Contact:
Carl Herko
Vice President, Media & Public Relations
503-416-6347
cherko@orsymphony.org

September 11, 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

THE OREGON SYMPHONY IN OCTOBER:
THE LANG LANG PHENOMENON STORMS INTO PORTLAND

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(PORTLAND, Ore.) – The Oregon Symphony’s October concert calendar kicks off with one of the season’s blockbusters – the Oregon Symphony debut of Lang Lang, the young superstar pianist from China – and continues with the opening events of the orchestra’s Pops and Kids Concerts series as well as the season’s second classical series concerts. Complete details on all of the Oregon Symphony’s October concerts follow:

FRIDAY, OCT. 3:
SUPERSTAR PIANIST LANG LANG MAKES HIS OREGON SYMPHONY DEBUT

• When and Where: 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 3; Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall.

• The Performers: The Oregon Symphony, with Music Director Carlos Kalmar on the podium, joined by Lang Lang, the 26-year-old Chinese pianist heralded by the New York Times as the “hottest artist on the classical music planet.”

• The Program:
• John Adams: The Chairman Dances; Foxtrot for Orchestra
• Leonard Bernstein: Symphonic Dances from West Side Story
• Sergei Rachmaninoff: Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Opus 18 (Lang Lang, piano)

• Tickets: $35 to $150; at the Oregon Symphony Ticket Office, 923 SW Washington St., in downtown Portland. Ticket office hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday. Tickets may also be purchased by phone at (503) 228-1353 or (800) 228-7343 during the same hours, or online at any time from the orchestra’s web site, orsymphony.org. Tickets are also available through ticketmaster.com or by calling (503) 790-ARTS.

• What’s So Special About This Concert:
• It is the first Oregon Symphony appearance ever by Lang Lang, the young Chinese pianist whose theatrical performances have sparked controversy throughout his career but who is widely regarded as classical music’s brightest celebrity-of-the-moment.
• Lang Lang is more multimedia marketing phenomenon than mere guest artist: His performance at the opening ceremony put him front and center at the recent Beijing Olympics; he recently was the subject of a major profile in The New Yorker and currently has two books on bookstore shelves, including a critically praised autobiography, Journey of a Thousand Miles: My Story. Adidas is even marketing an autographed Lang Lang athletic shoe.
• Ticket availability is extremely limited, and a sold-out concert is expected.
• The concert features three significant 20th century works: Lang Lang performs the popular Rachmaninoff Second Piano Concerto, written in 1900-01, on the second half of the program. The first half includes American composer John Adams’ The Chairman Dances, an outtake from his opera Nixon in China (composed in 1985), as well as a perennial crowd-pleaser, Leonard Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances from West Side Story (written in 1957).
• Media sponsor of the concert is All Classical FM.

 

SATURDAY-SUNDAY, OCT. 11-12:
THE POPS SERIES OPENS WITH A TRIBUTE TO DORSEY AND SINATRA

• When and Where: 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 11, and 3 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 12; Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. (NOTE: This concert will also be performed at 8 p.m. Monday, Oct. 13, at Willamette University’s Smith Hall in Salem.)

• The Performers: The Oregon Symphony, with newly named Principal Pops  Conductor Jeff Tyzik on the podium, joined by guest soloists Steve Lippia, vocals, and Robert Taylor, trombone.

• The Program:
• Bugle Call Rag
• A Dorsey Tribute (Robert Taylor, trombone)
• Royal Garden Blues
• An excerpt from Nathanial Shilkret’s Concerto for Orchestra and Trombone (Robert Taylor, trombone)
• Two sets of Sinatra tunes, including “Come Fly With Me,” “Fly Me to the Moon,” “That’s Life,” The Lady Is a Tramp” and “New York, New York,” among others (Steve Lippia, vocalist)

• Tickets: FOR THE PORTLAND PERFORMANCES: $15 to $92; at the Oregon Symphony Ticket Office, 923 SW Washington St., in downtown Portland. Ticket office hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday. Tickets may also be purchased by phone at (503) 228-1353 or (800) 228-7343 during the same hours, or online at any time from the orchestra’s web site, orsymphony.org. Tickets are also available through ticketmaster.com or by calling (503) 790-ARTS.

FOR THE SALEM PERFORMANCE: $26 to $54, available from TicketsWest.

