sidlin at the American Academy of Conducting at Aspen and Leonard Slatkin at the National Conducting Institute. He read economics at St. John’s College, Cambridge University and was an attorney specializing in international finance for ten years before becoming a conductor.
Maestro Lam is the recipient of the 2015 Johns Hopkins University Global Achievement Award, given to alumni who exemplify the university’s tradition of excellence and who have brought credit to the university and their profession in the international arena through their professional achievements.
16 CharlestonSymphony.org LETTER FROM THE MUSIC DIRECTOR Ken Lam
t the risk of sounding like a parent choosing a favorite child, I must admit that I am particularly excited for our 2019-2020 season. Classical music fans will notice many blockbuster pieces in the Alineup, including Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, and Dvorˇák’s New World Symphony—but stellar repertoire is only one of the many things I’m looking forward to.
In October the CSO will perform Pictures at an Exhibition, a thematic concert that will feature the premiere of artist Mary Whyte’s collection, “We the People.” Whyte will present a series of 50 portraits, one veteran from each state in the U.S., while the CSO will play Copland’s Lincoln Portrait and Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.
In addition to excellent repertoire, we will also welcome back one of our all-time favorite guest artists, Conrad Tao. Tao performed with the CSO in 2018 to great acclaim, and in the time since has risen to a level of fame earned by few contemporary musicians or composers his age. Fresh off of performances with the New York Philharmonic (as both composer and soloist), Tao returns to perform Brahms’ First Piano Concerto with the CSO, and I for one cannot wait to collaborate with him again.
Lastly, our season finale is a special concert designed to pay tribute to Charleston’s 350th anniversary. The CSO will perform Dvorˇák’s New World Symphony, Edmund Thornton Jenkins’ Charlestonia, and the world premiere of Edward Hart’s A Charleston Concerto. We will welcome back the world-famous Shanghai Quartet to perform A Charleston Concerto, which Hart has written in honor of our city’s past, present, and future.
Please join us for the Charleston Symphony’s most exciting season of music yet. I cannot wait to share this with you.
Sincerely,
Ken Lam Music Director
CharlestonSymphony.org 17 PRINCIPAL POPS CONDUCTOR Yuriy Bekker
uriy Bekker, critically-acclaimed violinist and conductor, has led the Charleston Symphony Orchestra as Concertmaster Ysince 2007 and was named Principal Pops Conductor in 2016. Bekker served as the orchestra’s Acting Artistic Director from 2010- 2014 and Director of Chamber Orchestra from 2014-2015, playing a major role in the orchestra’s successful resurgence.
Mr. Bekker is an adjunct faculty member of the College of Charleston School of the Arts as a violin professor and as conductor of the College of Charleston Orchestra. He is Music Director of the Piccolo Spoleto Festival’s Spotlight Chamber Music Series and co-founder of the Charleston Chamber Music Institute. In the summer, he also serves on faculty of the Gingold Chamber Music Festival in Miami. Mr. Bekker was given the Outstanding Artistic Achievement award from the City of Charleston in 2011 to honor his cultural contributions to the community. Bekker has also held the position of concertmaster for the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra and the AIMS Festival in Graz, Austria, and has held additional positions with the Houston Symphony and the Houston Grand Opera and Ballet orchestras.
Bekker has performed worldwide as a celebrated guest concertmaster, avid chamber musician, and critically-acclaimed soloist. In addition to over a dozen concertos with the Charleston Symphony, he has performed with the Vancouver Symphony (British Columbia), Ulster Orchestra in Northern Ireland, Buffalo Philharmonic, Chicago Chamber Music Society, European Music Festival Stuttgart (Germany), Pacific Music Festival (Japan), Spoleto Festival USA, Piccolo Spoleto Festival, Aspen Music Festival, at the Kennedy Center, and in cities including New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Orlando, Amarillo, El Paso, Missoula, Asheville, Flagstaff, Scottsdale, Barcelona, Spain and Graz, Austria. He has collaborated with Herbert Greenberg, Claudio Bohorquez, Alexander Kerr, Andres Cardenes, Andrew Armstrong, Robert DeMaine, Sara Chang, Gil Shaham, Ilya Kaler, Joshua Roman, JoAnn Falletta, and Andrew Litton. As Principal Pops Conductor of the Charleston Symphony, Bekker has worked with notable guests artists such as Ben Folds, Tony Desare, Ellis Hall, and Cirque de la Symphonie.
Bekker’s recent and upcoming engagements include conductor and violinist with the Amarillo Symphony, violinist on Tchaikovsky’s, Bruch’s, and Edward Hart’s Concertos for Violin with the Charleston Symphony, conductor of Mahler’s Symphony No. 6 at the Miami Music Festival, a chamber music appearance with the Fort-Worth Chamber Music Society, and a busy upcoming pops season packed with exciting repertoire and guest artists.
Bekker earned a Graduate Performance Diploma from the Peabody Conservatory under the tutelage of Herbert Greenberg. He also holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Indiana University School of Music, where he studied violin with Nelli Shkolnikova and Ilya Kaler. Mr. Bekker has studied conducting with Christopher Wilkins, David Zinman, Imre Pallo and David Effron. His debut CD, Twentieth Century Duos, received world-wide acclaim and a nomination for the International Classical Music Awards. Born in Minsk, Belarus, Bekker is now a United States citizen, and is a proud husband and father to his wife, Jenny, their toddler son, Nathanael, and newborn daughter Charlotte. He performs on the 1638 Franz Degen Andrea Guarneri violin, generously on loan to him from an anonymous patron. Visit www.YuriyBekker.com for more information.
18 CharlestonSymphony.org FROM THE Orchestra
elcome to the 2019-2020 Charleston Symphony Season! My name is Gretchen Roper, and I play Second Clarinet. WThe Charleston Symphony is a fantastic ensemble to play in because it is full of dedicated and talented people who genuinely love playing music! The orchestra and staff take great care to bring our audiences the best performances possible, and this season is particularly exciting because so much of it celebrates our wonderful city of Charleston!
In 2006, when I joined the CSO and moved to Charleston, I quickly discovered the city’s unique blend of old and new that make it so special. Such care and pride is taken to preserve the city’s history, its charming downtown, beautiful beaches, quiet parks, and peaceful marshlands. At the same time, there is the new, “up and coming” side of the city showcasing incredible food, sophisticated nightlife, bold new construction projects, and of course, the exciting arts scene!
Knowing that the Charleston Symphony plays a large role in this city’s diverse culture makes me proud! During my time here, we’ve honored the city’s history with events like the concert at the Battery commemorating the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War. We’ve partnered with new craft breweries playing polka band music to celebrate Octoberfest. We’ve played chamber music at some of the area’s most historic plantations, and of course performed many concerts in the gorgeously renovated Gaillard Auditorium.
Themes of old and new will be reflected in this year’s season as well. We will bring you classic works written by composers such as Strauss, Brahms, Mussorgsky, and Mozart. We will also bring you exciting new music written by Charleston’s own composer Edward Hart, as well as a fun collaboration with Charleston based jazz quintet Ranky Tanky, the debut of portraits from local artist Mary Whyte, and several performances featuring your very own Charleston Symphony musicians! I know I speak for all of my colleagues when I say that we want you at every concert to celebrate and take pride in what we have here in Charleston!
We are so excited to play for you this season, and as always, are so thankful for your continued support. We would not be here without you!
Most Sincerely, Gretchen Roper
CharlestonSymphony.org 19 CSO CHORUS Dr. Robert Taylor, Director
he Charleston Symphony Orchestra Chorus is the premier all- volunteer Chorus in Lowcountry South Carolina. Composed Tof auditioned, volunteers drawn from the greater Charleston metropolitan area, the Chorus is an independent, non-profit organization under the direction of Dr. Robert Taylor, the Director of Choral Activities for the College of Charleston. Dedicated to the promotion, enjoyment, and appreciation of choral music, the Chorus performs a diverse choral repertoire presented in concerts of the highest musical excellence that seek to entertain and educate audiences of all generations as well as nurture and encourage young singers.
Founded by Emily Remington as the Charleston Singers Guild, the full, 120 voice Chorus has provided the choral component for a broad range of classical and modern choral Masterworks, Pops, and Spoleto USA concerts for the City of Charleston for four decades. Major work performances routinely include the voices of the College of Charleston Concert Choir and more recently the Charleston Southern Singers as well as area children’s choirs. The Chorus Chamber Singers, a select sub-division of the CSO Chorus, provides a smaller ensemble to perform works in the chamber repertoire, including three annual performances of Handel’s Messiah.
Calendar 2018 performances included two Charleston Symphony Masterworks appearances: Ralph Vaughn Williams Toward the Unknown Region and Benjamin Britten’s Saint Nicholas, the ever-popular Holiday Pops and Pops 4 which included presentations of six well known Italian opera choruses in a full evening of Italian opera music. The Chamber Chorus presented the traditional and popular Holy City Messiah performances in December. The Chorus concluded the spring 2019 symphony concert season to excellent critical reviews, performing Mozart’s Requiem along with the College of Charleston Concert Choir and Charleston Southern University Chorus. The Chorus’ performance season climaxed with an appearance in Spoleto USA along with the Westminster College Choir singing Bach’s St. John Passion.
The Chorus continues to seek skilled, experienced vocal talent and offers audition opportunities routinely in August and January. For additional information about the CSO Chorus or to register for an audition, please visit www.CSOChorus.com.
20 CharlestonSymphony.org CHORUS ROSTER
SOPRANO Bethany Moebs Janice Kisling Stevenson Griggs Inga Agrest Ru Monsell Jean Kuhn Steve Gurry Bethany Bates Aimie Morris Alyssa Matelske Wayne Heckrotte Mary Bell Mary Moser Amanda Mazzaro Noah Jacobsen Pat Benzien Martina Mueller Susan McAdoo Bob Krantz Alexandra (Ali) Berry Kay Nickel Lisa McClure Mark Lazzaro Susan Borick Emily Payton Christe McCoy- Hank Martin Jenny Brennan Rebecca (Becca) Peters Lawrence Ellen McGeady Krysta Carhart Carlen Quinn Sarah Napier Mike Mout Susan Chagrin Meghan Ravenel Sally Newell Richard Rathmann Jana Chanthabane Judith Rinaman Tara Noone Theresa Robards* Katherine (Katie) Clifton Andrea Rose Rousseaux Marianne Nubel Jordan Stoner Lilly Cooper Andrea Scheulen Donna Padgette* Curtis Worthington Gail Corvette Silke Sida Joyce Peach BASS Casey Cross Danielle Simonian* Faith Pecorella Tom Bracewell Maryileen Cumbaa Cathy Sippell Kourtnee Pierson Erin Danley Deborah Smith-Hargett Hanna Platt Stanley Chepenik Libby Davis Sharon Spruell Rachel Premo Thomas Churchill Jennifer Dickson Sharon Steffan Betty Roe Bruce Elliot Helena Dilling Jessica Sucevich Karen Ruggiero Mark Fitzpatrick Ruth Dombrowski Meta Van Sickle Jessica (Jessie) Bill Flack Tammy Dorociak Samantha Vandapuye Schlotfeld Joe Gamboa Anna Doyle Leah Whatley Taylor Seman Thomas Gerber Elizabeth Evans Sarah Woods Marybeth Sgambelluri Stuart Kaufman Linda Gast Sophia Zimmermann Jessica Sharp Lee Kohlenberg Ally Grant ALTO Mary Ann Spivey Wei-Kai (Bryan) Lai Janet Hildebrand Eileen Vanhorn Scott McBroom Rennie All Susan Hoskins Rachel Walls Meghan Batson Nate Medford Alexandra Houlbrooke Charlene Whalen Ann Beauchamp Ed Mitchell Laura Irick Sarah Woodall Eloise Brooks Norman Moebs Erika Janitschek Annie Wray Susan Cheves Gary Nichols Hannah Jessup Christina Wynn Sally Clemence Dick Pekruhn Phyllis Jestice Mary Ellen Doyle TENOR Karl Peterson Danie Johnson Anna-Sian Eigen Philip Amarendran John (Jack) Pitzer* Elise Jorgens Julie Fenimore Kirk Beckstrom Tim Rinamen Emma Keefner Sue Findlay Celeste Carlson Stuart Terry Annie Kouba Jaimie Flack Gabriel Chavarria Bill Thornby Tia Lewis Lynne Flaugher Mitchell (Mitch) Cohen Keith Timmons Brie Lombino Melody (or Mel) Flowers Jeff Collins McIver Watson Berita Martin Jennifer Foster Ralph D’Amico Donna Mastrandrea Dwight Williams Savannah Gignac Jiska Ford Mendy McGuire-Gray Carol Heckrotte Bill Gesin Yon Meyer Patricia Hoff Terry Goans * section leaders
CharlestonSymphony.org 21 HOW YOU CAN HELP THE CSO
“PHILANTHROPY LIES You are instrumental to our success! Did you know that ticket sales cover less than AT THE HEART OF 50% of the CSO’s annual operating expenses? As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, we rely HUMAN GREATNESS.” on the generosity of our patrons to bridge —PATRICK J. RYAN that gap every year. You can play your part for the CSO by making a tax-deductible donation to help us achieve our mission of inspiring and engaging the community with exceptional musical performances and educational programs. A gift of any size makes a difference! WAYS TO GIVE Online: www.charlestonsymphony.org Check: Payable to Charleston Symphony Orchestra Mailing address: P.O. Box 30818, Charleston, SC 29417 Stock: Contact South State Investment Services at 843.566.3975 CSO Account Number: 5082-2715 | DTC Number: 0075 Required Minimum Distribution (RMD): Are you over the age of 70½? We hope you will consider making a tax-free gift to the CSO from your IRA account. A donation to the CSO counts as an RMD but does not increase your adjusted gross income. The CSO's Tax ID number is 57-6000192. COMPOSE YOUR LEGACY WITH PLANNED GIVING Ensure the gift of music remains accessible for future generations by including the Charleston Symphony in your estate plans. Leave a gift of cash or securities to the CSO in your will. Designate the CSO as a beneficiary of your retirement fund, life insurance policy, annuity, and more.
