Proclaimed as “the most Russian of all Russian composers” by Igor Stravinsky, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was one of Western classical music’s most illustrious romantic composers. From the bombastic 1812 Overture to the enchanting Nutcracker ballet, Tchaikovsky’s music never fails to sweep listeners off of their feet.
The Grand Rapids Symphony’s Tchaikovsky Festival will celebrate the music of Tchaikovsky with a program featuring four pieces by the 19th century composer including At Bedtime, Variations on a Rococo Theme for Cello and Orchestra, Andante Cantabile for Cello and String Orchestra, and the Symphony No. 4 in F minor.
The Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series concert is led by music director Marcelo Lehninger. The orchestra will be joined by the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus and cellist Andrei Ioniţă, winner of the 2015 International Tchaikovsky Competition.
The Grand Rapids Symphony also will perform at the ‘Tchaikovsky Festival” set for Feb. 8-9. (Supplied)
Join in the festivities on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 8-9 at 8 p.m. at DeVos Performance Hall.
The Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus is sponsored by Mary Tuuk. Romanian cellist Andrei Ioniţă’s appearance is sponsored by the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
Organized in 1962 with the guidance and support of Mary Ann Keeler, the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus attracts singers, ages 18 to 80, from all walks of life across West Michigan. In its 57th season as an affiliate of the Grand Rapids Symphony, the Chorus has joined the Symphony in performances of Mozart’s Mass in C minor and the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops.
Tchaikovsky’s music has a wide range of style and emotion, drawing inspiration from folk music to composers like Haydn and Mozart. With his Variations on a Rococo Theme, Tchaikovsky attempted to embody the simple elegance of 18th century music.
He had a reverence for Mozart in particular, as he told the Petersburg Life newspaper in an 1892 interview. “I was 16 when I heard Mozart’s Don Giovanni for the first time. For me, this was a revelation: I cannot find words to describe the overwhelming power of the impression which it made on me. It is probably due to this fact that of all the great composers it is Mozart for whom I feel the most tender love.”
Andrei Ioniţă, born in 1994 in Bucharest, began taking piano lessons at the age of 5 and received his first cello lesson three years later. His Gold Medal at the International Tchaikovsky Competition in 2015 launched his flourishing career as a soloist and has performed in concert halls around the globe.
The San Diego Union Tribune declared that, “Ioniţă displayed an uncanny sureness of intonation and a beauty of tone, no matter how far his fingers traveled on the strings or how high his lines soared.”
Besides the popular Variations on a Rococo Theme, Ioniţă also will join the Grand Rapids Symphony for the Andante Cantabile for Cello and Orchestra, an arrangement of the second movement of Tchaikovsky’s first string quartet, which was performed at a concert honoring author Leo Tolstoy.
Of all late 19th century composers, Tchaikovsky had a knack for writing beautiful and eloquent melodies. The main melody of the Andante Cantabile is a Ukrainian folk song, but the secondary melody is Tchaikovsky’s, and the two melodies combined created music that brought Tolstoy to tears at its debut.
At the time he wrote his Symphony No. 4, Tchaikovsky had just entered a disastrous marriage that would end in divorce less than a year later. It comes as no surprise that his tumultuous personal life is reflected in the theme of his symphony.
In a letter to his friend and supporter, Madame von Meck, Tchaikovsky revealed the meaning behind his Fourth Symphony. “The introduction is the germ of the entire symphony, its central idea. This is Fate, the force that prevents our hopes of happiness from being realized, that jealously watches to see that peace and happiness not be complete or unclouded. Successive new themes express growing discontent and despair. A sweet vision appears but bitter Fate awakens us. Life is a continuous, shifting, grim reality.”
The composer was pleased with the symphony and considered it to be some of his best work. Though in another letter to von Meck, Tchaikovsky couldn’t help but wonder of the fate of the symphony itself. “What lies in store for this symphony? Will it survive long after its author has disappeared from the face of the earth, or straight away plunge into the depths of oblivion?”
Tchaikovsky would undoubtedly be pleased to know that fate has been kind to his symphony. Not only has his music survived, but it is celebrated to this day.
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall
Tickets for the Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series start at $18 and are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9 am – 5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across the street from Calder Plaza). Call (616) 454-9451 x 4 to order by phone. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum).
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 am – 6 pm or on the day of the concert beginning two hours before the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Special Offers
Full-time students of any age can purchase tickets for $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Calvin College. Discounts are available to members of MySymphony360, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s organization for young professionals ages 21-35.
Students age 7-18 also are able to attend for free when accompanied by an adult. Free for Kids tickets must be purchased in advance at the GRS Ticket office. Up to two free tickets are available with the purchase of a regular-price adult ticket. Go online for more details.
Symphony Scorecard provides up to four free tickets for members of the community receiving financial assistance from the State of Michigan and for members of the U.S. Armed Forces, whether on active or reserve duty or serving in the National Guard. Go online for information to sign up with a Symphony Scorecard Partner Agency.
It’s wintertime West Michigan, but things are about to heat up downtown in DeVos Performance Hall. The Grand Rapids Symphony presents the rich and fiery flavor of Latinx music and dance in Rhythm of the Dance.
From Argentina to Spain, Rhythm of the Dance showcases music from both sides of the Atlantic and gives a taste of the classic favorites as well as a contemporary imaginings of Latin-American music. The program will include such classic works as Joaquin Rodrigo’sConcierto de Aranjuez, the most popular work of all time for guitar and orchestra, with guitarist Pablo Sáinz Villegas.
