By Kerry Clawson
Beacon Journal staff writer
A $150,000 grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation will enable the Akron Symphony Orchestra to produce a once-in-lifetime performance of the Gershwin opera Porgy and Bess as the centerpiece of its 59th season, a massive show that will involve 350 actors, singers, musicians and stage crew.
”I look at our opportunity to perform Porgy and Bess as a once-in-a-lifetimer because, first of all, I know we’re not going to get a major grant every year,” said Music Director Christopher Wilkins. ”It’s a chance to pull together so many elements that are already strong in the organization.”
The project is a natural given the huge popularity of the Gospel Meets Symphony program, which pairs the orchestra with its gospel choir and is the organization’s best-selling concert annually.
For Porgy, which will be performed April 16, 2011, the 200-voice volunteer gospel choir and teens in the YEPAW 365 youth leadership program’s chorus will sing the show’s spirituals from the upper balcony at E.J. Thomas Hall, creating a surround-sound experience. Onstage, an all-black cast and chorus will be chosen through auditions. Wilkins said the two lead roles of Porgy and Bess are expected to be filled by opera singers with a national or international reputation.
Wilkins, who calls Porgy and Bess ”the
great American masterpiece,” said it is rarely performed: ”It’s rare because it’s so complicated. The cast is enormous.
”It seems to bridge all things American for material.”
George Gershwin’s 1935 opera weaves together musical styles from Tin Pan Alley, Broadway, blues, jazz, classical and music inspired by his time in Charleston, S.C., where the opera’s story is set, namely spirituals. The sounds of urban Charleston are reflected in the street cries and work songs, as well as the music of the local Gullah people, with whom Gershwin made music during his visit.
”It has some of that authentic [folk] voice in it,” Wilkins said of Gershwin’s score. ”Copland has that ability. too. It’s such a rare gift.”
The opera’s half-dozen spirituals sound traditional, although they were written by Gershwin, Wilkins said: ”They tend to be gut-wrenching, soaring, probing laments or love songs. . . . They’re about community, as spirituals all are.”
Akron’s production will have a strong outreach component, including discounted tickets and the opportunity for students to attend an open dress rehearsal.
The Akron Symphony, which experienced success with a Verdi and Puccini program this year and a semi-staged version of La Traviata four years ago, has now made producing semi-staged or fully staged musicals or operas annually part of its strategic plan.
Auditions for Porgy will be Sept. 12. See http://www.akronsymphony.org for details.
Other highlights of the 2010-11 season include a performance by Grammy-winning chamber ensemble eighth blackbird, whom symphony spokesman Jason Swank described as ”one of the hottest classical ensembles touring in the U.S. right now.”
The ensemble, whose six members all graduated from Oberlin Conservatory, will perform the Ohio premiere of Jennifer Higdon’s On a Wire. Higdon, winner of the 2010 Pulitzer Prize in music and a graduate of Bowling Green, formerly studied privately with Jesse Ayers, a Malone College professor who has composed for the Akron Symphony Orchestra.
The Northeast Ohio connections continue with the upcoming season’s guest artists. Cleveland native Michael Cavanaugh of Broadway’s Movin’ Out will perform Billy Joel hits on piano in a pops concert Feb. 12. Carl Topilow, music director of the Cleveland Pops and conductor at the Cleveland Institute of Music, will conduct the holiday pops concerts Dec. 17 and 18.
Others on the schedule with Cleveland affiliations are Martina Filjak of Croatia, winner of the 2009 Cleveland International Piano Competition, who will perform an all Rachmaninoff concert March 5; and David Lockington, former music director of the Ohio Chamber Orchestra in Cleveland, who will be guest conductor of the Mozart Requiem program May 14.
For the second year, the Akron Symphony will offer 50 percent off for first-time subscribers purchasing either the classical or pops series or both. Those who buy the three-concert pop series also will receive two free student tickets per concert for each package purchased.
For subscriptions, call 330-535-8131 or see http://www.akronsymphony.org. Single tickets will go on sale Aug. 16.
Here’s the complete 2010-11 schedule:
• Opening Night, 8 p.m. Sept. 11, E.J. Thomas Hall. Smith’s Star Spangled Banner; Britten’s Sinfonia da Requiem, Op. 20; Mozart’s Ave Verum Corpus; and Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5 in D. Featuring the Akron Symphony Chorus, led by Maria Sensi Sellner.
• Early Romantics, 8 p.m. Oct. 16, E.J. Thomas Hall. Berlioz’s Roman Carnival Overture, Dance of the Sylphs and Hungarian March; Weber’s Clarinet Concerto No. 1; and Schumann’s Symphony No. 2. Featuring Kristina Belisle Jones, clarinet.
• Romantic Rhapsody, 8 p.m. Nov. 6, E.J. Thomas Hall. Dvorak’s Slavonic Dances; Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music; Enesco’s Romanian Rhapsody No. 1; and Borodin’s Polovetsian Dances. Featuring the Akron Symphony Chorus.
• A Grand Night: The Music of Richard Rodgers, pops concert, 8 p.m. Nov. 13, Akron Civic Theatre. Featuring the Broadway legend’s tunes from The Sound of Music, Carousel, Pal Joey, The King and I, Oklahoma, South Pacific and more.
• Holiday Pops, 7:30 p.m. Dec. 17 and 18, E.J. Thomas Hall. Carl Topilow, guest conductor. Featuring the Akron Symphony Chorus. Includes visit from Santa.
• eighth blackbird, 8 p.m. Jan. 15, E.J. Thomas Hall. Guest chamber ensemble to present Ohio premiere of Pulitzer Prize winner Jennifer Higdon’s On a Wire, with the Akron Symphony Orchestra. Program includes Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending, Sung’s The Phoenix Rising, Stravinsky’s The Firebird Suite and Gandolfi’s The Garden of Cosmic Speculation. Featuring Alan Bodman, violin.
• Gospel Meets Symphony 7:30 p.m. Feb. 5, E.J. Thomas Hall. Featuring the Akron Symphony Gospel Chorus and Akron Symphony.
• Michael Cavanaugh in Concert: The Music of Billy Joel and More, 8 p.m. Feb. 12, E.J. Thomas Hall. Piano man Cavanaugh from Broadway’s Movin’ Out returns home to Northeast Ohio for Valentine’s pops concert with the Akron Symphony.
• All Rachmaninoff, 8 p.m. March 5, E.J. Thomas Hall. Rachmaninoff’s Vocalise, Symphonic Dances and Piano Concerto No. 2. Featuring Martina Filjak, 2009 winner of the Cleveland International Piano Competition.
• Akron Symphony Chorus Spring Concert, 2 p.m. March 27, St. Sebastian Church, Akron.
• Porgy and Bess, 8 p.m. April 16, E.J. Thomas Hall. Fully staged Gershwin production to feature Akron Symphony Gospel Chorus and high school students in YEPAW 365. Sponsored by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
• Mozart Requiem, 8 p.m. May 14, E.J. Thomas Hall. Program also includes Part’s Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten and Vaughan Williams’ Fantasia on a theme by Thomas Tallis. Featuring guest conductor David Lockington and the Akron Symphony Chorus.
Arts writer Kerry Clawson may be reached at 330-996-3527 or kclawson@thebeaconjournal.com.