Opportunities to join the Legacy Society are endless—and you can eliminate significant tax-saving benefits as well!
Please visit our website or call our Development Office at (843) 723-7528 x 115 for more information.
22 CharlestonSymphony.org MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS 2019-2020 With appreciation for your annual support, the following special benefits and events are designed to enhance your connection with the CSO:
COMPOSER’S CLUB Bach Level Member ($100-$249) Subscription to E-Notes, the CSO’s digital newsletter for supporters Mozart Level Member ($250-$499) benefits above, plus: Donor recognition online and in the Annual Report Special invitation to CSOL Coffees with the Maestro Beethoven Level Member ($500-$999) benefits above, plus: Season-long recognition in Bravo Invitation to one working orchestra rehearsal Chopin Level Member ($1,000-$1,999) benefits above, plus: Invitation to the CSO’s Annual Meeting Invitation to two working orchestra rehearsals
SYMPHONY SOCIETY ($2,000-$4,999) benefits above, plus: Complimentary parking in the Charleston Gaillard garage Invitation to private donor receptions and special events throughout the concert season
MUSICIAN’S CIRCLE ($5,000-$9,999) benefits above, plus: Opportunity to sponsor a Guest Musician Chair Opportunity to sponsor a select “Overture” as part of a Masterworks performance Invitation to the Musician Donor Luncheon Invitation to sit on stage during open rehearsal events Invitation to Meet the Musicians receptions Reserved seating at the Sunset Serenade concert
ARTIST’S CIRCLE ($10,000-$14,999) benefits above, plus: Opportunity to sponsor a CSO Section Core Musician Opportunity to sponsor a featured Soloist/Guest Artist or a “Concerto” as part of a Masterworks performance Exclusive parking opportunities for one vehicle in the George Street lot Reserved seating for Chamber Music and Messiah performances
PRINCIPAL’S CIRCLE ($15,000-$24,999) benefits above, plus: Opportunity to sponsor a CSO Principal Musician Opportunity to sponsor a “Symphony” as part of a Masterworks performance
MAESTRO’S CIRCLE ($25,000+) benefits above, plus: Gifts at this leadership level demonstrate a tremendous dedication to the Charleston Symphony. To discuss benefits and personalized experiences that come with this level of commitment, please contact the Development office at 843.723.7528 ext. 115.
CharlestonSymphony.org 23 DONORS
MAESTRO’S CIRCLE ($50,000+) ARTIST’S CIRCLE ($10,000-$14,999) Gail and David Corvette Nicholas and Eileen D'Agostino, Jr. With special gratitude: Mrs. Sharon Balderson Daniel Island Community Fund Charleston Symphony Orchestra Ilse Calcagno Mary and John Degnan League, Inc. Barbara Chapman Keith and Susanne Emge City of Charleston Coastal Community Foundation Jerry H. Evans and Stephen T. Bajjaly Herzman-Fishman Charitable Fund Open Grants Mr. Jesse W. Garth and Carol H. Fishman County of Charleston Dr. and Mrs. Frederick J. Goulding Speedwell Foundation Maryileen & Charlie Cumbaa Rajan and Suman Govindan Kite Foundation Fund / Dominion Energy Judith Green and Dr. Michael Fritz Nancye B. Starnes Dr. Jeffery and Mrs. Tammy Dorociak Richard and Ann Gridley Mr. Ronald H. Fielding and Tracy and Billy Grooms MAESTRO’S CIRCLE ($25,000-$49,999) Ms. Susan Lobell Dr. William D. Gudger Gray Charitable Trust Henry & Sylvia Yaschik Foundation, Inc. Anonymous (2) Cindy and George Hartley John T. and Elizabeth K. Cahill Mr. and Mrs. Raymond D. Houlihan Clyde and Jill Hiers Ms. Katherine M. Huger Fund of Coastal Community Lee and Ann Higdon Foundation of SC Ilderton Contractors Robert and Catherine Hill Sue and Ken Ingram Mr. and Mrs. Mark Gernand Paul and Becky Hilstad Ted and Joan Halkyard Dr. Eddie Irions Henry and Ann Hurd Fralix Mrs. Gail Kahn Martha Rivers Ingram Advised June and Mariano La Via Fund of The Community William and Corinne Khouri Mr. and Mrs. Edward E. Legasey Elizabeth Rivers Lewine Foundation of Middle Tennessee In Memory of John Maybank Peter R. & Cynthia K. Kellogg Endowment of Coastal Mrs. Phyllis Miller Community Foundation of SC Foundation Barbara and Michael Moody The Kennedy-Herterich Foundation Dr. and Mrs. Fritz Lorscheider Larry and Eilene Nunnery Jon Olson and Anne Regan Morgan and Lauren Herterich Anne P. Olsen and Dieter and Karyn Ellen and Mayo Read Mr. and Mrs. G. Richard Query Paul and Mary Jane Roberts Kennedy Herterich Michael Griffith and Donna Reyburn Robert Bosch Corporation Claire and Joseph Schady David Savard and Helen Savard Thomas and Alison Schneider South Carolina Arts Commission Helen and Robert Siedell Storey Foundation Mr. M. Edward Sellers and Roger and Vivian Steel Dr. Suzan D. Boyd PRINCIPAL’S CIRCLE ($15,000-$24,999) Ike and Betsy Smith MUSICIAN’S CIRCLE ($5,000-$9,999) Mrs. Merinda Smith Claire and James Allen Anonymous (2) South State Bank Family Foundation Mary Jo and Fred Armbrust Susan W. and James V. Sullivan Dr. Cynthia Cleland Austin Tricia and Tom Bliss Albert and Caroline Thibault BlueCross BlueShield of Dr. Ivy Broder and Ms. Ann Wessel South Carolina Dr. John F. Morrall III Dr. and Mrs. William T. Creasman Frank and Kathy Cassidy SYMPHONY SOCIETY ($2,000-$4,999) Dr. Miriam DeAntonio Mr. and Mrs. Wayland H. Cato, Jr. Dr. and Mrs. Baker Allen Macdonald Carew Family Fund Lucia Childs Gerald and Gretchen Tanenbaum Mr. and Mrs. Brady and Dr. James L. and Judy E. Chitwood - Betty Anderson Mrs. Andrea Volpe Chitwood Family Fund Mr. Alan Watkins Mr. Ivan V. Anderson and Eliza Chrystie Dr. Renee Dobbins Anderson L. John and Judy Clark Dr. Charles A. Andrus Colbert Family Fund of Coastal Dr. Bobby and Julie Baker Community Foundation of SC
24 CharlestonSymphony.org THE CHARLESTON SYMPHONY gratefully acknowledges supporters from the following individual, corporate, foundation, and government entities for their commitment to moving the mission of the CSO forward. Listed below are gifts received between July 1, 2018 and June 30, 2019.
Charles and Sharon Barnett Profs. Bill and Carolyn Matalene Joanne and Christopher Eustis Jodi Rush and Jon Baumgarten Mr. and Mrs. David H. Maybank, Jr. Exchange Club of Charleston The Bihun Family Foundation Jack and Cathy McWhorter The Francis Marion Hotel Henry M. Blackmer Foundation, Inc. Mrs. Patricia Mesel Sharon Fratepietro and Mr. and Mrs. Thomas W. Boswell Bill and Sheila Prezzano Herb Silverman William and Mary Buckley Foundation Dr. and Mrs. A. Bert Pruitt John and Pamela Gerstmayr Mr. and Mrs. T. G. Burke Publix Super Markets Charities Arthur and Betty Glenn Jean F. Carlton Mr. and Mrs. William J. Raver Rick Goldmeyer Dr. Malcolm C. Clark Mr. and Mrs. Donald S. Reid Fran Griffiths Sally and Colin Cuskley Robert S. and Sylvia K. Reitman Dick and Eleanor Hale Ellen and Tommy Davis Family Foundation Joseph and Elaine Heckelman Mrs. Clementina Edwards Royall Ace Hardware, Inc. Mr. and Mrs. Peter Hempstead Nancy and Ralph Edwards Nancy N. Rudy Paul and Joanne Hennessy Julie and John Fenimore Gretchen and Fritz Saenger Abby and Frederick T. Himmelein William and Prudence Finn Ms. Mindelle Seltzer and Bill and Ruth Hindman Charitable Trust Dr. Robert Lovinger Sherry and Kenneth Hirsch Richard J. Friedman, M.D. and Enoch and Annette Sherman Dr. and Mrs. Joseph M. Jenrette, III Sandra Brett Mr. and Mrs. Michael Sommer David Jump Richard and Neva Gadsden Byron Stahl Kiawah Seabrook Exchange Club Joe and Sylvia Gamboa Elizabeth and Charles Sullivan Anne and Cisco Lindsey Dr. Robert Gant Synovus The Jack and Joanne Martin Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Marilyn and George Taylor Charitable Foundation Foundation Foster and Betty Thalheimer Gene and Susan Massamillo Kathy and Pete Gaynor The Mark Elliott Motley Foundation David and Louise Maybank Joyce and Gerry Gherlein Mr. and Mrs. D. Sykes Wilford Mr. Ralph Mills David and Patricia Hannemann Drs. Deborah Williamson and Dr. Martina Mueller Charles and Celia Hansult David Garr Margalit and Gary Neiman Mr. James C. Hare, Jr. Christine and Richard Yriart Loretta “Dolly” Nethercot The James and Pamela Hentges Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Ziff Mr. and Mrs. Howard Phipps, Jr. Charitable Fund Ms. Pamela Pollitt Nelson Hicks Chopin Level Members ($1,000-$1,999) James and Kathleen Ramich Bob and Marcia Hider Family Fund Katherine Kelsey Jill and Richard Almeida Elizabeth and James Ravenel Bettie and Jim Keyes Anonymous (2) Mark Reinhardt Dr. Michael S. Kogan Mrs. Nella G. Barkley Mr. and Mrs. William R. Richardson, Jr. Mr. and Mrs. Karl Kuester Kenneth and Lori Bate Mr. John M. Rivers, Jr. Mrs. Joan S. Ladd Anne and Philip Bergan Ms. Kathleen H. Rivers Mr. and Mrs. Michael Laughlin Mr. and Mrs. R. Jeffrey Bixler Alesia and Scott Ross Susan and Bob Leggett The Boatwright Family Mr. Robert M. Schlau Mr. and Mrs. Fulton D. Lewis Charitable Fund of Bill and Gloria Seaborn Richard and Lasca Lilly National Christian Foundation Elaine and Bill Simpson John H. Longmaid and Ruth Monsell Dr. and Mrs. H. Fred Butehorn, Jr. Mrs. Maurice Thompson Janine Luke Mr. and Mrs. James A. Cathcart, III Gregory Van Schaack Cynthia S. and James C. Mabry Dr. Harry and Mrs. Jennifer Clarke Mr. and Mrs. John H. Warren, III Lyn Magee and Ron Schildge Coastal Wealth Management Mary Ellen and Charles S. Way Dr. and Mrs. Michael Maginnis Joseph R. Cockrell, MD Capt. and Mrs. Nat Malcolm Dr. and Mrs. Haskell S. Ellison
CharlestonSymphony.org 25 DONORS
Beethoven Level Members ($500-$999) Mr. and Mrs. Edward C. Holscher, Jr. Dr. Harold J. Quinn Gail and Tim Hughes Robert and Judith Rainear Dr. Sy Baron and Gloria Adelson Dr. John Jasina and Dr. Eunjung Choi Mr. and Mrs. Clark L. Remsburg Mr. and Mrs. James P. Anderson Riley Rogers Kash Harriet Ripinsky Anonymous (2) Mr. and Mrs. Michael Kirk Mr. and Mrs. Claron A. Robertson Susan Parsons and Angus Baker Mr. Michael and Alesia and Scott Ross Mr. and Mrs. Frank L. Barkley, Jr. Dr. Dianne Kochamba Mr. and Mrs. James Rovito Dr. and Mrs. William Y. Buchanan John and Shea Kuhn Mr. and Mrs. Robert K. Schafer Dr. and Mrs. G. Stephen Buck Dr. Edmund LeRoy Bill and Ruth Schwartz James and Barbara Buckley Charles and Joan Lipuma Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Schwartz Paul and Polly Cathcart Mr. George J. Pothering and Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth Seeger Richard Clapp Ms. Maria V. Lundell Herk and Sherry Sims Margaret Comfort Ms. Lane Howell MacAvoy Mr. and Mrs. George W. Smyth, Jr. Michael and Sally Connelly Mr. and Mrs. Emory Main Duane and Lee Spong Jill Davidge Dr. and Mrs. John C. Maize Thomas and Jane Steele Gary and Susan DiCamillo Cathy Marino Tim and Mary Strand Dr. Carol Drowota Gary and Donna Mastrandrea Mr. and Mrs. Harold Talbot Eaton Corporation Mr. Tony Mazurkiewicz Lavinia M. Thaxton Mrs. Virginia Ennis Mr. and Mrs. Thomas McDermott Drs. Terri Thomas and Alex Kent Mr. and Mrs. Fair Mary Anne Michael Anne and Ken Tidwell The Fink Family Susan and Larry Middaugh Ann and Peter Trees Jaimie and Bill Flack Dr. and Mrs. Terence N. Moore Mr. and Mrs. Martin J. Vincentsen Paula and Eugene Freed Helen and Gerd D. Mueller Gero and Linda vonGrotthuss Sallie and Stephen Fuerth Helen and Donald Muglia John and Cecily Ward Jane and Jack Gelston Patrick and Agnes Murphy Ms. Jane Waring Mr. and Mrs. Cliff Genatt Virgil and Pam Niesslein Betty and Leo Weber Veronica D. and Peter B. Goodrich Anthony R. Oglietti Constance West Mrs. Faye F. Griffin Mr. and Mrs. Bob Omahne Mr. Joseph L. Wright, Jr. Joanne Hawkins Owen/ McClinton Family Fund Dr. and Mrs. Arnie Zaks Aileen Hedrick Dr. and Mrs. Leonard L. Peters Jodie-Beth Galos and Richard and Nancy Heiss Foundation Ms. Eloise Pingry Michael Zwerling Kandace and William Higley Ms. Helen Powell
26 CharlestonSymphony.org IN HONOR / IN MEMORY