Dancers from Grand Rapids Ballet will join the orchestra for the vibrant rhythms and irresistible melodies of Two Tangos by Astor Piazzolla.
The concert in the Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series, led by Music Director Marcelo Lehninger, will take place at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Jan. 18-19 in DeVos Performance Hall. Concert sponsor is Warner Norcross + Judd. Villegas’ performance is sponsored by the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
The Grand Rapids Symphony’s Brazilian-born Music Director will lead the orchestra in Spanish composer Manuel de Falla’s Suite No. 1 from The Three-Cornered Hat and in Argentinean composer Alberto Ginastera’s Four Dances fromEstancia.
The Symphony will also perform Three Latin American Dances, a contemporary work written by Gabriela Lena Frank, a Grammy Award-winning American composer of Peruvian descent.
Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez, which includes one of the most hauntingly beautiful English horn solos in the symphonic repertoire, is sure to be a highlight of the program.
Having lost his sight at the age of 3, Rodrigo was a virtuoso pianist and gifted composer. Though he was not a guitar player himself, several of his works for guitar and orchestra raised the profile of the instrument within the world of classical music.
Spanish guitarist Pablo Sáinz Villegas, winner of the Andres Segovia Award and Gold Medalist in the first Christopher Parkening International Guitar Competition, will join the Symphony to perform the concerto that made Rodrigo famous.
Born and raised in La Rioja, Spain, a region full of wineries and bodegas in northern Spain, Villegas is praised as a charismatic performer with singing tone and consummate technique that conjures the passion, playfulness and drama of his homeland’s musical heritage.
‘I never heard the guitar sound the way that you play it.’ is a comment guitarist Villegas often hears.
Villegas told Billboard Magazine in 2016, “When I play a concert, people always say, ‘I never heard the guitar sound the way that you play it.’ And that is exactly what I am looking for. We’re talking about an emotional connection through the music using the guitar. For me, the guitar is the most wonderful and expressive instrument.”
An evening of Latin music would not be complete without a tango or two by “The Great Astor.”
On his ninth birthday, Piazzolla received his first bandoneon, an instrument related to the accordion, from his father, who bought it from a pawn shop for less than $20. Piazzolla soon became a prodigy on the instrument, learning the music of Bach, Mozart and Schumann and, of course, the tango.
Intending to become a composer of classical music, Piazzolla for 10 years wrote symphonies, piano concertos and chamber music. After winning a composers’ competition, he was given the opportunity to study with the famed pedagogue Nadia Boulanger, mentor to such composers as Aaron Copland and Philip Glass.
In a 1988 interview with the Washington Post, Piazzolla recalled presenting his work to Nadia Boulanger, “…all of a sudden she says, ‘Why don’t you play a piece of the music you write in tango? I’m very much interested.’ I played eight bars and she just took my two hands and put them against her chest and said, ‘This is Astor Piazzolla, this is the music you have to go on writing, not that. Throw that into the garbage.’”
“And that’s what I did,” he continued. “I threw 10 years out of my life into the garbage. Now I write classical music, or symphonies, but always with a tango taste in it, trying the most to be Astor Piazzolla always.”
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall.
Tickets for the Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series start at $18 and are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9 am – 5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across the street from Calder Plaza). Call (616) 454-9451 x 4 to order by phone. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum).
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 am – 6 pm or on the day of the concert beginning two hours before the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Only 354 days until Christmas! Now, about that tree…
Don’t let your Christmas tree dry out — drop it off at a designated site
Wondering what to do with that Christmas tree? If you’re a resident of Wyoming, there is a drop-off site at 2660 Burlingame Ave. SW. Kentwood residents can drop off their trees at the city’s Department of Public Works, 5068 Breton Ave. SE from 7:30am-4pm Monday-Friday, through Jan. 31. Get the details here.
No. 89… No. 89… Oh, wait…
Cool, old-timey photo of the Grand Rapids Symphony in the 1930s
The Grand Rapids Symphony officially organized on Jan. 11, 1930, making it 89 in 2019. Coincidentally, the Symphony has a concert performance on Jan. 11. So to celebrate its 89th birthday, one of the featured pieces is Hayden’s Symphony No. 89. Pretty clever, no? Go here for more info.
And now, a blast from the past
Remember them now?
Hey! Remember S&H Green Stamps? No? Maybe your mom does — well, your grandmother definitely does. You can trace the roots of Meijer’s MPerks and Hallmark’s Gold Crown Rewards back to about 1896, when Sperry & Hutchinson (the S&H — get it?) started to offer its loyalty retail program to supermarkets, gas stations and stores in the form of small green stamps. Managing editor Joanne Bailey-Boorsma dishes on this once-ubiquitous homemaker staple here.
Fun fact:
45%
That’s the percentage of Americans who make New Year’s resolutions. The top resolutions are: to lose weight, get organized, to spend less and save more, to stay fit and healthy, and to quit smoking. While nearly half of all Americans make resolutions, 25 percent of them give up on their resolutions by the second week of January. That’s next week, y’all.
The number 89 is considered mundane by some, being the number before the major milestone of 90. Yet according to numerology, 89 is a building number. It s known to build large structures that benefit society and that endure for a longtime, such as the Grand Rapids Symphony.
The Grand Rapids Symphony officially organized on Jan. 11, 1930, making it 89 in 2019. Coincidentally, the Symphony has a concert performance on Jan. 11. So to celebrate its 89th birthday, one of the featured pieces is Hayden’s Symphony No. 89.
