Chamber Orchestra Mixes It Up for 40th Anniversary
A landmark season lies ahead for the Cincinnati
Chamber Orchestra. Number 40, to be exact, and they are celebrating with
everything from Mozart to Bernard Herrmann.
Music director Mischa Santora will lead all five season subscription concerts, plus a special non-subscription presentation of Gian Carlo Menotti’s “Amahl and the Night Visitors.” The holiday favorite, inaugurated last season at Xavier University’s Gallagher Center Theater and expanded to six performances this year, will feature puppets from Madcap Puppet Theater, dancers from Pones Inc. and Xavier’s Edgecliff Vocal Ensemble.
There will be sacred music, Mozart’s Great Mass in C Minor, K. 427, and Arvo Part’s “Te Deum,” and also profane, the Suite from Herrmann’s film score for “Psycho.” The former will mark the CCO’s annual collaboration with Cincinnati’s Vocal Arts Ensemble and will take place at St. Catherine of Siena Church in Westwood. The latter will share a self-styled “creepy” program with the Exhale Dance Tribe in their inaugural collaboration with the CCO at the School for Creative and Performing Arts. Founded by Broadway veterans Missy Lay Zimmer and Andrew Hubbard and known for their groundbreaking choreography, Exhale Dance Tribe will perform a choreographed interpretation of Bartok’s Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta (used by director Stanley Kubrick in his movie based on Stephen King’s “The Shining”).
The season will open Oct. 9 at SCPA with “Time for Three,” billed as “the world’s first classically trained garage band.” The ensemble, violinists Zack DePue and Nick Kendall and bassist Ranaan Meyer, are known for mixing it up,” i.e. for highly improvised performances of music from Bach to bluegrass and jazz, and for arrangements of pop tunes by Imogen Heap, Katy Perry and Kanye West. The CCO will frame their performances with music appropriately “reflective of the individualistic American spirit.” The concert is part of the 2013 Constella Festival of Music and Fine Arts.
There will be a special 40th anniversary concert and gala – details to be announced – at the Cincinnati Masonic Center. The season will close at SCPA with arias and orchestral music by Verdi, Rossini and Bellini, featuring guest artist, soprano Sarah Coburn.
The 2013-2014 Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra season.
Oct. 9 – 7:30 p.m. School for Creative and Performing Arts. “Time for Three.” Mischa Santora, conductor. Program to be announced. Presented in collaboration with the Constella Festival of Music and Fine Arts.
Nov. 17 – 4 p.m. St. Catherine of Siena Church, Westwood. Vocal Arts Ensemble. Mischa Santora, conductor. Mozart, Great Mass in C Minor, K. 427. Arvo Pärt, “Te Deum.”
Jan. 26 – 5 p.m. School for Creative and Performing Arts. Exhale Dance Tribe. Mischa Santora, conductor. Dmitri Shostakovich, Chamber Symphony, Op. 110a. Bernard Herrmann, Suite from “Psycho.” Bartok, Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta.
March 8 – 7:30 p.m. Cincinnati Masonic Center. 40th anniversary concert and gala. Mischa Santora, conductor. Program tba.
June 1 – 4 p.m. School for Creative and Performing Arts. Sarah Coburn, soprano. Mischa Santora, conductor. Arias and orchestra music by Verdi, Rossini and Bellini.
Non-subscription. “Amahl and the Night Visitors” by Gian Carlo Menotti. Dec. 20 and 23 – 7:30 p.m. Dec. 21 and 22 – 2 and 4 p.m. Gallagher Center Theater, Xavier University. Madcap Puppets. Pones, Inc. Dancers. Edgecliff Vocal Ensemble. Mischa Santora, conductor.
Season subscriptions are $100 for all five concerts, $40 for children and students. A three-concert flex pass good for any three concerts is $63 for adults, $25 for children and students. Tickets for “Amahl and the Night Visitors” are $25 for adults, $10 for children and students, $20 and $8 for subscribers until Sept. 1. Gala pricing will be announced at a later date.
Order at (513) 723-1182, or visit ccocincinnati.org