IN HONOR IN MEMORY Charlotte Bekker Sheila Christie Dr. and Mrs. Fritz Lorscheider Dr. James L. and Judy E. Chitwood - Chitwood Family Fund Yuriy Becker Judith Green and Dr. Michael Fritz Septima Poinsette Clark Marilyn Hoffman Elizabeth Poinsette-Fisher Harold Talbot Dr. Hal and Jo Fallon Mark Edwards Charleston Restorative and Gwen Greenwalt Cosmetic Dentistry, LLC Dr. James L. and Judy E. Chitwood - Jerry Evans Chitwood Family Fund Daniel Brownstein Robert and Catherine Hill Dr. and Mrs. Fritz Lorscheider Carol Fishman Dr. Sy Baron and Gloria Adelson John F. Maybank David H. Maybank Reverend Deane Kemper Mrs. Katherine Maybank Harbor View Presbyterian Church Mr. John M. Rivers, Jr. Mariano and June La Via Dorothy Irene Carson Rhett Joseph R. Cockrell, MD Rev. Dr. William P. Rhett, Jr. Preston Lee Linda Ripinksy Sandra Lee Harriet Ripinsky Elizabeth Rivers Lewine Ann Rudick Martha Rivers Ingram Advised Fund of Mr. and Mrs. Alfred L. Malabre, Jr. Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee Edward Heriot Sparkman Drs. Paul and Mary Jane Roberts Marcia and Raul Farroch Bryan Smalley Julia Lamson-Scribner Gordon Strauss Mr. Robert L. Pratt Sam and Judi Deturo Mr. and Mrs. Claron A. Robertson
John H. Warren, III Esq. Dr. Samuel Dwane Thomas Henry M. Blackmer Foundation, Inc. Alan Watkins Weesie and Tradd Newton Pamela M. Packard Byron Stahl Hal Currey and Peggy Schachte Financial Advocacy Network
CharlestonSymphony.org 27 SUPPORT THE CSO’S SPECIAL RECORDING PROJECT
he Charleston Symphony is excited to announce a special project that will showcase the orchestra’s artistic excellence, both locally and abroad. This season the CSO will be recording two works Twritten by Charleston composer, Edward Hart; Under an Indigo Sky, a violin concerto featuring Yuriy Bekker, and a newly-commissioned world-premiere, A Charleston Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra, featuring the renowned Shanghai Quartet.
These works will be recorded live during the Masterworks season premiere and finale weekends, with additional patch sessions scheduled around the performances. We are thrilled to have the unique opportunity to produce a commercial recording of music celebrating Charleston performed by the Charleston Symphony, that will be available for future world-wide release.
We believe that this project will serve to significantly elevate the reputation of the Charleston Symphony beyond the Lowcountry.
With appreciation to the following supporters who, as of October 1, 2019, have supported this initiative to make the project a reality:
Anonymous John and Shea Kuhn Patricia Ann Abraham June and Mariano La Via Brady and Betty Anderson Elizabeth Rivers Lewine Jon Baumgarten and Jodi Rush Valerie and John Luther James L. and Judy E. Chitwood Lenna Macdonald and Robert Carew Anne and Will Cleveland INDIGO BOOKS from Nat & Linda Malcolm Carol H. Fishman Mrs. Katherine Maybank Jaimie and Bill Flack Phyllis P. Miller Jodie-Beth Galos and Michael Zwerling Kathleen J. Reid Rajan and Suman Govindan Sylvia and Bob Reitman Cindy and George Hartley David Savard Lee and Ann Higdon Helen and Robert Siedell Robert and Catherine Hill Susan W. and James V. Sullivan Paul and Becky Hilstad Gerald and Gretchen Tanenbaum Marilyn Hoffman Mr. and Mrs. John H. Warren, III Ken and Sue Ingram
We are extremely grateful to those who have contributed so far. As of October 1, 2019, we are just over halfway to our goal of raising $60,000. If you are interested in making a special one-time gift to be part of this exciting initiative, please contact Alana Morrall at 843-723-7528 ext. 115 or [email protected]. Benefits include recognition as a sponsor on the CD booklet, an invitation to the CD Release Party, special events, receptions with the artists, and more.
Visit our website www.charlestonsymphony.org to learn more.
28 CharlestonSymphony.org BRING THE CHARLESTON SYMPHONY INTO YOUR HOME — LITERALLY!
Join the many members of the Charleston Symphony family who already provide housing for visiting guest musicians.
Get to know some of the wonderful musicians who travel to Charleston to bring you great music, and at the same time have a direct impact on the quality of the music-making on-stage!
Host only when it is convenient for you, and all you need to provide is a private room. We are looking for hosts (or unused vacation rental property, we will pay any fees) in all areas of greater Charleston.
For more information on this program, contact: Tom Joyce, Personnel Manager [email protected] 843-469-4274 cell
CharlestonSymphony.org 29 THE CSOL® A letter from our President
ear Fellow Music Lovers:
Welcome to the 83rd season of the Charleston Symphony. This also marks the 55th D ® year of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra League, Inc. (CSOL ). Our mission is to provide financial assistance to the orchestra through fundraising projects and to support our community through scholarships and music education programs.
The CSOL 2019-2020 season is off to a marvelous start, beginning with a wonderful gala featuring renowned watercolor artist, Mary Whyte, in collaboration with concertmaster, Yuriy Bekker, and a CSO string ensemble. If you attended the Where Art Our Veterans luncheon in mid-October, you know how moving and uplifting this event was. We are also pleased to announce the unveiling this year’s car sponsorship. Courtesy of Hendricks Volvo Cars of Charleston, our featured car is a 2020 Volvo XC60 (see the ad in this edition of BRAVO!). Plans are well underway for our annual Designer Showhouse—a perennial favorite—that will be held from March 19th through April 19th. In fall 2020, we welcome the return of our “Swing for the Symphony” golf tournament, to be held at the beautiful Country Club of Charleston. Stay tuned for all the details on these great events.
The CSOL is proud to be the largest institutional donor to the Charleston Symphony. Our fundraising projects last year enabled us to contribute more than $185,000 to the orchestra. In addition, we awarded more than $35,000 for scholarships to musically talented youth from the tri-county area and to members of the Charleston Symphony. The money we raise enables our young and professional musicians to expand their musical talents and experiences.
CSOL is close to 275 members strong. We count on our hard-working volunteers to run our projects and raise the money needed to support the Charleston Symphony and our scholarship and music education programs. Please consider joining this energetic and talented group. Working together, we can continue to support our mission of ‘keeping the music playing in the Lowcountry.’
For more information, visit our website at www.csolinc.org, or contact me personally at [email protected].
30 CharlestonSymphony.org CharlestonSymphony.org 31 32 CharlestonSymphony.org
EDUCATION AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT he Charleston Symphony offers a variety of accessible educational programs for students and teachers to foster lifelong relationships with music, ranging from introductory performances for children that are Texperiencing music for the first time, to mentoring the region’s top instrumentalists of the Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestra. The CSO believes in the immense value of education through music, and it is our goal to reflect this belief in the mission of our educational programs—to inspire, challenge, and educate students through musical experiences. To fulfill our mission, create more opportunities for young people, and to make an impact in our community, the CSO invests over $350,000 annually in its educational initiatives.
ABOUT OUR INITIATIVES:
Musicians in Schools: When the CSO Musicians are Young People’s Concert: The Charleston Symphony not on stage, they are performing for students in partners with Carnegie Hall’s Link Up program to offer schools throughout the tri-county region at no cost a highly interactive concert experience for students in to the school, eliminating barriers of access such as grades K-5. Each concert program is designed with affordability and transportation. For many students, a curriculum that is taught in the classroom to all this is their first experience and only opportunity to participating students so that students can sing and see a live musical performance. Last season, CSO play recorder along with the CSO at the culminating ensembles gave 112 performances at 73 schools, concert. The CSO offers district accredited reaching over 15,000 students, 45% of whom are workshops on the Link Up curriculum for all educators from Title I schools. participating in the Young People’s Concert. Last season, the CSO performed The Orchestra Swings at Charleston Southern University’s Lightsey Chapel for 2,200 students from 23 schools.
34 CharlestonSymphony.org Residency Program: Throughout the season, CSO programs, please contact the CSO’s Director of Principal Timpanist, Beth Albert, and Principal Education and Community Engagement, Mitsuko Percussionist, Ryan Leveille visit the Allegro Charter Flynn, at [email protected] or call School of Music as part of an on-site residency (843) 723-7528 ext. 103. program. This highly collaborative program allows the CSO musicians to work closely with the music Special thanks to our Education Sponsors: teacher to enhance classroom curriculum and aims Anonymous Kiawah Seabrook to create long lasting impact of mentorship through Mr. and Mrs. Frank L. Exchange Club music. The CSO musicians work closely with Barkley, Jr. Janine Luke students to coach and mentor students on percussion The Bihun Family Cynthia S. and Foundation James C. Mabry technique and musicality. BlueCross BlueShield Macdonald Carew of South Carolina Family Fund Community Performances: The CSO partners with a Dr. Ivy Broder and Jack and Cathy McWhorter Dr. John F. Morrall III The Mark Elliott Motley variety of local organizations to bring the community City of Charleston Foundation performances such as Saltwater Sounds at the South Coastal Wealth Publix Super Markets Carolina Aquarium, Story Time at the Charleston Management Charities County of Charleston Michael Griffith and County Public Library, and performances at the local Charleston Symphony Donna Reyburn Farmers Markets. Orchestra League, Inc. Harriet Ripinsky Daniel Island Alesia and Scott Ross Community Fund Mr. David Savard Student Ticket Options: Steeply discounted student Dominion Energy South Carolina Arts tickets are available including $10 Student Rush Joanne and Commission tickets on the evening of all CSO performances, Christopher Eustis South State Bank Exchange Club Speedwell Foundation making musical experiences more accessible and of Charleston Albert and Caroline Thibault affordable for young people. Julie and John Fenimore The Kennedy-Herterich Judith Green and Foundation Dr. Michael Fritz Morgan and How do we do it? Richard and Ann Gridley Lauren Herterich The CSO is committed to serving our community Robert and Catherine Hill Dieter and Karyn and offers meaningful musical experiences to Sue and Ken Ingram Kennedy Herterich Mrs. Gail Kahn students through the generous support of donors, Kite Foundation Fund / corporate sponsors, and community partners. Nancye B. Starnes To learn more about how you can support these
CharlestonSymphony.org 35 EDUCATION AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestra
The Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestra (CSYO) program is a core educational program of the Charleston Symphony and one of the leading youth orchestras of South Carolina. Led by CSO Assistant Conductor, Kellen Gray, CSYO offers middle and high school musicians an opportunity to perform symphonic music with a high standard of musical excellence. The student musicians of the CSYO receive high quality musical instruction and have access to the resources of the Charleston Symphony such as mentorship by the CSO core musicians through sectional coachings, side-by-side rehearsals and concerts. CSYO is for advanced string, wind, brass, and percussion students ranging in grades 7-12 and is comprised of students from the tri-county.
This season, the Charleston Symphony has launched a new ensemble, the Charleston Symphony Youth Strings (CSYS). The all string ensemble led by conductor Ryan Silvestri, CSYS is for string students in grades 5-9 and aims to serve younger students to help sharpen ensemble skills.