“Former Music Director David Lockington started the tradition years ago,” said Grand Rapids Symphony Senior Manager of Communications and Media Relations Jeffrey Kaczmarczyk of celebrating the symphony’s anniversary with a classical piece that has the correlating number. Kaczmarczyk said the Symphony started the tradition around its 75th anniversary, which was in 2004-2005 and has been following it, on and off, for the past 14 years.
The Jan. 11 concert is part of the Symphony’s PwC Great Eras series and is titled The Classical Concert: Viennese Masters. The performance, which also include, Beethoven’s “Creatures of Prometheus” and Mozart’s Symphony No. 39, will be at 8 p.m. at St. Cecilia Music Center’s Royce Auditorium, 24 Ransom Ave. NE.
In the late 18th Century, Vienna was the capital city of the music world with Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven all living and working there during their careers. Haydn was a mentor to both Beethoven, who studied briefly with the composer, and Mozart, who learned so much for Haydn that Mozart eventually dedicated six ring quartets to his mentor.
GRS Music Director Marcelo Lehninger will lead the Grand Rapids Symphony in the Jan. 11 PwC Great Eras Series concert Viennese Masters. (Supplied)
Of course, 89 is still the number before 90, which the Grand Rapids Symphony will mark its 90th season starting this fall and into 2020. Kaczmarczyk said the Symphony will be announcing its 90th season in February and he hopes to have some more interesting and fun information to provide about the organization. Until then, there is still a lot of the Grand Rapids Symphony’s 89th season to enjoy including the film presentations of “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,” Feb. 1 and 2, and n”Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl,” March 9-11.
Highlights of the The Classical Concert: Viennese Matters will be given at 10 a.m. at St. Cecilia Music Center as part of The Classical Coffee Concert. This is a Porter Hills Coffee Classic series that is a one-hour program held without intermission. Doors open at 9 a.m. for complementary coffee and pastry.
The complete The Classical Concert: Viennese Masters program will be rebroadcast on Sunday, April 7, 2019 at 1 p.m. on Blue Lake Public Radio, 88.9 FM or 90.3 FM.
Tickets start at $26 for the Great Eras series and $16 for Coffee Classics and are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9 a.m. – 5 p.m. at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100 (located across the street from Calder Plaza). Call 616-454-0451, ext. 4 to order by phone. Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert at the venue beginning two hours before the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full of clever antics and comical wit, Home Alone is sure to get everyone into the holiday spirit.
A modern holiday classic starring Macaulay Culkin, Home Alone is the story of an 8-year-old troublemaker, accidentally left behind by his family on Christmas vacation, who must protect his home from a pair of inept burglars.
See the full-length 1990 film with the Grand Rapids Pops performing John Williams’ score with its hummable melodies that evoke a child’s view of family, danger and Christmas in the Midwest.
Associate Conductor John Varineau will conduct this second concert of the Gerber SymphonicBoom series for one night only on Thursday November 29 at 7:30 p.m. in DeVos Performance Hall.
Screenwriter John Hughes had the idea for Home Alone while writing and directing the 1989 film, Uncle Buck. Macaulay Culkin played a starring role in the film, which inspired Hughes to create the precocious protagonist, Kevin McCallister.
Home Alone dominated the box office, making over $17 million in more than 1,200 theaters in its opening weekend and becoming the highest grossing film of 1990. For 27 years, the film held a Guinness World Record as the highest-grossing, live-action comedy in the United States.
Though the film is beloved for its hilarious catchphrases, stunts and mishaps, the comedic elements of Home Aloneare offset by a delightful magic that only John Williams can bring to a film score.
The Grand Rapids Symphony performs the musical score of the movie “Home Alone” while the film plays at a one-night only concert set for Thursday, Nov. 29.
Lukas Kendall, founder and editor of Film Score Monthly, told NPR, “[John Williams] has a breadth and depth of talent and career that really started before there were The Beatles; [today he is] essentially the dean of American composers. His themes sound inevitable. They sound like they fell out of his sleeves; they sound like they’ve always existed.”
John Williams sets Home Alone apart from other live-action, comedies meant for the entire family with music that’s imaginative and memorable, capturing both the rambunctious nature of the film and the essence of the holiday spirit.
Associate Conductor John Varineau, now in his fourth decade on the podium for the Grand Rapids Symphony, is our movie maestro who conducts most of the Grand Rapids Symphony’s concerts featuring film plus live music. Later this season, he’ll lead the Grand Rapids Pops in The Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl on March 8-10 in DeVos Performance Hall. Tickets are on sale beginning at $18 adults, $5 students.
John Williams is the second-most nominated person in the history of the Oscars and has received five Academy Awards and 51 Oscar nominations plus seven British Academy Awards, 23 Grammys, four Golden Globes, and five Emmys. In 2016 he received the 44th Life Achievement Award from the American Film Institute, the first time a composer was honored with this award.
He has composed the music for more than 100 films, including the themes used in the Harry Potter movies such as Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, which the Grand Rapids Symphony will perform in February. Williams also has composed the scores for all eight Star Wars films and for the Indiana Jones series, as well as for Superman, Memoirs of a Geisha, and The Book Thief. His 45-year artistic partnership with director Steven Spielberg has resulted in many of Hollywood’s most acclaimed and successful films, including Schindler’s List, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Jaws, Jurassic Park, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Saving Private Ryan, Lincoln, The BFG and The Post.
