Contact: Allison Griffin
Public Relations Associate
503-416-6347
September 22, 2006
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Portland, Ore. … Imitation is the highest form of flattery, and the Oregon Symphony will pay tribute to Mozart by doing just that—imitation through improvisation. “Each performance will be different,” said Artistic Administrator Charles Calmer. “Its unpredictability is similar to a jazz concert.”
Audience members will be asked to submit a theme prior to each performance—anything from “Twinkle Twinkle” to an original song. Featured pianist Robert Levin will then improvise on selected themes in the style of Mozart.
“It’s quite a shift from what we’re used to,” said Calmer. “The audience has the capacity to create the concert.”
Levin is a noted Mozart scholar and professor of humanities at Harvard University. His completion of the composer’s unfinished Requiem was performed by the Symphony last season, and has been heard worldwide.
For the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birth, Music Director Carlos Kalmar and the Symphony will open the concert with Symphony No. 39. The work has been labeled “Mozart’s splendid symphony” for its elegant lightheartedness, despite his troubled personal life at the time of the composition.
Levin will perform Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 19. Composed during the happiest and most productive period his life, the piece appeals to both the trained and amateur ear. Following the improvisation, the Symphony will perform A Smile, Homage to Mozart by contemporary composer Olivier Messiaen.
“Despite all his sorrows and sufferings…Mozart never stopped smiling,” he said. “His music smiles, too.” Messiaen wrote the piece to celebrate the bicentennial of Mozart’s death in 1991.
Performances are Saturday, October 21 at 7:30 p.m., Sunday, October 22 at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. and Monday, October 23 at 8 p.m. at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. Tickets are $20 to $88 and may be purchased at the Oregon Symphony Ticket Office, located at 923 S.W. Washington. Ticket office hours are Monday through Saturday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tickets may also be purchased anytime online at www.orsymphony.org or charged by phone at (503) 228-1353 or (800) 228-7343, Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. and Saturday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Discounted tickets for groups of eight or more are available through the group sales hotline at (503) 416-6380.
Kuni BMW is the official automotive sponsor of the 2006-07 Classical Series. Lufthansa is the exclusive airline of the Symphony’s 2006-07 Classical Series. Media support is provided by The Oregonian.