The CSYO and CSYS rehearse on Sunday afternoons at the Charleston County School of the Arts and perform three concerts throughout the season. Please visit www.CharlestonSymphony.org/csyo for more information.
36 CharlestonSymphony.org MEET THE CSYO Team
Kellen Gray, Charleston Symphony Assistant Conductor and Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestra Music Director Kellen Gray has earned a reputation as a versatile and imaginative conductor through his enthusiasm for traditional, experimental, and integrative multimedia art programs. Presently, he serves as Assistant Conductor at the Charleston Symphony Orchestra and Music Director of the Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestra.
Prior to his Charleston appointment, Kellen was a Project Inclusion Freeman Conducting Fellow, and later, Assistant Conductor at Chicago Sinfonietta, under Music Director, Mei-Ann Chen, while also fulfilling duties as Associate Conductor of the Columbus Ballet (GA) from 2016-18. Before leaving Chicago, Kellen made his Chicago Symphony Center debut, which Jacob Davis of Chicago’s Picture This Post, described as, “...laser-like focus that allowed the entire orchestra to seem to become one organism.”
From 2014-16, Kellen was Assistant Conductor at the Valdosta Symphony Orchestra, under Music Director Howard Hsu, and Music Director of the Valdosta Symphony Youth Orchestra of Georgia. Also in 2016, he was one of eight Conducting Fellows selected to attend Eastern Music Festival, under the tutelage of Gerard Schwarz, Grant Cooper, and Jose-Luis Novo. Of his North Carolina debut at Eastern Music Festival, Peter Perret of the Classical Voice of North Carolina referred to Kellen as an “...gestures so smooth and polished they’re almost choreography...”
Kellen spoke on the 2018 League of American Orchestras conference discussion panel on the value of leadership pipelines in classical music based on diversity, inclusion, and equity. At a 2017 festival celebrating the 100th birthday of Georgia-born author, Carson McCullers, he was awarded the honor of guest-conducting a collaboration of the music of David Diamond and the premiere of Karen Allen’s debut film, “A Tree, A Rock, A Cloud.”
He earned an undergraduate degree in Violin Performance and an Artist’s Diploma in Orchestral Conducting from the Schwob School of Music at Columbus State University and Master’s degree in Orchestral Conducting from Valdosta State University.
Kellen’s recent and upcoming conducting endeavors include the Philadelphia Orchestra, Boston Symphony, Charlotte Symphony, Charlotte Ballet, Chicago Philharmonic, and Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra.
CharlestonSymphony.org 37 MEET THE CSYO Team
Ryan Silvestri, Charleston Symphony Youth Strings Conductor Ryan Silvestri is in his seventh year at Wando High School as Director of Orchestras. A native of Boardman, Ohio, Ryan earned a bachelor's degree in instrumental music education from Florida State University and a master's degree in violin performance from UNC-Greensboro. He completed his string education studies with the late Dr. Michael Allen, co-author of the Essential Elements for Strings series, as well as Dr. Rebecca MacLeod. As a violinist Ryan has performed with the Charleston, Greensboro, and Tallahassee Symphonies and also served as Concertmaster of the Brevard Music Center Sinfonia Orchestra. Primary violin teachers include Marjorie Bagley, Corinne Stillwell, Eliot Chapo, and John Wilcox.
Ryan has served as an adjudicator and guest clinician throughout South Carolina. Professional associations include the National Association for Music Education (NAfME) and the American String Teachers Association (ASTA). Mr. Silvestri has been published in the America String Teacher—a national string journal put out by the American String Teacher's Association. Under his direction, the Wando Orchestras have nearly tripled in size and consistently received Superior ratings at the South Carolina Music Educators Association (SCMEA) Concert Festival. In 2017, the Wando Honors Orchestra was invited to perform at the SCMEA state conference, and in 2018 competed in the ASTA National Orchestra Festival. Ryan lives in Mount Pleasant, SC with his wife and three children.
38 CharlestonSymphony.org
MASTERWORKS January 10 and 11, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center Sponsored by John and Betsy Cahill
BACH’S BRANDENBURG Micah Gangwer, Asako Kremer and Alexander Boissonnault, Violins Norbert Lewandowski, Cello Jessica Hull-Dambaugh, Flute Chee-Hang See, Piano Ken Lam, Conductor
Arcangelo Corelli (1653-1713) Concerto Grosso Op.6, No. 2 in F Major I. Vivace; Allegro II. Allegro III. Grave; Andante largo; Allegro
Sir Michael Tippett (1905-1998) Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli
INTERMISSION
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G Major, BWV 1048 I. Allegro II. [Adagio] III. Allegro
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) Concerto in E-flat “Dumbarton Oaks” I. Tempo giusto II. Allegretto III. Con moto
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D Major, BWV 1050 I. Allegro II. Affettuoso III. Allegro
CharlestonSymphony.org 41 ABOUT THE ARTIST Masterworks Chee-Hang See, Piano hee-Hang See is a prize-winning pianist who has been called “a cool and confident performer” by the Charleston City Paper. He Chas performed in concert series and festivals such as the Festival Internacional de Colonia, Hilton Head Symphony Orchestra Musicale, South Carolina Chamber Music Festival, Chicago Duo Piano Festival, Hawaii International Cultural Arts Festival, and Piccolo Spoleto Festival. He has soloed with the Toa Payoh West Chinese Orchestra in Singapore, Bela Bartok Orchestra in Perugia, Italy, Montevideo Philharmonic in Uruguay, College of Charleston Orchestra, and the Cleveland Institute of Music Chamber Orchestra. He plays regularly with Charleston Symphony, Chamber Music Charleston, and his duo Tan and See Piano Duo.
Chee-Hang is currently faculty at Charleston Academy of Music and music director of Midtown Theater in North Charleston, where he founded Midweek at Midtown, a chamber music series. He remains in high demand as pianist and composer in his native Singapore and all over the U.S. His debut album “Violin Transcriptions”, featuring works by Rachmaninoff and Muczynski, was released in 2014.
Chee-Hang received a Master’s degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music where he was a student of Sandra Shapiro. Previously, he graduated summa cum laude from the College of Charleston where he was also awarded an Artist Certificate in Piano Performance while studying with Enrique Graf. He also received Piano Performance and Accompaniment diplomas from the Royal Schools of Music and Trinity College in London under the tutelage of Wong Joon Hwang in Singapore.
42 CharlestonSymphony.org PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Johann Sebastian Bach By contrast, Concerto No. 3 presses the same small Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 3 and 5 collection of string instruments into service as both concertino and ripieno, with subsets of the group When asked about what message we might send to fluidly transitioning between the roles of soloist an extraterrestrial civilization, physician and former and accompanist over the course of the piece. The dean of the Yale and NYU medical schools Lewis first movement and last movements are organized Thomas remarked, “I would vote for Bach, all of Bach, around a ritornello, a kind of instrumental refrain streamed out into space, over and over again. We that alternates with soloistic episodes in which the would be bragging of course.” Even after more than musical material is developed through a back and two-and-a-half centuries since his death in 1750, the forth between the performers. The second movement music of Johann Sebastian Bach continues to serve is something of a curiosity consisting of a single as a high-water mark for many musicians, composers, measure with only two chords in it. Many scholars conductors, and music fans. Mozart, Beethoven, have suggested that these chords are probably meant and Mendelssohn regarded J.S. Bach as the giant on to surround a cadenza improvised by the harpsichord whose shoulders they stood, and it was his spectacular or violin player, but modern performance approaches vision and intricate craftsmanship that inspired them range from simply playing the cadence with minimal to create masterpieces of their own. And in 1977, the ornamentation to inserting full movements from first movement of Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto other works to fill the gap. No. 2 was chosen as the first musical piece to be played on the Voyager Golden Record, a phonograph Igor Stravinsky record containing a broad sample of Earth's common Concerto in E-flat (“Dumbarton Oaks”) sounds, languages, and music sent into outer space with the two Voyager probes. Perhaps someday, an Igor Stravinsky is a compositional master of disguise, alien civilization will acknowledge our “bragging” by fully reinventing himself no less than three times sending along some music by a Bach of their own. over his sixty-year career. So, when encountering one of his compositions, one must first determine Together, the Brandenburg Concertos comprise which Stravinsky is responsible. Stravinsky wrote the a set of six orchestral compositions dedicated by Concerto in E-flat towards the end of his neo-classical Bach to Prince Christian Ludwig of Brandenburg in period and pays clear homage to the concision and the spring of 1721. These works are not “concertos” clarity of Baroque concerted music like the Bach in the sense we think of them today, with a single and Corelli included on tonight’s program. In fact, soloist accompanied by the orchestra. Instead, they Stravinsky discussed Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto represent an older tradition of “concerted music,” No. 3 as a pervasive and specific influence on the in which a small group of featured players (the composition: “I played Bach very regularly during concertino) converse against a background texture of the composition of the concerto and I was greatly strings and harpsichord (the ripieno). Concerto No. 5 attracted to the Brandenburg Concertos. Whether features a concertino of flute, violin, and harpsichord or not the first theme of my first movement against a ripieno of strings with the beautiful middle is a conscious borrowing from the third of the movement scored for just the trio of concertino Brandenburg set, however, I do not know. What I players. The featured role of the harpsichord in this can say is that Bach would most certainly have been concerto, which moves back and forth between delighted to loan it to me; to borrow in this way was concertino and ripieno throughout, is almost certainly exactly the sort of thing he liked to do.” an indication that the part was written for no less a performer than Bach himself.
CharlestonSymphony.org 43 PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Just as with Stravinsky’s other “neo-classical” age of seventeen, the Philharmonic Academy in compositions, however, the emphasis is decisively Bologna, where he began his career as a violinist and on the “neo.” No one listening could mistake this composer, accepted Corelli as a member. During his concerto for something penned in the European Bologna days, various stories describe him traveling courts of the 18th century. This is a thoroughly and to Paris, Munich, and Amsterdam and being forced rigorously modern composition that simply borrows out of each new location because of the threatening the graceful gestures and contours of a previous era. power of his genius. At some point, Corelli moved The piece takes its nickname from the Dumbarton from Bologna to Rome where he was a fixture at Oaks estate in Washington, D.C. whose owners, the papal court and well known among the Roman Robert and Mildred Bliss, commissioned the piece in and ecclesial aristocracy. Just a few years before his honor of their 30th wedding anniversary. Stravinsky death, he was inducted into the Arcadian Academy visited the estate before he started composing and he of Rome. He was buried in the Roman Pantheon. All claimed to have been influenced in his design of the this despite having published only five collections of piece by the perfect layout of the Blisses’ elaborate sonatas during his lifetime and supposedly refusing to formal gardens. The piece premiered in May 1938 in play in the extreme upper register of his instrument, the music room in the Dumbarton Oaks mansion, the violin. conducted by no less than the famed composer and pedagogue Nadia Boulanger, who had first put the Nonetheless, Johann Sebastian Bach and George couple in touch with Stravinsky. Frideric Handel both undertook extensive study of Corelli’s music with each of them composing works Despite the effervescence and cool refinement of his explicitly referencing his collections of sonatas and music, Stravinsky composed the Concerto in E-flat concerti. Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos, however, at an incredibly tumultuous and tragic time in the feature a rotating cast of solo instruments. Arcangelo composer’s personal life. In the spring of 1938, Katya, Corelli’s Opus 6, a collection of twelve concerti grossi, Stravinsky’s wife of 33 years, contracted tuberculosis all use the same instrumentation with a ripieno of and the disease quickly spread to his eldest daughter, string orchestra plus a featured concertino of two Ludmila, and to the composer himself. Neither his violins and a cello. Additionally, the vast majority daughter nor his wife survived the infection past the of Corelli’s concerti are exemplars of the Italian following year and Stravinsky himself spent more than Baroque practice of sonatas da chiesa (“sonatas five months in the hospital. Stravinsky credits the for the church”) in which suites of instrumental unimaginable difficulty of this period for his desire to music underscore at key moments in celebration take a kind of refuge in the music of his idol, J.S. Bach. of the Roman Catholic mass. The relatively short movements along with alternating between slow and Arcangelo Corell fast tempos provided a variety that enabled musicians Concerto Grosso, Op. 6, No. 2 to navigate a wide range of different liturgical settings. These concerti form a bridge between Arcangelo Corelli’s life story is inextricable from the the inchoate instrumental traditions of the Italian mythos that developed around him. He was born in Renaissance and the flourishing of instrumental February 1653 in the Papal States, a cross-section virtuosity that characterized the late Baroque. of territory in the central Italian peninsula that was controlled by the Pope and his court. Little is known about his early years, but by the exceptionally young
44 CharlestonSymphony.org PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Sir Michael Tippett During this period of new stability, the 1953 Edinburgh Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli Festival commissioned Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli to commemorate the 300th Michael Tippett’s nearly seventy-year career as a anniversary of Corelli’s birth. Tippett took as his composer progressed through a series of fits and inspiration the “Adagio” movement from Correlli’s starts. After graduating from the Royal College of F minor Concerto, Opus 6, Number 2. In this Music (RCM) in 1928 having studied contemporary composition, we see the full-flourishing of all Tippett’s composition, he took a job conducting choirs and myriad false starts and dead ends. The piece is at teaching French in a small village in rural Surrey. once traditional and daring, contrapuntal and lyrical, However, after staging a disappointing concert of derivative and totally original. Like Stravinsky’s neo- his own works in the village of Oxted in 1930, he classical works, this is music that draws on traditional withdrew all his compositions and re-enrolled at RCM forms and gestures but pushes them in radical and to study 16th- and 17th-century counterpoint. After unmistakably new directions. In a review of the first graduating a second time in 1932, Tippett moved performance, a critic for The Times’s complained to South London and resumed composing, but by that the “excessive complexity of the contrapuntal the end of the decade, Tippett again withdrew as writing” meant that “there was so much going on he ramped up his political engagement in a number that the perplexed ear knew not where to turn or of different organizations and struggled to come to fasten itself.” One might agree with The Times’s terms with his homosexuality. Tippett re-emerged reviewer’s assessment that the music presents too in 1941 with the completed score for A Child of Our many simultaneous ideas to engage just one at a time Time, his secular oratorio about the events inside but might also question whether that constitutes a Nazi Germany leading up to Kristallnacht. Prior to flaw in Tippett’s design. Rather, the joy of Fantasia the premiere in March 1944, Tippett served several Concertante comes from the slightly disorienting months in prison for avoiding his conscripted military swirl of musical phrases that fold and turn in on each service during the Second World War. By the early other in all kinds of new and surprising ways. 1950s, Tippett was finally settling into a new teaching position at Morley College and working on his first major opera, The Midsummer Marriage.