Williams served as music director of the Boston Pops Orchestra for 14 seasons and remains their Laureate Conductor. He also has composed numerous works for the concert stage including two symphonies, and concertos commissioned by many of America’s most prominent orchestras.
Williams has composed themes for four Olympic Games, and in 2003, he received the Olympic Order, the IOC’s highest honor, for his contributions to the Olympic movement.
In 2004, he received a Kennedy Center Honor, given to those in the performing arts for their lifetime of contributions to American culture. In 2009 he received the National Medal of Arts, the highest award given by the U.S. Government to an artist.
Tickets
Tickets for Home Alone start at $32 and are available at the GRS ticket office, weekdays 9 a.m.-5 p.m. at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
With thrilling acrobatics, classic films and timeless music, the sublime sounds of the holidays from the Grand Rapids Pops are sure to make spirits bright.
Carrying on tradition, the Grand Rapids Symphony once again presents its Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops on Dec. 6-9 and Old National Bank Cirque de Noël on Dec. 19-20 in DeVos Performance Hall.
Also coming to the DeVos Performance Hall are two full-length feature holiday film concerts, The Snowman on Nov. 17 and Home Alone Nov. 29.
Principal Pops conductor Bob Bernhardt will lead the Symphony in the old, familiar carols and other timeless holiday melodies in this year’s Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops.
Joining the Symphony in favorites such as the “Hallelujah Chorus” from Handel’s Messiah and music from the 1990 filmHome Aloneare the joyful voices of the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus, led by director Pearl Shangkuan, and the Grand Rapids Symphony Youth Chorus, directed by Sean Ivory.
Bass-baritone Justin Hopkins, who was a special guest for the Grand Rapids Symphony’s 2016 Holiday Pops, will return to DeVos Performance Hall to perform You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch among other holiday hits. Hopkins’ appearance is sponsored by Jim & Ginger Jurries.
West Michigan’s own Embellish handbell ensemble, directed by Stephanie Wiltse, will return to the Holiday Pops to ring holiday favorites including Sing We Now of Christmas and the Coventry Carol.
Five performances of the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops will be held at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 6, and at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Dec. 7-8. Matinees will be at 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 8-9, in DeVos Performance Hall. Tickets for this Fox Motors Pops concert start at $18 adults, $5 students.
Cirque de la Symphonie
Since 2009, Cirque de la Symphonie has spent part of each Christmas season in Grand Rapids. This year, for the 10th annual Old National Bank Cirque de Noël with the Grand Rapids Symphony, Cirque de la Symphonie will once again bring the magic and thrill of the holiday season to DeVos Performance Hall at 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 19-20.
The company of acrobats, jugglers, contortionists and aerial artists will make merry with amazing feats of agility and strength, accompanied by beloved Christmas songs and classical favorites. Acts include aerial artists Vitalii Buza and Ekaterina Borzikova performing above the DeVos Hall stage while the Grand Rapids Symphony plays the “Waltz of the Flowers” from Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker.
Associate Conductor John Varineau leads the orchestra in familiar melodies such as Leroy Anderson’s A Christmas Festival, Franz Schubert’s Ava Maria, and Duke Ellington’s “Peanut Brittle Brigade” from The Nutcracker Suite.
Kicking off the Grand Rapids Symphony’s holiday season in November are two full-length feature film concerts.
The Snowman returns once more to inspire children of all ages with the story of a boy who builds a snowman who comes to life and leads him on a wide-eyed and wondrous adventure to meet Father Christmas.
The hour-long DTE Energy Foundation Family series concert, which has sold-out past performances by the Grand Rapids Symphony, features the popular animated short, projected onto a 40-foot screen, accompanied by a live performance of Howard Blake’s musical score at 3 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 17. Tickets are $15 adults, $5 children.
Full of clever antics and comical wit, the 1990 film Home Alone is sure to get everyone in the holiday spirit at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Nov. 29, part of the Gerber SymphonicBoom series.
A modern holiday classic starring Macaulay Culkin, Home Alone is the story of an 8-year-old troublemaker, accidentally left behind by his family on Christmas vacation, who must protect his home from a pair of inept burglars.
See the full-length film with the Grand Rapids Pops performing John Williams’ delightfully sentimental and sweet score, full of hummable melodies that evoke a child’s view of family and Christmas. Tickets start at $32.
Tickets
Tickets for Grand Rapids Symphony concerts and are available at the Symphony box office, weekdays 9 am – 5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across the street from Calder Plaza). Call (616) 454-9451 x 4 to order by phone. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum).
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10am-6pm or on the day of the concert beginning two hours before the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Special Offers
For the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops concert on Thursday, Dec. 6 or the matinee on Saturday, Dec. 8, full-time students of any age can purchase tickets for $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Calvin College.
Discounts also are available for the Holiday Pops to members of MySymphony360, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s organization for young professionals ages 21-35.
Students age 7-18 are able to attend for some concerts for free when accompanied by an adult. Free for Kids tickets must be purchased in advance at the GRS Ticket office. Up to two free tickets are available with the purchase of a regular-price adult ticket for the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops on Thursday, Dec. 6 or for The Snowman on Saturday, Nov. 17. Go online for more details.
Symphony Scorecard provides members up to four free tickets for many Grand Rapids Symphony concerts. Members of the community receiving financial assistance from the State of Michigan and members of the U.S. Armed Forces, whether on active or reserve duty or serving in the National Guard, are eligible. All concerts in the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops and DTE Energy Foundation Family Series are available to Scorecard members. Go online for information on signing up with a Symphony Scorecard Partner Agency.
