Aaron Copland: Appalachian Spring Suite

Aaron Copland: Billy The Kid Suite

Anton Webern: Adagio (Arr. Gerard Schwarz)

Richard Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier Suite, TrV 227, Op. 59 (Arr. Gerard Schwarz)

 

 

*The program and performer are subject to change.

 

Conductor: Gerard Schwarz
Internationally recognized for his moving performances, innovative programming and extensive catalogue of recordings, American conductor Gerard Schwarz serves as Music Director of the All-Star Orchestra, Eastern Music Festival, Palm Beach Symphony, and Mozart Orchestra of New York and is Conductor Laureate of the Seattle Symphony and Conductor Emeritus of the Mostly Mozart Festival. He holds the position of Distinguished Professor of Music; Conducting and Orchestral Studies of the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami and Music Director of the Frost Symphony Orchestra. Schwarz is a renowned interpreter of 19th century German, Austrian and Russian repertoire, in addition to his noted work with contemporary American composers.
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The All-Star Orchestra is an ensemble of top musicians from America’s leading orchestras featured in eighteen programs that have aired throughout the United States on public television, worldwide by online streaming and is the basis for their Khan Academy education platform that has already reached over 6 million students. Gerard Schwarz has also collaborated with the United States Marine Band adding three more programs. All the programs are released by Naxos on DVD and have been awarded nine Emmy Awards and the Deems Taylor Television Broadcast Award from ASCAP.

 

The Eastern Music Festival in North Carolina is among the country’s most important summer educational institutions bringing together world-renowned artists and exceptionally gifted young musicians from across the United States and beyond. The summer of 2020 was Schwarz’s 13th year at its artistic helm leading an innovative virtual Festival during our challenging times that garnered outstanding press acclaim. With more than 300 world premieres to his credit, Schwarz has always felt strongly about commissioning and performing new music. As Music Director of the Eastern Music Festival he initiated the Bonnie McElveen-Hunter Commissioning Project that has thus far commissioned works by John Corigliano, Richard Danielpour, André Previn, HyeKyung Lee, and Lowell Liebermann. In all, Ms. McElveen-Hunter has committed to ten new works from American composers.

 

 

Shanghai Philharmonic Orchestra
In 1996, the Shanghai Broadcasting Symphony Orchestra was established through a merger with the Shanghai Film Orchestra and Shanghai Broadcasting Orchestra. Headed by former music director HU Yongyan, it made great progress and developed into a professional symphony orchestra. In April 2004, it was renamed the Shanghai Philharmonic Orchestra (SPO), with the celebrated conductor CHEN Zuohuang as its artistic director, began to adopt the world’s most prevalent system of music seasons. In January 2008, conductor ZHANG Liang acted as its permanent conductor. In March 2009, the world-renowned conductor TANG Muhai became its artistic director. Since January 2018, the well-known conductor ZHANG Yi has served as its third artistic director, leading it to embark on a new journey.

 

For years, the orchestra has held concerts in cooperation with many renowned Chinese and foreign musicians, including: HUANG Xiaotong, YU Long, CHEN Xieyang, HUANG Yinling, , LÜ Jia, TAN Lihua, ZHANG Guoyong, ZHANG Yi, WANG Yongji, LIN Yousheng, ZHU Qiyuan, ZHAO Xiao’ou, Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Peter-Lukas Graf, Luciano Pavarotti, Plácido Domingo, José Carreras, Jessye Norman, Joe Hisaishi, Claus Peter Flor, Thomas Sanderling, Vladimir Krainev, Yo-Yo MA, Támás Vásáry, Boris Berman, David Lively, Peter Frankl, Idil Biret, Oxana Yablonskaya, Hung-kuan CHEN, Paul Badura-Skoda, Robert Blocker, LI Jian, TAN Dun, Lang Lang, LI Yundi, LIAO Changyong, HUANG Ying, SHEN Yang, XU Zhong, QIN Liwei, NING Feng, XUE Wei, HUANG Mengla, WANG Zhijiong and SONG Siheng.

 

In recent years, the SPO has successively staged the following masterpieces: Violin Concerto of Benjamin Britten (premiere in China), Bernstein Mahler's works (Symphony No.1 in D major “The Titan”, Symphony No. 2 in C minor “Resurrection”, Symphony No. 3 in D minor, Symphony No. 4 in G major, Symphony No. 5 in C sharp minor and Symphony No. 7 in E minor), Saint-Saëns's Symphony No. 3 “Organ”, The Firebird Suite by Igor Stravinsky, the oratorio Messiah by Handel, Pictures at an Exhibition by Mussorgsky, Dante Symphony by Franz Liszt, Beethoven’s pieces (Symphony No. 4 in B-flat major, Op. 60, Symphony No. 6 in F major “Pastorale”, Op. 68, Symphony No. 7 in A major, and Symphony No. 9 in D minor “Choral”, Op. 125), The War Symphonies (Symphony Nos. 7, 8 and 9) and Violin Concerto No. 1 in A minor by Shostakovich, Concerto for Orchestra and Violin Concerto No. 2 by Bartok, Hary Janos Suite by Kodaly, Manfred Symphony by Tchaikovsky, Scottish Fantasy by Bruch, Symphony No. 3 in A minor “Scottish” by Mendelssohn, Symphonic Metamorphosis of Themes by Carl Maria von Weber and Symphony: Mathis der Maler by Paul Hindemith, Der Ring des Nibelungen by Wagner, Richard Strauss’s works (Eine Alpensinfonie, Op. 64, Ein Heldenleben, Op. 40, Also sprach Zarathustra, Op. 30, and Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche, Op. 28), Symphony No. 6 in A major (WAB 106) by Anton Bruckner, Symphony No. 1 in E major, Op. 26 by Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin, Symphony No.5 in B-flat major, Op. 55 by Glazunov, and Rachmaninoff's works (Symphonic Dance, Op. 45, Symphony No. 2 in E minor, Op. 27 and Symphony No. 3 in A minor, Op. 44).

 

In order to meet the diverse and growing cultural needs of its audiences, the SPO has made great efforts to expand its performance range, taking on diversified performances. It has presented numerous operas such as Tosca, Madama Butterfly, La Bohème, Tea, A Mirror of Soul, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, Duke Bluebeard`s Castle and Pelléas and Mélisande. It also performed the Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty, Giselle, The Nutcracker, Coppelia, A Midsummer Night's Dream, La Cenerentola, Romeo and Juliet and other famous ballets. Moreover, it launched a number of programmes with creative style and unique content, deeply touching audiences. They include the large-scale symphonic Peking Opera Tang Concubines, Shaoxing Opera A Dream of Red Mansions and the symphonic theatre Shanghai Noah's Ark.