CharlestonSymphony.org 45 POPS January 23, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center
FROM RUSSIANS WITH LOVE Mikhail Smirnov, Bayan Elina Karokhina, Balalaika Edward Brennan, Tenor Yuriy Bekker, Conductor
Dmitri Shostakovich Festive Overture, Op. 96
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky “Polonaise” from Eugene Onegin
Sergei Rachmaninoff Vocalise
Modest Mussorgsky, arr. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov Night on Bald Mountain
Igor Stravinsky Firebird Infernal Dance Berceuse Finale
INTERMISSION
46 CharlestonSymphony.org POPS January 23, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center
Aram Khachaturian “Sabre Dance” from Gayane
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov “Flight of the Bumble Bee” from Tale of Tsar Saltan
Russian Folk Song, arr. Carmen Dragon Oche Chiornie (Dark Eyes)
Lionel Bart, arr. John Bachalis “From Russia With Love” from James Bond: From Russia With Love
Maurice Jarre, arr. Bill Holcombe “Lara’s Theme” from Doctor Zhivago
Russian Folk Songs Korobushka Kalinka Valenkee Moscow Nights
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky “Finale” from Symphony No. 4 in F minor, Op. 36
CharlestonSymphony.org 47 ABOUT THE ARTISTS Pops Mikhail Smirnov, Bayan ikhail Smirnov was born in Moscow, Russia. Mikhail is an artistic director and founder of ensemble Barynya based in New York MCity, and the author of many articles about traditional Russian dance, music and instruments in English and Russian. Mikhail received his master’s degree from the Moscow State University of Culture and Arts. As a child, he was a member of the famous “Moscow Boys Chorus”—one of the most prestigious all-male choirs in Russia. Before coming to the United States in 1991, Mikhail was a soloist in several Russian folk dance and music groups including the Moscow State Center for Russian song, “Russkaya Pesnya,” under the direction of Nadezhda Babkina. In January 2009, Mikhail Smirnov and dancers of ensemble Barynya were featured on national TV, NBC’s Superstars of Dance; a breathtaking international dance competition led by executive producers Nigel Lythgoe and Simon Fuller (American Idol, So You Think You Can Dance). Michael Flatley (“Lord of the Dance”) and Susie Castillo, a former Miss USA, hosted this prestigious dance competition. Mikhail Smirnov was one of eight judges to decide which country will win. The show premiered on the NBC network. Ensemble Barynya is a world-renowned group that enjoys exalting stature as the premier Russian folk ensemble outside of Russia. Under direction of Mr. Smirnov ensemble Barynya has become the most requested Russian dance, song and music show outside of Mother Russia.
Elina Karokhina, Balalaika alalaika virtuoso Elina Karokhina is currently the number 1 balalaika player in the United States. She was born in Leningrad (now Saint BPetersburg), Russia, began her formal training at the Mussorgsky Music College of St. Petersburg and continued her training at N.A. Rimsky-Korsakov Saint Petersburg State Conservatory, earning a degree as an Orchestra Soloist. She continued her training at the Conservatory, which included a brief residency in Germany. After, she returned to her native St. Petersburg and completed her education, earning a Doctor of Musical Art degree in the Balalaika. Following her graduation, she began working as a musician, both as a teacher and as a performer, teaching balalaika. Elina Karokhina served in the Russian Army in the Military Ensemble in the Northwest Order of Red Stars. As a balalaika soloist Elina has toured all over the world. When she moved to the United States in 2009, she was hired as a musical director and soloist with the biggest professional Russian music, song and dance ensemble Barynya (New York). In January 2015 Elina Karokhina was selected to perform the balalaika part with Mariinsky Theatre directed by famous Russian conductor Valery Gergiev in Rodion Shchedrin’s opera
48 CharlestonSymphony.org ABOUT THE ARTISTS Pops
“The Enchanted Wanderer” at the Howard Gilman Opera House in Brooklyn, New York. In May 2016 she was hired to play six concerts at the Carnegie Hall in New York City as a part of “The Orchestra Rocks” international event. In September 2016 she appeared at the Carnegie Hall, again as a part of “Moscow Gypsy Army” representing rich musical culture of Eastern European Roma people. In January 2017 Elina was hired to play Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s “The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh” Suite at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. with the National Symphony Orchestra. All four performances were under direction of world-famous conductor Sir Mark Elder. Recently Elina was invited to perform as an honored guest artist at the Balalaika and Domra Association of America 40th Jubilee Convention in Philadelphia.
Edward Brennan, Tenor dward is a proud graduate of The University of Illinois Urbana Champaign; while a student at U of I, he was an active member in Ethe Lyric Theater @ Illinois program. Making appearances in most productions over his years there, the most memorable may be his portrayal of Danilo in The Merry Widow, or Rapunzel’s Prince in Into the Woods. In 2018 Edward returned to Champaign to perform as a soloist with the Sinfonia de Camera.
In 2017 Edward made his professional debut with The Utah Festival Opera, performing the roles of Frederic in Pirates of Penzance, and Captain Phoebus de Martin in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Edward has been a finalist in competitions across the country including the Michael Ballam International Opera Competition, the Sinfonietta Bel Canto Voice Competition, as well as the Nicholas Loren Vocal Competition sponsored by the Holland Chorale. He has had the pleasure of performing with orchestras around the Midwest including Sinfonia da Camera, Sinfonietta bel Canto, The Danville Symphony Orchestra, and the Blackburn College Orchestra and Chorale.
In 2019 Edward joined The Institute for Young Dramatic Voices, a training program that specializes in the cultivation of dramatic voices from around the world. He is originally from New Lenox, Illinois and is currently under the tutelage of Harold Meers and Saundra DeAthos-Meers.
CharlestonSymphony.org 49 MASTERWORKS February 7 and 8, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center
CONRAD TAO PLAYS BRAHMS Conrad Tao, Piano Ken Lam, Conductor
Johann Strauss, Jr. (1825-1899) Voices of Spring, Waltz for Orchestra, Op. 410
Robert Schumann (1810-1856) Symphony No. 1 in B-flat Major, Op. 38 “Spring” I. Andante un poco maestoso; Allegro molto vivace II. Larghetto III. Scherzo: Molto vivace IV. Allegro animato e grazioso
INTERMISSION
Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15 I. Maestoso II. Adagio III. Rondo: Allegro non troppo
50 CharlestonSymphony.org ABOUT THE ARTIST Masterworks Conrad Tao, Piano onrad Tao has appeared worldwide as a pianist and composer, performing to acclaim from critics and audiences alike. The former Cprodigy continues to emerge as a mature, thoughtful and thought- provoking artist, confidently pushing boundaries as a leading performer, composer, curator, and commissioner, championing new music while continuing to present core repertoire in a new light.
In addition to being the only classical musician selected to Forbes 30 Under 30 in 2012 (at age 17), a few of Tao’s numerous accolades and awards include being a Presidential Scholar in the Arts, an Avery Fisher Career Grant-winner, and a Lincoln Center Emerging Artist. His career as composer garnered eight consecutive ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer Awards before he turned 18, and he has been commissioned by the New York Philharmonic, the Dallas Symphony, the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, and others.
Tao’s Warner Classics recordings have been praised by NPR, The New York Times, The New Yorker’s Alex Ross and others, and New York Magazine called him “The kind of musician who is shaping the future of classical music.”
CharlestonSymphony.org 51 PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Johann Strauss, Jr. and described himself as a Kunstpfeifer (“artistic Voices of Spring, Waltz for Orchestra, whistler”). While you may not be up to the standards Op. 410 set by Tranquillini, don’t be surprised to find yourself whistling this charming tune on your way out of the hall this evening. Johann Strauss, Jr. was the undisputed king of dance music in 19th century Vienna. Starting around the age Robert Schumann of nineteen and following in the footsteps of his father and namesake, Strauss composed over 500 waltzes, Symphony No. 1 in B-flat Major, Op. 38 polkas, and quadrilles that earned him the title of “Waltz King” among Vienna’s musical elite. Strauss’s Robert Schumann’s Symphony No. 1, also known penchant for writing so-called “light music” rather as the Frühlingssinfonie (“Spring Symphony”), than heavier concert fare—symphonies, concertos, came at a crucial juncture in his life and career. and chamber music—has occasionally led to his Throughout the 1830s, Schumann built his marginalization in musical histories, but Strauss’s reputation as one of Germany’s preeminent musical contemporaries clearly counted him among the virtuosos by composing and performing increasingly brightest lights in the crowded Viennese firmament. daring and inventive suites of piano music most One famous story recounts Strauss’s wife Adele famously represented by Kinderszenen (“Scenes approaching the great master Johannes Brahms for from Childhood”) and Kreisleriana, both of which an autograph. Upon such a request, Brahms would premiered in 1838. He also spent the majority of typically inscribe a few measures of his most well- these years living under the roof of his piano teacher, known music, and then sign his name underneath. On Friedrich Wieck, in the famously musical town of this occasion, however, he chose instead to inscribe a Leipzig. During this time, Schumann developed a few measures from Strauss’s famous “Blue Danube” strong affection for Wieck’s daughter, Clara, and waltz, and then wrote beneath it: “Unfortunately, the two were engaged to be married in 1837. This NOT by Johannes Brahms.” engagement, however, was not approved by Clara’s father, who feared that marrying an indigent and Frühlingsstimmen (“Voices of Spring”) began as so unreliable artist like Schumann would halt her own many of Strauss’s compositions: intended to entertain burgeoning career as a piano virtuoso and composer. the audience at a charity performance for Vienna’s This set off an acrimonious three-year legal battle elite. The original performance featured the orchestral between Schumann and Wieck that finally ended waltz you hear today augmented by a soprano soloist. with Robert and Clara’s marriage in the fall of 1840. The soprano part was written for Bianca Bianchi, a star of the Vienna Court Opera, with a text evoking Clara strongly urged Schumann to try his hand the singing of birds as the landscape awakens from its at composing for forces beyond the piano, even winter slumber. The text was provided by Viennese writing in her diary at the time, “It would be best if poet Richard Genée, a frequent collaborator with he composed for orchestra; his imagination cannot Strauss and the librettist for Strauss’s most famous find sufficient scope on the piano ... my highest wish operetta, Die Fledermaus. The piece was such a smash is that he should compose for orchestra—that is his success at the charity performance that Strauss field! May I succeed in bringing him to it!” Schumann quickly retooled the piece for orchestral performance clearly heeded her advice, and in the year following and debuted the instrumental version seventeen days their marriage, he wrote extensively for orchestra later. In subsequent years, the piece became a staple including completing two of his four symphonies. in performances by Viennese artist Hans Tranquillini, In fact, Schumann appears to have finished the first who performed under the stage name of Baron Jean drafts for Symphony No. 1 in a period of only four
52 CharlestonSymphony.org PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks days during January 1841. The piece premiered under music and assured his readers that Brahms alone the baton of Schumann’s friend and fellow composer was “destined to give expression to our times in the Felix Mendelssohn just eight weeks later. highest and most ideal manner.” As if this forceful passing of the mantel wasn’t pressure enough on One of the biggest problems facing music historians the young composer, Schumann attempted suicide when dealing with Schumann’s symphonies is that five months later, which lead to his commitment to the composer was a fanatical reviser of his own an asylum until his eventual death in 1856. During works. Schumann made near-continuous changes those years of Schumann’s institutionalization, the and revisions to the score of Symphony No. 1 until young Brahms became the de facto head of the he finally allowed the definitive score to be published Schumann household, helping to manage financial in 1853—twelve full years after the premiere. affairs on Schumann’s and Clara’s behalf and visiting Though he withdrew them from the score prior to its Schumann regularly at the sanatorium since Clara eventual publication, Schumann’s earliest versions of was forbidden to see him until just days before his the piece actually carry programmatic or narrative death. During this period of turmoil for nearly five subtitles for each movement. The gradually unfurling years after Schumann’s suicide attempt, Brahms first movement is designated as “The Beginning published no new music and was largely kept afloat by of Spring,” the gorgeous and meditative second Clara’s continued commitment to programming his movement as “Evening,” the stately third movement published compositions on her public recitals. as “Merry Playmates,” and the grand final movement as “Spring in Full Bloom.” Regardless of Schumann’s Brahms’s only focus during this time was completing desire to include them in the score, these designations his first piano concerto that finally premiered in give listeners a good blueprint of what to expect January 1859 with the composer at the keyboard. It is from the piece. Consider these movements as a no accident that Brahms used the key of D minor this musical foretaste of what’s to come as we similarly work, the same as Beethoven’s monumental Ninth wait for February to melt away into glorious spring. Symphony. Brahms traveled to Cologne to hear his first performance of the Ninth in the spring of 1854 Johannes Brahms and that masterwork left its mark on his musical Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15 sketchbooks in the succeeding months. He finally began to shape his sketches into a piano concerto An understanding of Johannes Brahms’ Piano by 1856 as a kind of compromise after considering Concerto No. 1 must begin with the second half of the using the material for both a solo piano sonata and a story related in the notes above about Schumann’s full-fledged symphony. Despite the concerto format, Symphony No. 1. In the decade following his marriage Brahms ambition in this piece is clearly symphonic in to Clara, Schumann developed a reputation as one of register. In the same way that Beethoven’s towering the most important musical voices in Germany. His Ninth Symphony is often said to attempt to capture reputation as a composer grew as his music expanded the entirety of human experience in a single work, and diversified, but he also continued to sharpen Brahms seems to have put the full emotional freight his skills as a music writer and critic in the pages of of his early career and tumultuous personal life into the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik (“New Journal of this single concerto. From the youthful exhilaration of Music”), a journal he co-founded in 1834 with his being named Germany’s “Chosen One” to the tragic teacher and eventual father-in-law Friedrich Wieck. institutionalization and eventual death of his mentor, In 1853, Schumann wrote an infamous profile of the and even the burgeoning romantic infatuation Brahms then totally unknown 20-year-old Brahms in which was developing for Clara Schumann, all are present in he declared him “the Chosen One” of German a kind of delicate and frenzied balance that probably mirrors something of Brahms’s psyche at the time.
