Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association Presents MARCH 2021 DIGITAL PROGRAMS ON CSOTV — Preview

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WHEN:

Available NOW

THE DEMOCRACY! SUITE with Wynton Marsalis: Thru 28

WHERE:

ON DEMAND via CSOtv

TICKETS:

CSO Sessions: $15 per episode

CSO Archives: FREE

THE DEMOCRACY! SUITE with Wynton Marsalis: $25

The Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association (CSOA) March 2021 programming on CSOtv and other digital content includes:

WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH

In recognition of Women’s History Month, this video playlist features 2020 performances by contemporary women composers and the stories behind their music. This includes CSO Sessions series of Caroline Shaw’s Boris Kerner; Paola Prestini’s G-Force, for Mickey; Joan Tower’s Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman No. 1; and Death Valley Junction by CSO Mead Composer-in-Residence Missy Mazzoli. The video playlist also includes 2020 performances by members of the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, including Florence Price’s Juba Dance from Symphony No. 1 and works by Jessie Montgomery and Nicole Mitchell.

From the CSO Archives:

EPISODE 3: DÉSIRÉ DEFAUW
This episode features the Belgian conductor who served as the CSO’s third music director from 1943 until 1947. He returned to guest conduct on several occasions, including a television concert—one of the Orchestra’s earliest filmed concerts in the collections of the Rosenthal Archives—in December 1953. From WGN’s studios, Defauw led suites from Grétry’s Cephalus and Procris and Fauré’s Pelleas and Melisande, along with Schumann’s Fourth Symphony.

CSO Sessions:

EPISODE 15: MONTGOMERY & BEETHOVEN
This episode opens with composer Jessie Montgomery’s Strum. Strum is based on ‘a driving pizzicato rhythm,’ as Montgomery has observed. This rhythm offers the string players an opportunity to strum all four strings to create what Montgomery describes as ‘folk-like, guitar-like, driving groove’ throughout the piece. The program concludes with Beethoven’s Septet in E-flat Major.

The performances feature:
Assistant Concertmaster Yuan-Qing Yu
Principal Clarinet Stephen Williamson
Simon Michal (violin)
Weijing Wang (viola)
Assistant Principal Cello Kenneth Olsen
Principal Bass Alexander Hanna
Miles Maner (bassoon)
Principal Horn David Cooper

EPISODE 16: HARBERG, GABRIELI & BACH
Composer Amanda Harberg’s Hall of Ghosts, written for solo piccolo, opens this episode. Of the work, written at the height of the pandemic lockdown in 2020, a spokesperson writes “[T]he evocative five-minute piece invites listeners to imagine an empty concert hall slowly returning to life with the piccolo as a musical guide.” CSO Piccolo Jennifer Gunn is joined by dancer Alyssa Allen from Hubbard Street Dance Chicago for a filmed interpretation of the piece.

J.S. Bach, whose birthday is recognized on March 21, is celebrated later in this episode with performances of the Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 3 and 6. Between the two concertos by Bach is a selection of works for brass written by the 16th-century Italian composer Giovanni Gabrieli and performed by members of the CSO brass section. This set of Gabrieli works includes O magnum mysterium and several of his “canzoni” for four and eight players.

The performances feature:
Guest musician Mark Shuldiner (harpsichord)
Acting Principal Viola Li-Kuo Chang
Weijing Wang (viola)
Musicians from the CSO’s string sections

Symphony Center On Demand:

EPISODE 3: THE DEMOCRACY! SUITE with Wynton Marsalis

Written by Wynton Marsalis in 2020 in response to the COVID-19 crisis and the political, social, and economic challenges facing the U.S. during the past year, The Democracy! Suite celebrates America’s music in this September 2020 performance recorded live at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Appel Room in New York City. Marsalis describes the new work as “a swinging and stimulating instrumental rumination on the issues that have recently dominated our lives as well as the beauty that could emerge from a collective effort to create a better future.”

The performance features:
Wynton Marsalis (trumpet/music director)
Elliot Mason (trombone)
Ted Nash (alto saxophone and flute)
Walter Blanding (tenor and soprano saxophones)
Dan Nimmer (piano)
Carlos Henriquez (bass)
Obed Calvaire (drums)

For more information, visit Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association website.

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