PROGRAM NOTES AND COMPOSER FEATURE

The

of classical music starts here — with the National Repertory Orchestra!

Music Director Michael Stern has planned a terrific season of “must-hear” concerts that will delight and inspire. It all begins with a brand-new work commissioned by the NRO from one of our illustrious alums, David Dzubay. David has composed Ridgeline, a colorful showpiece inspired by the peaks and ridges that frame the sky around Breckenridge. It is a wonderful tribute to this beautiful location and the great music heard here every summer!

Adolphus Hailstork’s Fanfare on “Amazing Grace” follows a glorious and uplifting take on the beloved hymn tune with its ceremonial brilliance and unrestrained exuberance. American music stays in the forefront as Tim Higgins’ vivacious Sinfonietta shines the spotlight on the NRO brass and percussion sections. Higgins is the principal trombonist of the San Francisco Symphony, and he knows a thing or three about writing exciting music. Woodwinds and horns take the stage in Richard Strauss’ early Serenade, an engaging piece that reveals his traditional classical training as well as presaging the masterworks to come.

Strings return in Ralph Vaughan Williams’ gorgeous Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, one of the high points of English music across the centuries. The program concludes with Béla Bartók’s brilliant Concerto for Orchestra, one of the greatest pieces of the 20th century. At turns bravura, mysterious, playful, contemplative and virtuosic, Bartók’s music is the perfect ending to this concert, showcasing every section of the orchestra.

© Eric T. Williams

Composer Feature

David Dzubay, NRO Alumnus

Richard Strauss (1864-1949)

Serenade in E-flat major, Op. 7

Ralph Vaughan-Williams (1872-1958)

Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis

Sadie Hamrin and Natalie Koh, violins

Kate MacKenzie, viola

Clare Choi, cello

-INTERMISSION-

Béla Bartók (1881-1945)

Concerto for Orchestra

I. Intrudizione. Andante non troppo – Allegro vivace

II. Presentando le coppie. Allegro scherzando

III. Elegia. Andante non troppo

IV. Intermezzo interrotto. Allegretto

V. Finale. Presto

David Dzubay was born in 1964 in Minneapolis, grew up in Portland, Oregon, and earned a Doctor of Music degree in Composition at Indiana University in 1991. Additional studies include a fellowship in composition at Tanglewood (1990) and two summers as co-principal trumpet of the National Repertory Orchestra (1988, 1989).

Dzubay has received commissions from Meet the Composer, Chamber Music America, the National Endowment for the Arts, the US-Mexico Fund for Culture, and the Fromm and Barlow foundations, among others. Recent honors include Guggenheim, Bogliasco, MacDowell, Yaddo, Copland House and Djerassi fellowships, a 2011 Arts and Letters Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the 2015/17 Sackler Prize and a 2015 Fromm Commission. His music has been performed by orchestras, ensembles and soloists in the U.S., Europe, Canada, Mexico, and Asia, and is published by Pro Nova Music and recorded on the Sony, Bridge, Centaur, Innova, Naxos, Crystal, Klavier, Gia, and First Edition labels.

Currently chair of the Composition Department and Director of the New Music Ensemble at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music in Bloomington, Dzubay also spent three years as Composer-Consultant to the Minnesota Orchestra and one as Composer-in-Residence with the Green Bay Symphony. Since 2011, he has taught composition for three weeks each summer at the Brevard Music Center.

Take your concert experience to the next level!

See extended program notes in the FREE NRO App or at NROmusic.org.