The hour-long concert, which has sold-out past performance by the Grand Rapids Symphony, features the well-known animated film, projected onto a 40-foot screen while accompanied by the musical score performed live at 3 p.m., Saturday, November 17, in DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW.
Hailed as “iconic and ethereal” The Snowman wordlessly tells the story of a boy who builds a snowman who comes to life and leads him on a wide-eyed and wondrous adventure to meet Father Christmas.
Led by Associate Conductor John Varineau, the Grand Rapids Symphony will perform the magical score by Howard Blake as the snowman and his young friend adventure through darkened woods, over rolling mountains, and above quiet ocean waves in the film that garnered an Academy Award nomination in 1982.
With plucky violins and xylophones for mischief, reflective piano melodies for soft, falling snow, and deep bass notes for night-time flight – it is an invitation for children ages 8 to 13 and adults to savor the simple joys of the holiday season.
The program features other popular holiday melodies including Leroy Anderson’s “Sleigh Ride” and “Let it Go!” from the Walt Disney film Frozen along with the performance of The Snowman.
Come early for pre-concert activities beginning at 2 p.m. Children can experience the joy of making music with an instrument petting zoo and keep their creative juices flowing with crafts inspired by the playful snowman they’ll soon see in the show.
Originally published in 1978 by famed children’s illustrator Raymond Briggs, The Snowman has become one of the world’s most popular children’s books, selling in excess of 8.5 million copies worldwide, with translations into 15 different languages.
Adapted for screen by producer John Coates, the 30-minute film first premiered in the United Kingdom in 1982 on a British public television station. The film quickly became a beloved staple of the Christmas season in Great Britain, and later found a home in America, with the help of an introduction by rock icon David Bowe. The film has since been broadcast on a global scale, and garnered an Academy Award nomination and a BAFTA TV award.
First performed by Peter Auty, a choirboy at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, the song, “Walking in the Air,” provides the only dialogue in the otherwise wordless film. The startlingly beautiful melody with an almost haunting orchestration will be performed by singers of the Grand Rapids Symphony Youth Chorus’s select ensemble, Mandala.
Tickets
Tickets are $15 adults and $5 children, available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10am-6pm or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the day of the concert by enrolling in theGRS Student Ticket program.
Special Offers
Students age 7-18 also are able to attend for most concerts for free when accompanied by an adult. Free for Kids tickets must be purchased in advance at the GRS Ticket office. Up to two free tickets are available with the purchase of a regular-price adult ticket. Go online for more details.
Symphony Scorecardprovides members up to four free tickets for most Grand Rapids Symphony concerts. Member of the community receiving financial assistance from the State of Michigan and members of the U.S. Armed Forces, whether on active or reserve duty or serving in the National Guard, are eligible. Go online for information on signing up with a Symphony Scorecard Partner Agency.
A two-concert package also includes a performance of The Conductor’s Spellbook, the magical story of Tony Stradivarius, who takes a field trip to a symphony and finds a powerful book of spells that he’s able to use to control the orchestra. The narrated concert is at 3 p.m. on Saturday, March 2, 2018 in DeVos Performance Hall. Tickets for the two-concert package are $27 adults, $10 children.
A three-concert package adds a performance of the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops, featuring the Grand Rapids Symphony, Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus and Youth Chorus joined by vocalist Justin Hopkins and Embellish handbell ensemble. The show eligible for the package is at 3 p.m. Saturday, December 8. Tickets for the three-concert package are $60 adults, $15 children.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, composer of symphonies, operas and concertos, was one of the most gifted musicians in the history of Western classical music. In the 35 years of his life, Mozart gave the world over 600 masterworks. Mozart’s music is not beloved just for its sheer quantity, but also for its unparalleled quality.
Music Director Marcelo Lehninger will lead the Grand Rapids Symphony in a performance of one of Mozart’s masterpieces, the Great Mass in C minor, along with Franz Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony No. 8, and Charles Ives’ The Unanswered Question, at 8pm Friday and Saturday, Nov. 16 and 17 in DeVos Performance Hall.
Joining the Symphony for the Richard and Helen DeVos Classicalseries concert is the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus, directed by Pearl Shangkuan, plus soprano Martha Guth, mezzo-soprano Susan Platts, tenor Jonathan Matthew Myers, and bass-baritone Dashon Burton as guest soloists. Guest Artist sponsor is the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
Pope Francis, head of the worldwide Roman Catholic Church, in 2013 in the first major, wide-ranging interview of his papacy, declares his admiration for the music of Mozart, especially his Great Mass in C minor.
“Among musicians, I love Mozart, of course,” he said. “The Et incarnates est from his Mass in C minor is matchless; it lifts you to God!”
In his great modern-day biography of Mozart, Maynard Solomon says that “occasionally . . . Mozart composed a work in a spirit of inquiry, as an affirmation of his beliefs, or as a gift of love or friendship. The several accounts of its origin indicate that the Mass in C Minor arose from a fusion of all three of these motivations.”
Rather than for any financial incentive, Mozart began composing his Mass in C minor in his early 20s for a reason that was rather unusual for the composer — to fulfill a vow he had made to his wife, Constanze.
Albert Einstein once said that Mozart’s music “is of such purity and beauty that one feels he merely found it — that it has always existed as part of the inner beauty of the universe waiting to be revealed.”
