Review of our Saturday Concert

Music Critic John Farrell reviews our Saturday performance of Verdi’s Requiem.

Save the biggest for last. That was the recipe for Saturday’s Pasadena Symphony Orchestra concert, the last one in the orchestra’s 2007-2008.

If you hadn’t read the program, which announced a performance of Verdi’s Requiem as the final work on the annual schedule, you could still tell, as you were taking your seat, that it was going to be a night of big sounds. Eight bass fiddles leaned against the concert shell on the left. The chairs for the musicians were crowded right up to the edge of the stage, and there was a choir rank in the back that would eventually fill up with more than 100 singers, so many that when they stood to sing the also spread out across he back of the stage: They needed extra room to breathe.

This was the second time that the Verdi Requiem as been heard locally. Last fall, it was performed by Los Angeles Opera as a tribute to both Luciano Pavarotti and Edgar Baetzel. If memory serves, Saturday’s version was more lyric, more dramatic and altogether more satisfying.

It was a wonderful night, we hope you loved it as much as we did!

TEMPO! TEMPO! We Love to Sing and Play!

Our elementary school program, TEMPO! (Teaching the Essentials of Music through Participation and Observation) featured something different and more hands-on for the 3,000+ 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd graders that receive the program this past March. The TEMPO! “Student Workshop 1,” featured dancer Heather Lipson and vocal specialist Vena Luthey who got the kids to sing and move to TEMPO! Song favorites such as “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad,” and “Michael Row the Boat Ashore.”

 

Heather Lipson gets TEMPO! students to move to “I’ve been working on the Railroad.”

“Student Workshop 2,” featured artists Enzo Fina (who is the teaching artist in residence for the Orchestras’ Middle School program Science of Sound), Ross Crayton (TEMPO! 3 teaching artist) and Luke Alberti (piano/keyboard). Director of Education and Community Engagement, Jerri Price-Gaines created and narrated a story about a Little Boy who gets lost in the forest while TEMPO! students created the sounds that went along with the story. Students played their recorders, along with human sounds, indigenous instruments and body percussion to create sounds of an indigenous people in outdoor environment.  Students were given plastic bags to make the sound of rain; Bubble Wrap to make the sound of a crackling fire and Poster Boards and Transparencies to make the sound of Thunder.We had a great time in the creation of this story set to music!

 

 Enzo Fina demonstrates some of his home-made musical instruments!

 

 

- The Education & Community Engagement Department

 

Preview of Verdi Requim

Robert D. Thomas previews our April concert. He quotes Music Director Jorge Mester.

The evening will be the final concert of the orchestra’s 80th season and it was a natural choice for Music Director Jorge Mester, who estimates he has conducted the work about 10 times. “I think ‘the Verdi’ is one of those magic pieces that works on every level,” says Mester. “For some reason, many performing artists often feel a spiritual connection to it. For those who find it a religious experience, it is that also, but it’s dramatic, very operatic as well.”

Only a handful of organizations have the forces to perform Verdi’s Requiem adequately, explains Jeffrey Bernstein, director of the Occidental Chorale, which will sing in Saturday’s performance. “It requires enormous forces, a full-sized orchestra and a lot of singers — 120 singers is a bare minimum. It doesn’t get done a whole lot because it takes an orchestra of the Pasadena Symphony’s caliber to do it.” To cite but one example of that latter statement: Verdi’s Requiem wasn’t performed by the Chicago Symphony until 1952.

Few works in the choral repertoire vary as widely dynamically as does the Verdi Requiem. The Dies Irae and Tuba Mirum sections feature some of the loudest music ever written, with trumpets surrounding the stage and bass drum stroke that hammer home the ominous message like no other composer every did.

“Jorge’s passion for this piece is incredible; in a way,” says Bernstein. “He feels like he wrote it. I can tell when we talk about it that this is going to be quite extraordinary.”

It will be an extraordinary evening, we can’t wait!

LA Times Reviews March 15th Concert.

Richard S. Ginell from the Los Angeles Times reviewed our last concert, and it seems he was impressed. Ginell says,

A concert containing nothing but Mozart piano concertos can cut two ways for an audience.

When heard or overheard casually, a menu like this goes down easily. But if you are actively concentrating on the music — and the performers are just ambling routinely through the scores — it can be a long, long evening.

Jeffrey Kahane and the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra pulled off such programs successfully many times on the way to a rare complete cycle, but in that case, there was the added excitement of witnessing a stunt in progress.