CharlestonSymphony.org 53
SPECIAL EVENT February 20, 2020 • 7:30pm College of Charleston Simmons Recital Hall
MAGNETIC SOUTH
György Ligeti (1923-2006) Six Bagatelles for Wind Quintet I. Allegro con spirito II. Rubato lamentoso III. Allegro grazioso IV. Presto ruvido V. Adagio Mesto- Béla Bartók in memoriam VI. Molto Vivace Capriccioso
Luciano Berio (1925-2003) Sequenza V for Trombone Solo
Jeffrey Rathbun (b. 1959) Three Diversions for 2 Oboes I. Allegretto II. Lento III. Vigoroso
Dr. James MacMillan (b. 1959) …as others see us…
CharlestonSymphony.org 55
MASTERWORKS February 28 and 29, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center
SCHEHERAZADE Daniel Moody, Countertenor Charleston Symphony Orchestra Chorus, Dr. Robert Taylor, Director College of Charleston Concert Choir, Dr. Robert Taylor, Director Ken Lam, Conductor
Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) Song of the Nightingale I. Presto II. Chinese March III. Song of the Nightingale IV. The Mechanical Nightingale
Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) Chichester Psalms I. Psalm 108:2; Psalm 100 II. Psalm 23; Psalm 2:1-4 III. Psalm 131; Psalm 133:1
INTERMISSION
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (1844-1908) Scheherazade, Op. 35 I. The Sea and Sinbad’s Ship II. The Tale of Prince Kalendar III. The Young Prince and the Princess IV. The Festival at Bagdad; The Sea; The Ship Goes to Pieces on a Rock
CharlestonSymphony.org 57 ABOUT THE ARTIST Masterworks Daniel Moody, Countertenor raised as having a “vocal resonance, [which] makes a profoundly startling impression” (The New York Times) and for his “vivid and Ppowerful” voice (The Boston Musical Intelligencer), Countertenor Daniel Moody has appeared in the title opera roles of Handel’s Giulio Cesare and Rinaldo, Arsamene in Handel’s Xerxes, Oberon in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and most recently, Nerone in Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea with the Cincinnati Opera.
Mr. Moody has performed with the Atlanta Symphony (Thomas Søndergård, conductor), Les Violons du Roy (w/ Bernard Labadie), Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra (w/ Nicholas McGegan) in a duet concert with famed mezzo-soprano Anne Sophie von Otter, Apollo’s Fire, The Cleveland Baroque Orchestra (w/ Jeannette Sorrell), the Mark Morris Dance Group, and several other groups, orchestras and festivals in America.
Career highlights include Carnegie Hall debuts with Oratorio Society of New York and Musica Sacra (w/ Kent Tritle), Off-Broadway debut in a production of Hans Christian Andersen, and performing the American premiere of George Benjamin’s intricate work Dream of the Song (w/ Stefan Asbury) at the Festival of Contemporary Music at Tanglewood.
In the 2019-20 season, he premieres with the Minnesota Orchestra, Miller Theater at Columbia University, Opera Lafayette, and debuts new operas Desire (Hannah Lash) and Cosmic Cowboy (Elena Ruehr).
A graduate of Peabody Conservatory (BM), Yale School of Music/Institute of Sacred Music (MM), Mr. Moody has won awards from the Metropolitan National Council, George London Competition, Sullivan Foundation, Handel Aria Competition, New York Oratorio Society Competition, and Russell Wonderlic Competition. www.DanielMoodyCountertenor.com
58 CharlestonSymphony.org LIBRETTO Masterworks Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) Chichester Psalms Chichester Psalms
Psalm 108, verse 2 Psalm 108, verse 2 Urah, hanevel, v’chinor! Awake, psaltery and harp! A-irah shachar! I will rouse the dawn!
Psalm 100 Psalm 100 Hariu l’Adonai kol ha-arets. Make a joyful noise unto the Lord all ye lands. Iv’du et Adonai b’simcha. Serve the Lord with gladness. Bo-u l’fanav bir’nanah. Come before His presence with singing. D’u ki Adonai Hu Elohim. Know that the Lord, He is God. Hu asanu, v’lo anachnu. It is He that has made us, and not we ourselves. Amo v’tson mar’ito. We are His people and the sheep of His pasture. Bo-u sh’arav b’todah, Come unto His gates with thanksgiving, Chatseirotav bit’hilah, And into His court with praise, Hodu lo, bar’chu sh’mo. Be thankful unto Him and bless His name. Ki tov Adonai, l’alom chas’do, The Lord is good, His mercy everlasting, V’ad dor vador emunato. And His truth endureth to all generations.
Psalm 23 Psalm 23 Adonai ro-i, lo echsar. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. Bin’ot deshe yarbitseini, He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, Al mei m’nuchot y’nachaleini, He leadeth me beside the still waters, Naf’shi y’shovev, He restoreth my soul, Yan’cheini b’ma’aglei tsedek, He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness, L’ma’an sh’mo. For His name’s sake.
Gam ki eilech Yea, though I walk B’gei tsalmavet, Through the valley of the shadow of death, Lo ira ra, I will fear no evil, Ki Atah imadi. For Thou art with me. Shiv’t’cha umishan’techa Thy rod and Thy staff Hemah y’nachamuni. They comfort me.
Ta’aroch l’fanai shulchan, Thou preparest a table before me, Neged tsor’rai In the presence of my enemies Dishanta vashemen roshi Thou anointest my head with oil Cosi r’vayah. My cup runneth over. Ach tov vachesed Surely goodness and mercy Yird’funi kol y’mei chayai, Shall follow me all the days of my life, V’shav’ti b’veit Adonai And I will dwell in the house of the Lord L’orech yamim. Forever.
CharlestonSymphony.org 59 LIBRETTO Masterworks Chichester Psalms cont’d Chichester Psalms cont’d
Psalm 2, verses 1-4 Psalm 2, verses 1-4 Lamah rag’shu goyim Why do the nations rage Ul’umim yeh’gu rik? And the people imagine a vain thing? Yit’yats’vu malchei erets, The kings of the earth set themselves, V’roznim nos’du yachad And the rulers take counsel together Al Adonai v’al m’shicho. Against the Lord and against His anointed.
N’natkah et mos’roteimo, Saying, let us break their bonds asunder, V’nashlichah mimenu avoteimo. And cast away their cords from us. Yoshev bashamayim He that sitteth in the heavens Yis’chak, Adonai Shall laugh, and the Lord Yil’ag lamo! Shall have them in derision!
Psalm 131 Psalm 131 Adonai, Adonai, Lord, Lord, Lo gavah libi, My heart is not haughty, V’lo ramu einai, Nor mine eyes lofty, V’lo hilachti Neither do I exercise myself Big’dolot uv’niflaot In great matters or in things Mimeni. Too wonderful for me to understand. Im lo shiviti Surely I have calmed V’domam’ti, And quieted myself, Naf’shi k’gamul alei imo, As a child that is weaned of his mother, Kagamul alai naf’shi. My soul is even as a weaned child. Yachel Yis’rael el Adonai Let Israel hope in the Lord Me’atah v’ad olam. From henceforth and forever.
Psalm 133, verse 1 Psalm 133, verse 1 Hineh mah tov, Behold how good, Umah nayim, And how pleasant it is, Shevet achim For brethren to dwell Gam yachad. Together in unity.
60 CharlestonSymphony.org PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov The first movement is titled “The Sea and Sinbad’s Scheherazade, Op. 35 Ship” in reference to the famous Middle Eastern folk hero of the same name, but Rimsky-Korsakov Though it doesn’t always tell a definite story, Nikolai intentionally leaves references to the story fairly Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade depicts a series vague, inviting us to supply specific details about of scenes from the famous collection of medieval which of Sinbad’s many voyages is being dramatized. Arabic folk tales known as the One Thousand and One The second movement, “The Kalandar Prince,” tells Nights. As told in the Arabic epic, Scheherazade is the the story of a wandering Sufi mystic who finds himself crafty storyteller who continues to spin cliffhanging shipwrecked on a deserted island filled with strange tales night after night in an attempt to forestall her and terrible creatures. In both cases, the throbbing own death at the hands of a wicked sultan. The piece of the ocean is always close at hand and provides the opens with an evocation of these two characters: narrative motion for the story. The third movement, the Sultan portrayed by the unison and fortissimo “The Young Prince and the Young Princess,” tells the proclamation, and Scheherazade by the soft fairy-tale simplest and most innocent story of young love in a chords in the woodwinds and the entry of the mournful playful dialogue between the woodwinds and strings. and seductive solo violin. What follows, unfolding The final movement is the most erratic and the most through four movements, is what the composer colorful, evoking no less than three additional stories described as “a kaleidoscope of fairy-tale images as well as incorporating reminiscences of previous and designs,” evoking many of the stories contained movements. Despite a lack of clear narrative in the in the One Thousand and One Nights, but not piece as a whole, it is difficult not to hear the final necessarily programmatic in a clear or direct way. In his movement as the master storyteller Scheherazade memoirs, Rimsky-Korsakov explained, “In composing weaving all of the narrative threads together Scheherazade, I meant the hints [conveyed by the and finally winning over the heart of the Sultan. titles] to direct the listener’s fancy but slightly on The peaceful coda at the end of the final movement the path which my own fancy had traveled. All I had lets us know that, in the end, love triumphs over evil desired was that the listener, if he liked my piece as and the kingdom is once again at peace. symphonic music, should carry away the impression that it is beyond doubt an Oriental narrative of some numerous and varied fairy-tale wonders and not merely four pieces played one after another and composed on the basis of themes common to all four movements.”
CharlestonSymphony.org 61 POPS March 12, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center
RANKY TANKY WITH THE CSO Featuring Ranky Tanky Yuriy Bekker, Conductor
George and Ira Gershwin, arr. Chuck Sayre Gershwin in Concert
Ranky Tanky Freedom All For You Good Time Sink Em Low Turtle Dove Sometimes Ranky Tanky
INTERMISSION
Duke Ellington, arr. Ralph Hermann Duke Ellington Fantasy
Ranky Tanky Stand By Me Go To Sleep Let Me Be Beat Em Down Green Sally That’s Alright
62 CharlestonSymphony.org ABOUT THE ARTISTS Pops Ranky Tanky
anky Tanky released their eponymous debut on Oct. 20th, 2017. By December of that year, the group had been profiled on NPR’s RFresh Air with Terry Gross and their album soared to the #1 position on the Billboard, I-Tunes, and Amazon Jazz Charts.
“Gullah” comes from West African language and means “a people blessed by God.” “Ranky Tanky” translates loosely as “Work It,” or “Get Funky!” In this spirit, this Charleston, SC based quintet performs timeless music of Gullah culture born in the southeastern Sea Island region of the United States. From playful game songs to ecstatic shouts, from heartbreaking spirituals to delicate lullabies, the musical roots of Charleston, SC are “rank” and fertile ground from which these contemporary artists are grateful to have grown.