Mozart’s Great Mass, however, is only partially revealed.
When the time came to premiere it, the work was incomplete. Mozart had to use movements from his earlier compositions to fill the missing pieces. Much to the frustration of musicians, audiences and scholars, Mozart never completed the Mass.
Despite its absent parts, the Mass in C minor contains some of Mozart’s most astounding work. The soprano aria ‘Et incarnates est’ is especially difficult and was written specifically for the voice of Mozart’s wife, Constanze, who performed the aria at the Mass’s premiere.
Joining the Grand Rapids Symphony to sing this famous aria is soprano Martha Guth. Guth has performed distinctive roles in productions across the globe such as Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro and Don Giovanni at Opera Lyra Ottawa, and The Magic Flute and Il Seraglio in Göggingen, Germany.
Also joining the Grand Rapids Symphony are the exceptional voices of Susan Platts, John Matthew Myers and Dashon Burton, sponsored by Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
Both Platts and Myers have performed with the Grand Rapids Symphony previously in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in May 2018. Susan Platts also appeared with the Symphony in April 2012 for Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 “Symphony of a Thousand”.
The Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus, an ensemble of some 140 singers led by director Pearl Shangkuan and sponsored by Mary Tuuk, will help bring to life this classical masterpiece. Organized in 1962 with the guidance and support of Mary Ann Keeler, the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus attracts singers, ages 18 to 80, from all walks of life across West Michigan.
Great Mass in C minor
Last year, the chorus-in-residence traveled with the orchestra to New York City in April to sing Heitor Villa-Lobos’ Chôros No. 10, It Tears Your Heart in Carnegie Hall.
The chorus will join the Grand Rapids Symphony again in December for the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops.
Preceding the Great Mass in the program are two pieces that complete the “unfinished” theme: Ives’ The Unanswered Question and Schubert’s Symphony No. 8.
Franz Schubert, like Mozart, wrote a lot of music in his lifetime. By the time he was 18, Schubert had composed two symphonies, two masses, five operas, and numerous piano and chamber pieces.
It comes as no surprise that locked away in a chest was two movements of what was meant to be a complete four-movement symphony. Now known as Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony, the work is one of his most famous compositions.
Ives wrote The Unanswered Question while in his 20s. Though the work itself is complete, Ives used his music to contemplate the mysteries of life, the questions that cannot be answered.
Though Mozart and Schubert never completed their masterpieces, and Ives’ questions will remain unanswered, the elegance and beauty of their music will continue to captivate audiences for ages to come.
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7pm in the DeVos Place Recital Hall
Tickets for the Richard and Helen DeVos Classicalseries start at $18 and are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9am-5pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across the street from Calder Plaza). Call (616) 454-9451 x 4 to order by phone. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum).
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10am-6pm or on the day of the concert beginning two hours before the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Special Offers
Full-time students of any age can purchase tickets for $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Calvin College. Discounts are available to members of MySymphony360, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s organization for young professionals ages 21-35.
Students age 7-18 also are able to attend for free when accompanied by an adult. Free for Kids tickets must be purchased in advance at the GRS Ticket office. Up to two free tickets are available with the purchase of a regular-price adult ticket. Go online for more details.
Symphony Scorecard provides up to four free tickets for members of the community receiving financial assistance from the State of Michigan and for members of the U.S. Armed Forces, whether on active or reserve duty or serving in the National Guard. Go online for information to sign up with a Symphony Scorecard Partner Agency.
They called him the “Chairman of the Board of Music.”
Frank Sinatra was one of the most popular entertainers of the 20th century as well as one of the best-selling recording artists of all time.
Twenty years before fans screamed themselves hoarse at the sight of The Beatles, bobbysoxers worked themselves into a frenzy at the sight of a skinny, 20-something kid who sang with Tommy Dorsey’s Big Band.
Sinatra, though he didn’t sing rock music, was the music’s first rock star.
Grand Rapids Pops welcomes singer and pianist Tony DeSare back to Grand Rapids for a salute to the music of Frank Sinatra titled Sinatra and Beyond.
DeSare, who starred in the Off-Broadway show, Our Sinatra, will perform songs made famous by “The Sultan of Swoon.” Enjoy such “ring-a-ding-ding” tunes as Come Fly With Me, I’ve Got the World on a String, My Way and many more.
Associate Conductor John Varineau leads the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Fox Motors Pops series concerts at 8pm Friday and Saturday, Nov. 9-10 and at 3pm Sunday, Nov. 11 in DeVos Performance Hall. Guest Artist Sponsor: Holland Home.
Described in the New York Times in 2012 as “two parts young Sinatra to one part Billy Joel,” DeSare channels the best of the Great American Songbook.’
Generally when someone mentions the music of Ol’ Blue Eyes, they think of an older Sinatra, sporting a tuxedo, singing such songs as “New York, New York.” But DeSare, age 42, prefers Sinatra’s music from the 1950s, when he recorded such albums as “In the Wee Small Hours” and “Songs for Only the Lonely” for Capitol Records.
“Frank’s voice was dead-on perfect, and he was such a great interpreter,” DeSare said. “Plus, he was working with those classic Nelson Riddle arrangements.”
Named a Rising Star Male Vocalist by Downbeat magazine in 2009, DeSare has appeared in venues ranging from Carnegie Hall to jazz clubs. He’s headlined in Las Vegas with comedian Don Rickles, and he’s appeared with major symphony orchestras.
