Program Book - CSO for Kids: Carnival of the Animals

C H I CAGO SYM PH O NY O RC H E STR A

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OF THE

CSO for Kids: School Concerts February 16, 2024 | 10:15 & 12:00 CSO for Kids: Family Matinees February 17, 2024 | 11:00 & 12:45

A composer is like an author or an illustrator, creating music to tell a story. Instead of using words or pictures, the composer chooses musical ways to tell the story, including tempo, dynamics, rhythm and instruments. Together with the members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, we’ll discover how orchestral music can paint vivid images of people and places and species of all kinds.

PERFORMERS Members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Lina González-Granados conductor Charlotte Blake Alston narrator Patrick Godon piano Kelly Estes piano ON THE PROGRAM MONTGOMERY Starburst STILL Mother and Child SAINT-SAËNS The Carnival of the Animals

2 C SO for Kids : CARN I VAL O F THE AN I MALS

Jessie Montgomery, Mead Composerin-Residence of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, describes her piece Starburst as “a play on imagery of rapidly changing musical colors. Exploding gestures are juxtaposed with gentle, fleeting melodies to create a multidimensional soundscape.”

Listen as the rhythms in the piece imagine the rapid formation of stars in the galaxy.

OF THE Mother and Child is a gentle, sweet-sounding piece written by William Grant Still and is inspired by a painting by Sargent Johnson.

Listen as the music illustrates a mother gentling embracing her child. Notice how the composer uses dynamics (loud and soft), tempo (fast and slow), and rhythm (long and short notes) to paint his musical picture.

Fun fact about Carnival of the Animals: It was often performed with the musicians wearing masks of the animals they were representing.

As you listen to Carnival of the Animals, hear how Camille Saint-Saëns uses musical elements like tempo, dynamics, rhythm and instruments to capture the characteristics of the animals in his piece. Keep an ear out for the musical jokes he likes to tell, too!

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2 Hens and Roosters

March of the Lion 1 Royal

The strings sound like hens clucking, and the clarinet sounds like a rooster crowing.

Hear the pianos roar like “The King of the Jungle.”

3 Wild Donkeys The two pianos go wild as they play scales that go up and down.

4 Tortoise

In this musical pun, Saint-Saëns takes a piece that is usually played very fast and slows it way down, to portray a lumbering tortoise.

5 The Elephant

In this piece, the double basses and piano evoke a big, clumsy beast.

Another musical joke is played, using a famous waltz to make the elephant dance!

6 Kangaroos

The two pianos gracefully hop around, up and down the keyboard like a pair of kangaroos.

7 Aquarium 4 C SO for Kids : CARN I VAL O F THE AN I MALS

Graceful fish swim about in the aquarium, which is reflected in the melody of the flute and accompaniment by the strings.

8 Persons with Long Ears These “persons” are actually donkeys, and the string instruments depict the sound of a donkey braying “hee-haw!”

9 The Cuckoo

The pianos offer gentle chords, while somewhere off in the forest, the clarinet plays two notes that sound like the call of the cuckoo.

10 Aviary

The flute performs very fast notes that sound like a bird flying around in an aviary (a very large cage for birds).

11 Pianists

This is another musical joke because pianists are people who play the piano, and in this piece, they are practicing their scales.

12 Fossils 13 The Swan

One of the most famous pieces ever written for cello, it sounds like a swan gently swimming across a pond.

The xylophone suggests the sound of a rattling skeleton, and Saint-Saëns makes a musical joke about himself by using the melody of his own Danse Macabre.

14 Finale

All the instruments join together to play bits from each of the movements. It’s a real celebration!

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Meet the

Conductor i

Lina Gonzalez-Granados Colombian-American Lina González-Granados has distinguished herself nationally and internationally as a singularly talented young conductor.

Her powerful interpretations of the symphonic and operatic repertoire, as well as her dedication to highlighting new and unknown works by Latin American composers, have earned her international recognition, most recently being named part of Bloomberg Línea’s 100 Influential Latinos of 2022.

After winning the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's fourth Sir Georg Solti International Conducting Competition, Lina was named the Solti Conducting Apprentice, and served as the assistant to Maestro Riccardo Muti from February 2020 through June 2023.

Last season, she was appointed Resident Conductor by the LA Opera, a post she will hold through June 2025.

Meet the

guest artist Charlotte Blake Alston

For over 30 years, Charlotte Blake Alston has graced stages in venues throughout North America and abroad, including the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Smithsonian Institution, the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, Symphony Orchestra Narrations, and at regional, national and international storytelling festivals.

Her storytelling skills were honed in childhood when her father introduced her to the work of Black American poet Paul Laurence Dunbar.

In 1991, Charlotte became the first storyteller to perform with the Philadelphia Orchestra on its Family and Student concert series. Thirty seasons later, in 2021, she was named The Philadelphia Orchestra’s official storyteller, narrator and host.