For British pianist Howard Shelley, conductor Jorge Mester and the Pasadena Symphony Orchestra, though, there was no marathon involved Saturday night at the Pasadena Civic — just this one program of three concertos. And they performed it with style and vigor.

If you missed this one, there’s still time to catch our April 12th concert. Click here for the details.

Clazzical Notes presents “The Art of Fine Vocals: The Jazz Singer and the Diva.”

Love jazz? Love classical music? Then join us for music and discussion at the next Clazzical Notes where we pair a jazz performer and a classical music performer for music and discussion. This month we feature Jazz singer Yvette Freeman, and classical soprano Jamie Chamberlin. You’ll hear excellent jazz and classical music, and be able to participate in lively discussion, hosted by our moderator, Suzanna Guzman. Pasadena Now previews the event here.

FREE
March 24
7 p.m. - 8:30 p.m.
Caltech - Ramo Auditorium - 332 South Michigan Ave. (south of Del Mar Blvd.)
Directions to Ramo Auditorium
Free parking is available.

January 12th Concert

Our next concert is January 12th at 8 p.m. at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium. Don’t miss the All Mozart night featuring sopranos, Jamie Chamberlin and Shana Blake Hill, tenor Randall Bill, bass Jinyoung Jang, and the The Occidental Chorale.

Be sure to arrive at 7 p.m. for the pre-concert lecture presented by Bryon Adams.

You can get full concert information here and ticket information by clicking this link.

Pasadena Symphony to present all Mozart

The Los Angeles Chronicle previews our upcoming January concert.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart has often been referred to as a musician’s musician. Admirers among his fellow composers include Tchaikovsky, who praised him as “the highest, the culminating point that beauty has attained in the sphere of music” and Gounod, who ruefully conceded that, “Before Mozart, all ambition turns to despair.” But Mozart’s admirers extend beyond the musical world. “Mozart is the greatest of all,” the Nobel Prize winning physician Albert Einstein concluded.Are similar “All Mozart” performances on the musical horizon for upcoming seasons as well? “If our audiences make it clear that they would like this, we’ll make it happen,” says Tom O’Connor, Executive Director of The Pasadena Symphony Association. “Mozart composed over 600 works. We certainly have a long way to go before we run out of repertoire.”

Check out the whole preview here.

A Personal Look at the Pasadena Symphony

In the midst of our 80th season celebration, Robert D. Thomas takes a personal look at a former member of the Pasadena Symphony, Roberta “Bobbie” Groninger. Read that wonderful story here.

Best Concert of the Year

The Arcadia Weekly gives us the award for the most exciting concert of the year. As they say,

The award for the most exciting concert goes to the Pasadena Symphony Orchestra. In its opening concert, conductor Jorge Mester brought timpanists Jonathan Haas and John Evans to perform a concerto, which was written by Philip Glass for Haas. To enhance the visual aspect prior to the musical presentation, fog machines rolled gray fog over the stage and into the orchestra pit. Mester rose triumphantly through the fog to the podium. His entrance and the Concerto for Two Timpanists and Orchestra left the audience with an upbeat and exciting conclusion.

Thanks for noticing!

Clazzical Notes | Free Night of Jazz, Classical music and Discussion

“Clazzical Notes” The Pasadena Symphony’s free evening of jazz, classical music and discussion among the musicians will present Les Femmes: Women of Jazz and Classical Music on Monday evening, November 12, at the Pasadena Jazz Institute in Pasadena from 7 p.m. till 8:30 p.m.

The Pasadena Journal previews “Clazzical Notes”…

Representing the jazz side of the Clazzical Notes equation is base player Nedra Wheeler, hailed by All About Jazz for her ability to “anchor any ensemble in which she plays with a rhythmic authority blended with a melodic playfulness.” Recent performances have included appearances with Nate Morgan’s trio, Tracey Chapman, the Women’s Jazz Ensemble and her own sextet, which Wheeler describes as her current “favorite project.”

Joining Wheeler is acclaimed conductor, violinist and composer Yvette Devereaux, who, among her many achievements, was guest conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion with the F.A.M.E. Choirs of Los Angeles. She was also the first woman to hold the position of Music Director/Conductor of the Southeast Community Symphony in Los Angeles.

You wont want to miss this special evening.

More details can be found on our website and at The Pasadena Jazz Institute.