South Carolina natives Quentin Baxter, Kevin Hamilton, Charlton Singleton, and Clay Ross first came together in 1998, fresh out of University, to form a seminal Charleston jazz quartet. Now, united by years apart and a deeper understanding of home, these accomplished artists have come together again, joined by one of the low-country’s most celebrated vocalists Quiana Parler, to revive a “Heartland of American Music” born in their own backyards.
CharlestonSymphony.org 63
MASTERWORKS March 27 and 28, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center
MENDELSSOHN’S SCOTTISH SYMPHONY Jan-Marie Joyce, Viola Ken Lam, Conductor
Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) Overture to Ruy Blas, Op. 95 Kellen Gray, Conductor
Béla Bartók (1881-1945) Viola Concerto, Op. posth BB128 (rev. Tibor Serly) I. Moderato II. Lento - Adagio religioso - Allegretto III. Allegro vivace
INTERMISSION
Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) Symphony No. 3 in A Major, Op. 56 “Scottish” I. Andante con moto - Allegro un poco agitato II. Vivace non troppo III. Adagio IV. Allegro vivacissimo - Allegro maestoso assai
CharlestonSymphony.org 65 ABOUT THE ARTIST Masterworks Jan-Marie Joyce, Viola an-Marie Christy Joyce is in her twenty-first season as Principal Violist with the Charleston Symphony Orchestra, where she has Jappeared as soloist on such works as Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante and Berlioz’ Harold in Italy. After earning a master’s degree in both viola and trumpet performance from Louisiana State University, she completed a professional studies certificate from the Cleveland Institute of Music under Stanley Konopka, Assistant Principal Violist of The Cleveland Orchestra. Jan-Marie is former Principal Violist of the Canton (OH) Symphony and currently spends her summers as a member of the Breckenridge (CO) Music Festival Orchestra. In the summer of 2005, she was invited to perform in in the orchestra led by Robert Spano for the Seattle Opera's production of Wagner’s Ring des Nibelungen. Mrs. Joyce can be heard with her siblings, all professional musicians, on a recording of chamber music of works for oboe and strings of which Fanfare magazine wrote, “Their performances on this disc are uniformly splendid.” Mrs. Joyce maintains an active teaching studio, is a faculty member of the Charleston International Music School each June, and has taught viola and coached chamber at the College of Charleston. She lives on James Island with her husband Tom (bass trombonist of the CSO) and three children, Anthony, Emma, and Kenneth, all of whom play strings as well.
66 CharlestonSymphony.org PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Felix Mendelssohn his continued dislike of the Hugo play that occasioned Ruy Blas Overture the piece. Perhaps because he dashed it off so quickly, the overture is a near-perfect crystalline iteration In February 1839, the Theater Pension Fund of Mendelssohn’s mature style. The two contrasting approached Felix Mendelssohn in his hometown of themes—one strident and forceful and the other Leipzig to provide some original music for a benefit quiet and brooding—are introduced, developed, and performance of Victor Hugo’s tragic drama Ruy recapitulated in clever, if narrowly conventional, ways Blas. The Theater Pension Fund hoped that its before being brought to a triumphant conclusion in performance with a new overture and original song the coda that closes the piece. from the well-known Leipzig composer might sell more tickets and thus raise more money than one Béla Bartók without. Mendelssohn agreed, but upon reading the Viola Concerto play, he commented in a letter to his mother that “[it] was so absolutely ghastly and beyond contempt As the political situation in Hungary worsened during that you wouldn’t even believe it, and I decided that I the fall of 1940, composer Béla Bartók and his wife didn’t have time to compose an overture and would Ditta boarded a steamer ship bound for New York only give them the song.” Mendelssohn promptly City. Second in reputation only to the 19th-century submitted the song to the theater along with his virtuoso Franz Liszt in his home country of Hungary, regrets that he couldn’t provide an overture. during his first years in America Bartók found himself unwanted and unproductive. His health was Just a few days before the performance—scheduled deteriorating due to as yet undiagnosed leukemia for Monday, March 11—a group from the theater and finances were tight due to a lack of professional came to visit Mendelssohn and thank him for opportunities. However, the last 18 months of his contributing to the performance. According to life represented an extraordinary burst of creativity Mendelssohn himself, one of his visitors that day in which Bartók created some of his most enduring made an off-handed comment that it was “too bad masterpieces. Beginning with the commission that that [he] hadn’t written the overture” though he would yield his Concerto for Orchestra during the quickly added that he “realizes that one needs time fall of 1943, Bartók took on a flurry of new projects to write a piece like that, and that next year they and in the spring of 1945, he received a note from would try to give [him] more notice.” Apparently, the distinguished Scottish violist William Primrose this comment so bothered Mendelssohn that he asking for a new concerto. When Bartók responded immediately set to work on a score for the overture. that he didn’t know enough about the instrument Despite a very busy week of rehearsals and a concert to write for it effectively, Primrose responded that of his own on Thursday night, he managed to submit a he should “not feel in any way proscribed by the full manuscript of his score by Friday morning. apparent technical limitations of the instrument” in the hopes that he would write something The piece debuted to wild applause at the benefit unconventional and challenging. concert the following Monday and Mendelssohn later commented that “it was all so much more fun than Bartók worked on the concerto over the summer I’ve ever had writing one of my pieces.” Mendelssohn and on September 8 sent a note to Primrose: “I continued to conduct performances of the piece in am very glad to be able to tell you that your viola subsequent years, though he insisted on the alternate concerto is ready in draft, so that only the score has title Overture for the Theater Pension Fund because of to be written…If nothing happens I can be through
CharlestonSymphony.org 67 PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks in 5 or 6 weeks, that is, I can send you a copy of the room is shown there with a winding staircase leading orchestral score in the second half of October, and up to the door… The chapel below is now roofless. a few weeks afterwards a copy (or if you wish more Grass and ivy thrive there and at the broken altar where copies) of the piano score.” Unfortunately, Bartók Mary was crowned Queen of Scotland. Everything died just 18 days after penning this letter and never is ruined, decayed, and the clear heavens pour in. I managed to finish assembling the score. This task fell think I have found there the beginning of my ‘Scottish’ instead to his friend, composer and violist Tibor Serly, Symphony.” Along with the letter, he included a who had to assemble the haggard pile of unordered small scrap of staff paper on which he had inscribed manuscript pages into a usable whole and convert some ideas for the symphony’s brooding opening Bartók’s threadbare draft into an orchestral score. measures inspired by his twilight walk at Holyrood. Primrose finally premiered the piece in Minneapolis four years after the composer’s death and performed Despite this seeming bolt of inspiration, it hundreds of times before his own death in 1982. Mendelssohn’s work on the piece floundered. His Scottish sojourn also compelled him to work on an Formally, the Viola Concerto is almost classical overture inspired by the starkly beautiful basalt sea in its construction, though the three-movement caves of The Hebrides off the northwest coast of format hides a four-movement symphonic plan Scotland. Mendelssohn completed this overture, underneath. The first movement is a lengthy and titled simply The Hebrides, the following year, but wide-ranging sonata-allegro that spans more time continued to make little progress on the symphony. than the other two movements put together. The By 1831, he seems to have finally put the piece demands on the player are almost athletic, beginning away in frustration only returning to it in earnest a with some stretches and simple calisthenics before full decade later in 1841. Although his “Scottish” progressing to much more difficult terrain. The Symphony was the second of five symphonies on serenity of the “adagio religioso” at the beginning of which Mendelssohn began to work, it was the last of the second movement is a welcome relief from the the five to be completed and the last to finally receive ferociousness of the first and seems to send the its public premiere. soloist on ecstatic flights of fancy that separate the ensemble’s chorale portions. The second movement That Mendelssohn does not obviously cling to his ends with a short scherzo—again, mirroring the four original Scottish inspiration is not surprising given movements of a symphony—before moving into the the long and intermittent process that finally brought boisterous Hungarian folk dance evoked by the mid- Symphony No. 3 to completion. He uses no Scottish tempo finale. folk melodies in the score and gives little indication of how the four movements might relate to Scottish Felix Mendelssohn history, geography, or culture in any way. In fact, by Symphony No. 3 “Scottish” the time of the premiere in March 1842, Mendelssohn had completely dropped “Scottish” from the title. But On July 30, 1829, a twenty-year-old Felix while critics have argued over the years about which Mendelssohn visited the ruins of Holyrood Chapel in musical elements may or may not derive from his Edinburgh, Scotland. He had taken some time off for Scottish experience, they seem unified in the opinion a walking tour of Scotland after a string of successful that this represents the pinnacle of Mendelssohn’s performances in London. A few days later he sent achievement as a symphonic composer. From the a letter to his family back in Berlin recounting the brooding opening chords to the swirling, energetic experience: “In the deep twilight, we went today to scherzo through the gorgeous and lyrical adagio to the the palace where Queen Mary lived and loved; a little triumphant finale, it may not be a taste of Scotland, but it still makes for quite a trip.
68 CharlestonSymphony.org CharlestonSymphony.org 69 CHARLESTON SYMPHONY YOUTH ORCHESTRAS March 28, 2020 • 1:00pm Gaillard Center
SIDE BY SIDE CONCERT WITH THE CHARLESTON SYMPHONY
Jake Hoch, Bass 2019 Concerto Competition Winner Lydia Pless, Cello 2019 Concerto Competition Winner Charleston Symphony Youth Strings, Ryan Silvestri, Conductor Charleston Symphony Youth Orchestra Kellen Gray, Conductor Charleston Symphony Orchestra Ken Lam, Conductor
CHARLESTON SYMPHONY YOUTH STRINGS Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791), arr. Hoffman Amadeus!
Joseph Phillips (b. 1966) Fantasia on an Original Theme
Keith Sharp (b. 1962) Eureka!
INTERMISSION
70 CharlestonSymphony.org CHARLESTON SYMPHONY YOUTH ORCHESTRA Duke Ellington (1899-1974), arr. Ralph Hermann Duke Ellington Fantasy
Giovanni Bottesini (1821-1889) Grand Allegro alla Mendelssohn
Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) Concerto for Cello and Orchestra, No. 1 in B. minor, Op. 104 I. Allegro
Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 95 “From the New World” I. Adagio- Allegro molto II. Largo IV. Allegro con fuoco
Conductor bios on page 16, 37, & 38.
CharlestonSymphony.org 71
CHAMBER April 3 and 4, 2020 • 7:30pm Charleston Library Society Sponsored in part by the Henry and Sylvia Yaschik Foundation
ALL ROADS LEAD TO VIENNA
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) Oboe Quartet in F Major, K. 370 (368b) I. Allegro II. Adagio III. Rondeau: Allegro Kari Kistler, Oboe | Yuriy Bekker, Violin | Jan-Marie Joyce, Viola | Norbert Lewandowski, Violoncello
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) Septet in E-flat Major, Op. 20 I. Adagio; Allegro con brio II. Adagio cantabile III. Tempo di Menuetto IV. Tema con variazioni V. Scherzo: Allegro molto e vivace VI. Andante con moto alla Marcia; Presto Yuriy Bekker, Violin | Jan-Marie Joyce, Viola | Norbert Lewandowski, Violoncello | TBD, Bass | Charles Messersmith, Clarinet | Quinn Delaney, Bassoon | Brandon Nichols, Horn
CharlestonSymphony.org 73
MASTERWORKS April 17 and 18, 2020 • 7:30pm Gaillard Center
CHARLESTON AND THE NEW WORLD The Shanghai Quartet: Weigang Li and Yi-Wen Jiang, Violins; Honggang Li, Viola; Nicholas Tzavaras, Cello Ken Lam, Conductor
Edmund Thornton Jenkins (1894-1926), re-orchestrated Vincent Plush (b. 1950) Charlestonia
Edward Hart (b. 1965) A Charleston Concerto [World Premier] I. Discovery II. Tragedy and Reconciliation III. Tomorrow
INTERMISSION
Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) Symphony No. 9 in E minor, Op. 95 “From the New World” I. Adagio - Allegro molto II. Largo III. Molto vivace IV. Allegro con fuoco
CharlestonSymphony.org 75 ABOUT THE ARTISTS Masterworks The Shanghai Quartet: Weigang Li and Yi-Wen Jiang, Violins; Honggang Li, Viola; Nicholas Tzavaras, Cello enowned for its passionate musicality, impressive technique and multicultural innovations, the Shanghai Quartet has become one Rof the world’s foremost chamber ensembles. Its elegant style melds the delicacy of Eastern music with the emotional breadth of Western repertoire, allowing it to traverse musical genres including traditional Chinese folk music, masterpieces of Western music and cutting-edge contemporary works. Formed at the Shanghai Conservatory in 1983, the Quartet has worked with the world’s most distinguished artists and regularly tours the major music centers of Europe, North America and Asia. Recent festival performances range from the International Music Festivals of Seoul and Beijing to the Festival Pablo Casals in France and the Beethoven Festival in Poland, as well as numerous concerts in all regions of North America. The Quartet has appeared at Carnegie Hall in chamber performances and with orchestra; in 2006 they gave the premiere of Takuma Itoh’s Concerto for Quartet and Orchestra in Isaac Stern Auditorium. Among innumerable collaborations with noted artists, they have performed with the Tokyo, Juilliard and Guarneri Quartets, cellists Yo-Yo Ma and Lynn Harrell, pianists Menahem Pressler, Peter Serkin, Jean-Yves Thibaudet and Yuja Wang, pipa virtuoso Wu Man and the vocal ensemble Chanticleer. The Shanghai Quartet has been a regular performer at many of North America’s leading chamber music festivals, including Maverick Concerts where they recently made their 27th consecutive annual appearance.