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C SO for Kids : CARN I VAL O F THE AN I MALS

CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

RICCARDO MUTI music director emeritus for life

JESSIE MONTGOMERY Mead Composer-in-Residence • HILARY HAHN Artist-in-Residence

violins Robert Chen Concertmaster The Louis C. Sudler Chair, endowed by an anonymous benefactor Stephanie Jeong Associate Concertmaster The Cathy and Bill Osborn Chair David Taylor Assistant Concertmaster* The Ling Z. and Michael C. Markovitz Chair Yuan-Qing Yu Assistant Concertmaster‡ So Young Bae Cornelius Chiu Gina DiBello Kozue Funakoshi Russell Hershow Qing Hou Matous Michal Simon Michal Sando Shia Susan Synnestvedt Rong-Yan Tang Baird Dodge Principal Danny Yehun Jin Assistant Principal Lei Hou Ni Mei Hermine Gagné Rachel Goldstein Mihaela Ionescu Sylvia Kim Kilcullen Melanie Kupchynsky Wendy Koons Meir Joyce Noh Nancy Park Ronald Satkiewicz Florence Schwartz violas Catherine Brubaker Youming Chen Sunghee Choi Wei-Ting Kuo Danny Lai Weijing Michal Diane Mues Lawrence Neuman Max Raimi cel lo s John Sharp Principal The Eloise W. Martin Chair Kenneth Olsen Assistant Principal § The Adele Gidwitz Chair Karen Basrak The Joseph A. and Cecile Renaud Gorno Chair Loren Brown ‡ Richard Hirschl Daniel Katz Katinka Kleijn Brant Taylor

ba s s e s Alexander Hanna Principal The David and Mary Winton Green Principal Bass Chair Alexander Horton Assistant Principal Daniel Carson Ian Hallas Robert Kassinger Mark Kraemer Stephen Lester Bradley Opland Andrew Sommer ha r p Lynne Turner flu te s Stefán Ragnar Höskuldsson Principal The Erika and Dietrich M. Gross Principal Flute Chair Yevgeny Faniuk Assistant Principal Emma Gerstein Jennifer Gunn p iccolo Jennifer Gunn The Dora and John Aalbregtse Piccolo Chair oboe s William Welter Principal The Nancy and Larry Fuller Principal Oboe Chair Lora Schaefer Assistant Principal Scott Hostetler e ng lis h hor n Scott Hostetler cl a r in e ts Stephen Williamson Principal John Bruce Yeh Assistant Principal Gregory Smith e -fl at cl a r in e t John Bruce Yeh ba s s oons Keith Buncke Principal William Buchman Assistant Principal Miles Maner hor n s Mark Almond Principal James Smelser David Griffin Oto Carrillo Susanna Gaunt Daniel Gingrich

trumpets Esteban Batallán Principal The Adolph Herseth Principal Trumpet Chair, endowed by an anonymous benefactor Mark Ridenour Assistant Principal John Hagstrom The Bleck Family Chair Tage Larsen The Pritzker Military Museum & Library Chair trombones Jay Friedman Principal The Lisa and Paul Wiggin Principal Trombone Chair Michael Mulcahy Charles Vernon bass trombone Charles Vernon tuba Gene Pokorny Principal The Arnold Jacobs Principal Tuba Chair, endowed by Christine Querfeld ti mpani David Herbert Principal The Clinton Family Fund Chair Vadim Karpinos Assistant Principal perc ussi on Cynthia Yeh Principal Patricia Dash Vadim Karpinos James Ross li brari ans Justin Vibbard Principal Carole Keller Mark Swanson c so f ellows Gabriela Lara Violin The Michael and Kathleen Elliott Fellow Jesús Linárez Violin Olivia Reyes Bass orc hestra personnel John Deverman Director Anne MacQuarrie Manager, CSO Auditions and Orchestra Personnel stage tec hni c i ans Christopher Lewis Stage Manager Blair Carlson Paul Christopher Ryan Hartge Peter Landry Joshua Mondie Todd Snick

* Assistant concertmasters are listed by seniority. ‡ On sabbatical § On leave The CSO’s music director position is endowed in perpetuity by a generous gift from the Zell Family Foundation.

The Paul Hindemith Principal Viola, Gilchrist Foundation, and Louise H. Benton Wagner chairs currently are unoccupied.

The Chicago Symphony Orchestra string sections utilize revolving seating. Players behind the first desk (first two desks in the violins) change seats systematically every two weeks and are listed alphabetically. Section percussionists also are listed alphabetically.

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INSTRUMENTS OF THE ORCHESTRA THE STRING FAMILY includes violin, viola, cello, bass and harp. These instruments are made of wood and strings and are played by vibrating the strings using a bow, or plucking or striking the strings with the fingers.

Violin

Viola

Cello

clarinet, bassoon and saxophone. These instruments all have the same basic shape: a long tube with a mouthpiece at one end. The flute is played by blowing across a mouthpiece to create a vibration. Oboe, clarinet, bassoon and saxophone are all played by blowing air into a single or double reed attached to the mouthpiece, creating a vibration that results in sound.

Flute

Oboe

Clarinet

Harp

Bass

THE WOODWIND FAMILY includes flute, oboe,

THE BRASS FAMILY includes horn, trumpet,

trombone, euphonium and tuba. Brass instruments make a sound when the players vibrate their lips inside a mouthpiece, which is fitted into the instrument.

The players can change pitch on a trumpet, horn or tuba by pressing on valves. Trombone players change pitch by moving the slide back and forth.

Trumpet Trombone

Saxophone

Tuba

Horn

Bassoon

THE PERCUSSION FAMILY includes snare drum, bass drum, gong, triangle, xylophone, timpani and piano, among many others. Percussion instruments are struck, scraped or shaken.

Timpani

Snare Drum

Xylophone

Support for Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association programming for children and families is provided by Abbott Fund, Archer Daniels Midland Company, John D. and Leslie Henner Burns, John Hart and Carol Prins, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Kinder Morgan, PNC, Courtney Shea, Megan and Steve Shebik, Michael and Linda Simon, the Walter and Caroline Sueske Charitable Trust and an anonymous family foundation.

Cymbal

Piano

Youth Education Program Sponsor Kidsbook© is a publication of the Negaunee Music Institute.

For more information, call 312-294-3410 or email institute@cso.org.

Content for Kidsbook was created by Katy Clusen with graphic design by Shawn Sheehy.