admin April 22nd, 2008
The Akron Symphony is proud to announce dates for the 2008-2009 season. The new season offers a musical medley of musical experiences, from Tchaikovsky to Mozart to Beethoven and beyond. With something for everyone, the season includes a variety of programming such as a Classical celebration of Abraham Lincoln’s 200th Birthday; a swinging Pops performance of Frank Sinatra’s hit songs; and an out of this world musical Odyssey featuring the music and myth of the Star Wars film saga. Look here and in your mailbox for more details. In the meantime, here’s what the Akron Beacon Journal had to say about the new season.
Also, new subscribers can save up to 50% when they purchase either a Classic, Odyssey, or Pops series subscription. Call 330-535-8131 and reserve your seats today!
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admin April 17th, 2008
Saturday’s concert to feature orchestra, chorus, guest vocalists
Akron—The Akron Symphony will present Haydn’s master work, The Creation, this Saturday, April 19 at 8:00 p.m. at E.J. Thomas Hall on the campus of The University of Akron. Music Director Christopher Wilkins will lead the Akron Symphony Orchestra, Chorus, and guest vocalists Joyce Guyer (soprano), Karl Dent (tenor), and Timothy Jones (bass-baritone) through Haydn’s musical depiction of the seven days of the creation of the world as recounted in the Biblical book of Genesis. The Creation is the seventh and final Akron Symphony Classic concert of the 2007-2008 season.
Listen to a commercial for The Creation!
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admin March 5th, 2008
Akron Symphony’s March 15 Concert Goes All Beethoven
Concert To Feature Award-Winning Violinist, Feng Ning
Akron—The Akron Symphony will present Gold Medal Beethoven on Saturday, March 15 at 8:00 p.m. at E.J. Thomas Hall on the campus of The University of Akron. Music Director Christopher Wilkins will lead the Akron Symphony through three transcendent works from the legendary composer, including the Coriolan Overture and Symphony No. 4 in B-flat. Guest violinist and 2006 Paganini Gold Medalist Feng Ning will perform with the orchestra during Violin Concerto in D. Gold Medal Beethoven is the sixth Classic concert for the ASO and the penultimate for the 2007-2008 season.
Maestro Wilkins had originally wanted Feng Ning for a concert last season, but there were some problems. Wilkins explains:
I first worked with Feng Ning in New Zealand as part of the Michael Hill International Violin Competition, which he eventually won. I was so taken with his musicianship and technical fluency that shortly thereafter I invited him to perform with the Akron Symphony. This was to have been during our 2006-2007 season, but due to visa issues we were unable to secure a date. When I approached him again this season, he accepted immediately and then asked gently whether I knew that he had just won the Paganini Competition. Attached to his e-mail was a photograph of Feng playing Paganini’s Stradivarius. It will be a privilege to present him to Akron.
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admin February 28th, 2008
WAKR’s Chuck Collins offered up a thoughtful review of last weekend’s Gospel Meets Symphony concert. Collins’ column can be found at AkronNews.com.
“My observation is that problems are solved in today’s society through attrition rather than revolution. And as the intricate harmonies of classical music met the soaring rhythms of Gospel, I never felt more American; not black, not white, not red, not blue, just American.”
admin February 22nd, 2008
Music Director Christopher Wilkins and guest conductor Raymond Wise have been on the road promoting the 15th Anniversary Gospel Meets Symphony concert coming to E.J. Thomas Hall on Saturday night at 7:30 p.m. From WAKR’s Akron News Now and WKYC’s Good Company, to articles in the Akron Beacon Journal (here and here) and West Side Leader, the team of Wilkins and Wise have been spreading the gospel about, well, Gospel.
admin February 12th, 2008
Gospel Meets Symphony Celebrates 15 Years February 23
15th Anniversary Celebration reunites Wilkins and Wise and pays tribute to Balter
Gospel Meets Symphony celebrates its 15th Anniversary on Saturday, February 23rd at E.J. Thomas Hall on the campus of The University of Akron at 7:30 p.m. Akron Symphony Music Director, Christopher Wilkins, will share the podium with returning guest chorus master and 2007 audience favorite Dr. Raymond Wise as the two conduct the Akron Symphony Orchestra and a 150-voice choir in an uplifting program of spirited gospel works.
The 15th Anniversary Concert will look back at years past with a loving tribute to former Akron Symphony Music Director, the late Alan Balter, who co-founded Gospel Meets Symphony in 1994 and conducted the first five concerts. Native Akron gospel group Divine Hope will also be featured during the concert.
The Gospel Meets Symphony 15th Anniversary concert is chaired by Virginia Robinson.
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admin February 7th, 2008
The Plain Dealer’s Donald Rosenberg has posted an article at Cleveland.com profiling Benjamin Zander and the concert on Sunday.
Zander, 68, is here at the invitation of Christopher Wilkins, music director of the Akron Symphony, a friend and colleague since the latter was an oboist in the former’s youth orchestra in Boston three decades ago.
Putting on Mahler’s “Resurrection” Symphony is a pricey endeavor requiring chorus, massive orchestra and vocal soloists (oh, and conductor). Zander helped solve the problem of expense by suggesting that the Akron Symphony find a corporation — FirstEnergy eventually signed on — to sponsor the concerts and his local talk on “The Art of Possibility,” which he has delivered several times at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Zander is accepting no fee for his services this week, a testament both to his friendship with Wilkins and to his mission to spread the word of classical music. He believes musicians are empowered when they have input in the artistic product.
The full article can be found here.
admin February 6th, 2008
Benjamin Zander made an appearance on WCPN’s Around Noon program with host Dee Perry on Tuesday. During the radio interview, Maestro Zander discussed his dual career as Music Director of the Boston Philharmonic and one of the world’s most sought-after speakers on leadership, and his week-long collaboration with the ASO, culminating in two performances of Mahler’s 2nd Symphony, Resurrection this weekend at E.J. Thomas Hall at the University of Akron on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon at Severance Hall in Cleveland. Listen to the full interview here.
admin February 6th, 2008
Check out this interview with Akron Symphony Music Director, Christopher Wilkins, and his friend, the legendary Benjamin Zander on WKYC’s Good Company morning show.
admin February 1st, 2008
Both the West Side Leader and The Akron Beacon Journal have stories this week about “Zander Week,” which begins Sunday with Classical Fever, a free concert at E.J. Thomas Hall at 7:30 p.m. The full articles can be found here and here.
What is the message that brought tears and laughter to the financial wizards and tycoons at the just-concluded World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland?
It was what Benjamin Zander calls his message of possibility, as set out in The Art of Possibility, the best-selling book he co-authored with his wife, Rosamund Stone Zander.
Anyone who attends the free University of Akron Forum Series lecture by Zander at 4 p.m. Tuesday will get what Davos listeners got, and more, the peripatetic conductor and motivational speaker, 68, said. He was briefly at home in Boston before heading out again to speak to a group of 2,200 human resources people in Toronto and then to a dental convention in Nashville.
- Elaine Guregian, The Akron Beacon Journal (2-1-08)
DOWNTOWN AKRON — It’s a big deal when the Akron Symphony Orchestra (ASO) brings in a music conductor of Benjamin Zander’s stature as guest leader for its concerts featuring Gustav Mahler’s “Resurrection Symphony” at both E.J. Thomas Performing Arts Hall in Akron Feb. 9 and Severance Hall in Cleveland Feb. 10.
- Roger Durbin, West Side Leader (1-31-08)
Zander Week Complete Schedule