• What’s So Special About These Concerts:
• This is the first of four concerts this year in the orchestra’s shorter and more focused Pops season. All four were planned and will be conducted by Pops specialist Jeff Tyzik, who takes on a new role this year as the Oregon Symphony’s principal Pops conductor.
• In addition to his new Oregon Symphony position, Tyzik is also principal Pops conductor for the Rochester Philharmonic in New York State and the Vancouver Symphony in British Columbia.
• The TV show “Extra” has termed guest vocalist Steve Lippia the “next chairman” because of his voice’s remarkable similarity to that of Frank Sinatra. (A clip of the “Extra” segment on Lippia is available on YouTube.)
• Oregon Symphony trombonist Robert Taylor, who performs two works at this concert, is also a member of the Portland-based band Pink Martini.

 

SATURDAY-MONDAY, OCT. 18-20:
VALENTINA LISITSA RETURNS TO PERFORM THE GRIEG PIANO CONCERTO

• When and Where: Three performances, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 18 and 19, and 8 p.m. Monday, Oct. 20; Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. (NOTE: This concert will also be performed at 8 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 21, at Willamette University’s Smith Hall in Salem with guest conductor Kazem Abdullah.)

• The Performers: The Oregon Symphony, conducted by Music Director Carlos Kalmar, with guest soloist Valentina Lisitsa, piano.

• The Program:
• Bedrich Smetana: “The Moldau,” No. 2 from Ma vlast
• Edvard Grieg: Concerto in A Minor, Opus 16 (Valentina Lisitsa, piano)
• Osvaldo Golijov: Last Round
• Silvestre Revueltas: Homenaje a Federico Garcia Lorca (Homage to Lorca)
• Alberto Ginastera: Four Dances from Estancia

• Tickets: FOR THE PORTLAND PERFORMANCES: $15 to $98; at the Oregon Symphony Ticket Office, 923 SW Washington St., in downtown Portland. Ticket office hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday. Tickets may also be purchased by phone at (503) 228-1353 or (800) 228-7343 during the same hours, or online at any time from the orchestra’s web site, orsymphony.org. Tickets are also available through ticketmaster.com or by calling (503) 790-ARTS.

FOR THE SALEM PERFORMANCE: $25 to $43, available from TicketsWest.

• What’s So Special About This These Concerts:
• These concerts mark Ukrainian-American pianist Valentina Lisitsa’s fourth Oregon Symphony performance in the past two years. Last season she performed the Rachmaninoff Second Piano Concerto with the orchestra.
• Lisitsa and Music Director Carlos Kalmar also performed the Grieg Piano Concerto together this summer at Chicago’s Grant Park Music Festival.
• The Concerto in A Minor, written when Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg was 24, is his only concerto and among the most popular piano concertos in the classical repertoire.
• Two other works on the program – Osvaldo Golijov’s Last Round and Silvestre Revueltas’ Homenaje a Federico Garcia Lorca – receive their Oregon Symphony premiere performances at these concerts. Another work, the Four Dances from Estancia by Alberto Ginastera, has not been performed by the Oregon Symphony since 1966.

 

SUNDAY, OCT. 26:
THE KIDS CONCERTS SERIES KICKS OFF WITH PETER AND THE WOLF

• When and Where: 2 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 26; Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall

• The Performers: The Oregon Symphony, with guest conductor Benjamin Shwartz on the podium, joined by local actor and vocalist Pam Mahon.

• The Program:
• John Williams: Except from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone: Suite for Orchestra
• Richard Rodgers: “I Whistle a Happy Tune” from The King and I (Pam Mahon, soprano)
• Sergei Prokofiev: Peter and the Wolf, Opus 67 (Pam Mahon, narrator)
• Jacques Offenbach: Galop from Overture to Orpheus and the Underworld
• Stefan Kozinski: Creaky Door Overture
• Igor Stravinsky: Excepts from The Firebird Suite

• Tickets: $5 to $42; at the Oregon Symphony Ticket Office, 923 SW Washington St., in downtown Portland. Ticket office hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday. Tickets may also be purchased by phone at (503) 228-1353 or (800) 228-7343 during the same hours, or online at any time from the orchestra’s web site, orsymphony.org. Tickets are also available through ticketmaster.com or by calling (503) 790-ARTS.

• What’s So Special About This Concert:
• Kids Concerts are programmed specifically to appeal to young audiences and are an ideal way to introduce children to classical music.
• Guest conductor Benjamin Shwartz is resident conductor of the San Francisco Symphony and music director of the San Francisco Symphony Youth Orchestra.
• The centerpiece of the concert, Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf, is now a children’s classic, written for the composer’s son in 1936. Disney produced an animated version in 1946.