DeSare’s first appearance with the Grand Rapids Symphony was for its Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops in 2012. Earlier that year, he was in West Michigan to perform Our Sinatra at Mason Street Warehouse in Saugatuck.
Frank Sinatra by Gottlieb, c 1947
Tony DeSare’s first instrument, which he took up at age 8, was violin. Two years later, he began playing on a little Casio keyboard from Radio Shack. That’s what stuck.
“I’m not sure exactly what it is,” he told the South Bend Tribune in August. “I know one of the big things is that it’s the only instrument that lets you be your own orchestra.”
At age 11, he became obsessed with learning George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. Mining his parents’ record collection, he soon developed a fondness for such classic pop singers as Sinatra and Nat King Cole.
Music remained a hobby, and he was pre-law at Ithaca College until he attended a Billy Joel concert, and the singer/songwriter shared some advice from the stage for the audience of 20,000.
“What Billy said is that we did not have to become recording stars or follow in his footsteps,” DeSare recalled in an interview with the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal in September 2017. “He basically said, ‘If you feel you can pay your bills by playing music, that alone is reason enough to follow your dream,’”
“I just sat back, thinking to myself, ‘Wow, when you put it that way,’” he added. “I was much too far along for me to switch and begin pursuing a music degree,” he said. “But I dropped my law courses the next Monday and became a business major.”
Tickets
Single tickets for the Fox Motors Pops series start at $18 and are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9am-5pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum).
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Special Offers
Full-time students of any age can purchase tickets for $5 at the door on the day of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Calvin College. Discounts also are available to members of MySymphony360, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s organization for young professionals ages 21-35.
Students age 7-18 also are able to attend for free when accompanied by an adult. Free for Kids tickets must be purchased in advance at the GRS Ticket office. Up to two free tickets are available with the purchase of a regular-price adult ticket. Go online for more details.
Symphony Scorecard provides up to four free tickets for members of the community receiving financial assistance from the State of Michigan and for members of the U.S. Armed Forces, whether on active or reserve duty or serving in the National Guard. Go online for information to sign up with a Symphony Scorecard Partner Agency.
The music of Leonard Bernstein, who composed the music for West Side Story, has graced concert halls and theaters, radios and televisions in homes all across America. This year, the centennial of his birth, the world remembers the life and legacy of the great American composer, conductor, pianist, and educator.
The Grand Rapids Symphony joins in the worldwide celebration of Leonard Bernstein’s centennial with a concert featuring his Overture to Candide, his Symphony No. 2 “Age of Anxiety,” and selections from his Broadway hit, West Side Story among others.
Guest conductor Carl St. Clair will lead the Grand Rapids Symphony in Bernstein’s 100th on Friday, November 2 and Saturday, November 3 at 8 p.m. at DeVos Performance Hall. The performance in the Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series concert will feature pianist Benjamin Pasternack in “Age of Anxiety” and soprano Celena Shafer in selections from West Side Story and other vocal works. Guest artist sponsor is the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
Leonard Bernstein first came to the world’s attention with his impromptu conducting debut with the New York Philharmonic in 1943. Bruno Walter was meant to lead the orchestra in a radio-broadcasted performance, but came down with the flu. The 25-year-old assistant conductor was called upon to conduct in his stead.
Bernstein remembers that fateful day in a 1991 interview with his brother, Burton Bernstein: “When it came to the time – that very day – all I can remember is standing there in the wings shaking and being so scared. There was no rehearsal. I had just come from seeing Bruno Walter, who very sweetly and very quickly – wrapped up in blankets because he had the flu – went over the score of Don Quixote with me.”
With few hours to prepare and no rehearsal, Leonard Bernstein stepped up to the podium in Carnegie Hall to conduct a successful performance, broadcast to the entire nation, launching him into stardom.
Bernstein wrote several orchestral, choral, chamber, and operatic works over the course of his lifetime, but his music also ventured into the realms of theater, ballet, and musicals. The line between the classical and theatrical in Bernstein’s music was often blurred. He once said, “If the charge of ‘theatricality’ in a symphonic work is a valid one, I am willing to plead guilty. I have a deep suspicion that every work I write, for whatever medium, is really theater music in some way.”
Bernstein’s enthusiasm for music was contagious, and it spread across the country with his starring role in the memorable CBS television program, Young People’s Concerts, with the New York Philharmonic.
Carl St. Clair, music director of the Pacific Symphony and guest conductor for the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Bernstein’s 100th, was one of many who benefitted from Bernstein’s mentorship.
Leonard Bernstein in 1973
St. Clair first saw Bernstein on his television set at his childhood home in Texas. He was waiting for friends to pick him up to go to a country and western dance when Bernstein appeared on the TV, leading the Boston Symphony Orchestra in Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5. St. Clair was mesmerized both by the music and Bernstein. Needless to say, he missed the dance.
Bernstein and St. Clair didn’t cross paths until the summer of 1985 while Clair was studying under Gustav Meier at Tanglewood, the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra in western Massachusetts.
“I was very nervous,” St. Clair recalled. “He comes into the room, and there’s a big double door and we’re all standing in total respect. He greeted Gustav, of course they had known one another… But almost immediately he said, in this kind of Texas accent, or, in a Bostonian/Texas accent, ‘Where’s that cowboy from Texas? I’ve never met a cowboy from Texas who’s also a conductor.’”
During rehearsals for a concert at Tanglewood in 1990, complications with his health left Bernstein unable to conduct his new version of his Arias and Barcarolles, which was to be premiered the next day. The suggestion was made that St. Clair could conduct that piece, allowing Bernstein enough energy to lead the rest of the program.