The Quartet has a long history of championing new music and juxtaposing traditions of Eastern and Western music. With more than 30 commissioned works, their recent premieres include Du Yun’s Tattooed in Snow (2015), Zhao Lin’s Red Lantern (2015) for pipa and string quartet, and String Quartet No. 12, Fantasia notturna by William Bolcom (2017). The Quartet’s 30th Anniversary season in 2013 brought five new commissions; Bullycide by David Del Tredici; Fantasie by Australian composer Carl Vine; a concerto for string quartet and symphony orchestra by Jeajoon Ryu; Verge Quartet by Lei Liang and Scherzo by Robert Aldridge, commissioned by Yu Long and the Beijing Music Festival. Their 25th anniversary season featured commission works by Penderecki (String Quartet No. 3: Leaves of an Unwritten Diary), Chen Yi (From the Path of Beauty), Vivian Fung, and jazz pianist Dick Hyman. The Penderecki quartet was premiered at the composer’s 75th birthday concert in Poland, followed by numerous performances worldwide. It was featured again at the composer’s 80th Birthday celebration in 2013. Chen Yi’s From the Path of Beauty, co-commissioned with Chanticleer, premiered in San Francisco, with performances at Tanglewood and Ravinia, Beijing and Shanghai. Other important commissions and premieres include works by Bright Sheng, Lowell Lieberman, Sebastian Currier, Marc Neikrug, and Zhou Long. The tradition continues with forthcoming works by Wang Lei and Tan Dun composed for their 35th Anniversary in 2018-19. The Shanghai Quartet has an extensive discography of more than 30 recordings, ranging from the Schumann and Dvořák piano quintets with Rudolf Buchbinder to Zhou Long’s Poems from Tang for string quartet and orchestra with the Singapore Symphony (BIS). Delos released the Quartet’s most popular disc, Chinasong, a collection of Chinese folk songs arranged by Yi-Wen Jiang reflecting on his childhood memories of the Cultural Revolution in China. The complete Beethoven String Quartets, a highly praised, seven-disc project, can be heard on an acclaimed Camerata set, released in 2009.
76 CharlestonSymphony.org PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Edmund Thornton Jenkins country extensively throughout the 1910s and 1920s, Charlestonia playing hundreds of shows from coast to coast as well as international engagements in Paris, Berlin, Rome, Born in April 1894, Edmund Thornton Jenkins was a London, and Vienna. native Charlestonian and his composition Charlestonia is one of the greatest musical tributes to his vibrant One of these overseas tours brought 20-year-old hometown. It is perhaps surprising that part of the Edmund to London. By 1914, Jenkins had graduated piece premiered in 1919 in London and received its from Morehouse College and was serving as Director only complete performance in Jenkins’s short lifetime of Bands for his father’s orphanage when he received in Brussels, Belgium. Charlestonia finally debuted here an offer to remain in London as a student at the in the Holy City in October 1996 when the CSO, prestigious Royal Academy of Music. In London and under the baton of the late David Stahl, presented eventually in Paris, the young composer began to find the American premiere as part of the broader his voice through musical opportunities organized “Edmund Jenkins Homecoming Month” festivities by British composer of African descent Samuel proclaimed by former Charleston Mayor Joseph P. Coleridge-Taylor and through the political activism Riley Jr. By all accounts, Jenkins had a complicated of the African Progress Union. But he never forgot relationship with his home city, which he visited the music of his youth in Charleston. Will Marion infrequently after moving to Europe. Jenkins chose to Cook, an African American composer and student commemorate Charleston in much of his music, but of Antonin Dvořák, ran into Jenkins during a trip consistently found the freedom and opportunities to to Paris and wrote back to his father in Charleston: create outside of the Jim Crow South. “Want to congratulate you on your son… with whom I had a most wonderful association while in Paris. He Jenkins was the son of a prominent Charlestonian, is possibly the best musician in the colored race, the Reverend Daniel Jenkins, who ran the Jenkins very best instrumentalist in any race, and one of the Orphanage from 1892 until his death in 1937. At most perfect Gentlemen I have ever had the pleasure that time the orphanage occupied the Old Marine of knowing.” Hospital on Franklin Street and often had more than 500 young men and women in its care at any given Edward Hart time. From the founding, Reverend Jenkins saw music A Charleston Concerto as a salvific force for good and encouraged local citizens to donate any unused instruments for children Notes by the composer. to play. That first year, the orphanage hired two local musicians to tutor a small band of 11 boys who would A Charleston Concerto was written to commemorate give impromptu performances on the street in hopes the 350th Anniversary of the City of Charleston. I of soliciting small donations from passersby. Upon am very grateful for this opportunity to collaborate its founding, the Jenkins Orphanage Band became with the Charleston Symphony, maestro Ken Lam, the only black instrumental group organized in South and the world-renowned Shanghai Quartet. In Carolina. By the turn of the 20th century, the Jenkins this programmatic three-movement composition, Orphanage Band was renowned up and down the East I attempt to musically express Charleston’s Coast. They played in inaugural parades for Presidents autochthonous splendor, the city’s complex history, Theodore Roosevelt and William Taft. They appeared and its optimistic approach to the future. at the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1914. They toured the
CharlestonSymphony.org 77 PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks Movement I – Discovery Movement III – Tomorrow In the first movement, I imagine the experience of Optimism is a trait we all share in Charleston. It the first people to gaze upon Charleston Harbor. seems to be in our collective DNA. This optimism This group of natives may have been traversing the is the fervent belief that, despite past and present dense subtropical forest, gradually noticing fleeting challenges, our best days are ahead. Informed by gusts of sea breeze and shards of sunlight, only to be our history, we forge our future with the heartfelt awestruck when reaching the water’s edge, revealing expectation of a better tomorrow. the magnificent wind-swept harbor, filling them with a sense of awe and optimism. Antonín Dvořák Symphony No. 9 “From the New World” Movement II – Tragedy and Reconciliation Old places have complicated histories, including In 1891, the newly created National Conservatory tragedy. Charleston is no exception. Tragedy has of Music in New York City named Czech composer come from natural disasters such as hurricanes, Antonín Dvořák as director. The philanthropist floods, earthquakes, and disease. We have also Jeannette Thurber hoped to lure the European experienced man-made tragedy, including war and master to New York City to lend some much-needed especially the enslavement of our fellow man with the credibility to the still nascent classical music scene in subsequent ill treatment of their descendants. I have the United States. Though Dvořák accepted the job, chosen to represent tragedy with a Gullah Spiritual he seems to have been skeptical about his prospects entitled Sinnuh W’ah Yuh Doin’ Down Dere. for success. Just before departing for America to take up his post, he expressed doubt to a London reporter To me, reconciliation, both with our natural world that America could ever truly cultivate its own national and with each other, seems to be more of an ongoing style: “America will have to reflect the influence of process rather than a one-time act. The process the great German composers just as all countries itself is what creates hope. To represent this, I have do.” Upon arriving in New York, however, Dvořák was used the Gullah Spiritual Silbuh Spade (Silver Spade). struck by the breadth and quality of musical creativity The powerful first line, “You kin dig my grabe wid he found in the supposedly culture-starved “New a silbuh spade, cus I ain’t gwine lib here no more,” World.” As a fervent supporter of his own Czech folk is a statement of transcendent resilience, with the music traditions, Dvořák was thrilled by the richness certainty of a better future. and diversity of folk music that the American melting pot represented. He called specific attention to A note about Gullah culture: the African American folk music traditions that had Gullah is a rich culture that developed among the developed among former slaves in the American descendants of West Africans brought to America as South, saying “These can be the foundation of a th th slaves in the 17 and 18 centuries and found primarily serious and original school of composition, to be in the coastal regions of South Carolina and Georgia. developed in the United States. These beautiful and Among its many important contributions are Gullah varied themes are the product of the soil. They are the Spirituals, a musical genre combining elements of folk songs of America and your composers must turn West African performance practice with text from or to them.” inspired by Biblical passages. In order to completely reflect Charleston’s multifaceted culture, it would be impossible to ignore this significant and highly original musical tradition.
78 CharlestonSymphony.org PROGRAM NOTES Masterworks In 1893, Dvořák would be given the opportunity one of his students, composer William Arms Fisher, to practice what he preached when the New York supplemented with lyrics and adapted as a spiritual Philharmonic commissioned him to write a symphony song nearly 30 years after the symphony’s premiere. for their upcoming season. His so-called “New World” Symphony took as a jumping off point the Regardless of the actual sources of Dvořák’s material, myriad folk music traditions he encountered on the enduring achievement of the “New World” his American sojourn. Despite the piece’s almost Symphony was to call attention to the contributions universally warm reception, listeners both then and that Native American and African American now have had trouble identifying just what about musicians were already making to the fabric of Dvořák’s piece, if anything, is actually “American” American music. The symphony even moved one of in any meaningful sense. The most frequently cited Dvořák’s African American students, Will Marion example is the gorgeous “Largo” melody written for Cook, to wonder whether black composers might solo English horn. The song, now often known by the eventually become the voice of the nation that had title “Goin’ Home,” is sometimes mistakenly identified enslaved them. For this reason, a statue of the Czech as a traditional folk song or spiritual that Dvořák composer still stands in Stuyvesant Square, just blocks incorporated into his “New World” Symphony. from his former house on 17th Street, in recognition of That story, however, is backward. The melody is his contributions to American music. actually an original composition of Dvořák’s that
CharlestonSymphony.org 79 GUEST MUSICIAN HOSTS & IN-KIND GIFTS GUEST MUSICIAN HOSTS Mitsuko Flynn and Daniel Mumm Carol Spitznas Sharon Kloss Nancy Eaton Stedman Bill and Susan Anonie Marlene and Bruce Koedding Roger and Vivian Steel Ann Beauchamp Asako and Damian Kremer Dianna Stern Jenny and Yuriy Bekker Peggy and Franklin LaBelle Char and Cece Stricklin Ledlie Bell June and Mariano La Via Deborah A. Swan Linda Bergman Liz and Phil Leffel Mr. and Mrs. Gerald S. Tanenbaum Sarah J. Blum Susan and Bob Leggett Albert and Caroline Thibault Mr. and Mrs. J. Sidney Boone, Jr. Ms. Linda Leonard Jim and Carol Thiesing Mr. and Mrs. Thomas W. Boswell Penelope Leighton and Laurie and Frank Thigpen Sharon and Nigel Bowers John Hurshman Ms. Kathleen Tresnak and Tom Bradford and Susan Bass Courtenay and Mr. William Reehl Doug and Verna Bunao-Weeks Norbert Lewandowski Richard and Martha Ulmer Barbara Burgess Chris Licata and Jennifer Blevins Meta Van Sickle Dr. and Mrs. Phil Buscemi Rachel Ruth Lindsay Jenny and Ben Weiss Mary Bridget Cabezas Dr. and Mrs. Michael Maginnis Ann Wessel Jean Carlton Marjorie T. McManus Mr. and Mrs. D. Sykes Wilford Judy and Bill Casey Georgia H. Meagher Jim and Debby Willis Stuart and Susan Chagrin Janice and Jay Messeroff The Winther Family Joan and Richard Chardkoff Susan and Charles Messersmith Regina and Dr. Jeffrey Yost Lydia Chernicoff and Jaan Rannik Ed and Clare Meyer Julie and Stephen Ziff L. John and Judy Clark Wayne and Anna Mickiewicz Ms. Mary Zimerle Anne Cline Elizabeth Murphy Judy Collins Terri and Bob Musor In-Kind Gift Donors: Ann and Paul Comer Anne Nietert Carol M. Conklin Allegro Charter School of Music Barbara and Tom Pace Jeanne Anne Coplestone Belva’s Flower Shop Dr. and Mrs. Basil Papaharis Ms. Carolyne Cox Bishop Gadsden Joyce and Paul Perocchi Bill and Erble Creasman Carnegie Hall Helen C. Powell April and Terry Cullen Charleston County School Lorraine Perry and Ford Reese Nancy and Steven Cunningham of the Arts Claudia Porter and Allen Curry Charleston Southern University Stuart Hotchkiss Jill Rabon Davidge College of Charleston Donna Reyburn and Giulio and Donatella Della Porta Edmund’s Oast Michael Griffith Dr. Jeffery and Gibbes Museum of Art Faith and Herb Russell Mrs. Tammy Dorociak Holmes Avenue Baptist Church Bill and Amy Sage Ms. Karen Durand James Island Cleaners Barbara Sanders Tacy and Darrell Edwards John Wesley Methodist Church Beth and Mitchell Sherr Mr. and Mrs. Roger Embry Lutheran Church Fran and Jeff Sills Susan Fasola of the Redeemer Helen Snow Gail and Evan Firestone Second Presbyterian Church
80 CharlestonSymphony.org