“I’ll never forget,” St. Clair says. “He looked over at me, and even as sick as he was and as disappointed as he was, it just shows how quick he was — he looked over at me and in a mock Texas accent said, ‘Cowboy, you got it in ya? You got it in ya?”
St. Clair agreed to conduct Bernstein’s piece in what was Bernstein’s last concert appearance. He retired from conducting and passed away nearly two months later at the age of 72.
Bernstein no longer is with us, but his music lives on in performances such as the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Bernstein’s 100th on Nov. 2-3.
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9 am – 5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across the street from Calder Plaza). Call (616) 454-9451 x 4 to order by phone. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 am – 6 pm or on the day of the concert beginning two hours before the performance.
Full-time students of any age can purchase tickets for $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Calvin College. Discounts are available to members of MySymphony360, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s organization for young professionals ages 21-35.
J.S. Bach’s “Air on the G String”is an all-time audience favorite melody. It’s a sure bet you’ve heard it before.
It’s part of a larger work, Bach’s Orchestra Suite No. 3, which theGrand Rapids Symphonyperforms onFriday, Oct. 12, in St. Cecilia Music Center’s Royce Auditorium.
Principal Oboist Ellen Sherman is soloist onThe Baroque Concert: Bach and Beyond, which includes music from the Baroque plus a contemporary piece by Brazilian’s most famous composer, Heitor Villa-Lobos, that’s inspired by the music of Bach. It’s the first of four concerts in theGrand Rapids Symphony’s Great Erasseries.
Marcelo Lehningerleads the Grand Rapids Symphony at 8pm Oct. 12 in Grand Rapids plus a repeat of the entire concert at 8pm Saturday, Oct. 13 in Holland at the Jack Miller Center for Musical Arts at Hope College.
The Grand Rapids Symphony also plays a shorter version of the concert at 10am Oct. 12 at St. Cecilia for theCoffee Classicsseries. The one-hour concerts are held without intermission, and doors open at 9am for complementary coffee and donuts.
"Life is like riding a bicycle. In order to keep your balance, you must keep moving."- Albert Einstein
Love to Ride His Bicycle
Kentwood resident and avid bicyclist Ken Smith, 70, whose father was a fireman and son is a fireman, is riding from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean — Seaside, Oregon, to Boston, Massachusetts — in hopes of raising $30,000 to provide for possible care of and therapy for his grandson Jakob. He returned home last week, riding more 2,500 miles. He is set to continue the journey soon. Ken Smith has set up a Facebook page (facebook.com/rideforjake/) and a GoFundMe page (gofundme.com/ride-pacific-to-atlantic-for-jakob) to detail his journey and raise the funds.
Food for Thought
Hank Meijer
Meijer Chairman Hank Meijer, along with Richard Norton Smith, will be the featured lecturer this Friday for the Grand Valley State University’s Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies. The topic is “Mackinac Conference at 75,” which will be presented at 7 p.m. at L.V. Eberhard Center, Room 215, 301 W. Fulton St. The series, which continues through Dec. 5, will feature eight speakers who will encourage meaningful discussions about leadership and the search for common ground at a deep level, without the heated political rhetoric of the day.
And While We’re Talking Food
You might want to put a big food truck doodle on Sept. 15 as that is when Kentwood will be hosting its third annual End of Summer Food Truck Festival. Nearly 30 trucks are expected to participate at this year’s event. We know it will be the end-of-summer celebration you won’t want to miss because Managing Editor Joanne Bailey-Boorsma is still talking about last year’s event and all the food choices. Oh, and for the beer lovers, there will be a beer tent running from noon to 10 p.m. featuring a selection of craft beers.
Karen Gomyo, who had taken up Suzuki violin only a few months earlier, was just 5 ½ years old when she decided she would make music her life’s work. That was after her mother took her to a performance by the famous violinist Midori Goto.
“After seeing Midori, I just wanted to do what she was doing,” Gomyo told the Winnipeg Free Press in November 2012.
Two-and-a-half years ago, Gomyo was scheduled to make her Grand Rapids Symphony debut but had to cancel at the last minute. In September, the Canadian violinist will be on stage to open the Grand Rapids Symphony’s 89th season with Samuel Barber’s Violin Concerto.
Music Director Marcelo Lehninger will be on the podium for Beethoven’s 7th at 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday Sept. 14-15, 2018, in DeVos Performance Hall. Appointed Music Director in July 2016, Lehninger enters his third season at the helm of the Grand Rapids Symphony.
The opening concerts of the 2018-19 Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series opens with Leonard Bernstein’s Divertimento and conclude with Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7. The Concert Sponsor is Spectrum Health. Guest Artist Sponsor is the by Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
“It’s such a wonderful way to start a season,” said Lehninger. “Not only with Beethoven, but with that Beethoven Symphony.”
In the climactic scene of the 2010 film The King’s Speech, which won the Oscar for Best Picture, King George VI overcomes the stammer he’s had since childhood to announce on radio that The United Kingdom was at war with Nazi Germany.
As King George VI, portrayed by actor Colin Firth, addresses the nation on BBC radio, the gravitas of the moment in the film is supplied by the solemn and stirring allegretto from Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7.
Beethoven’s mature Symphony No. 7 in A Major is known today for the rhythmic vitality of all of its movements. All four are in a faster tempo than was normal for the time, giving the symphony a fiery energy seldom heard in the concert hall.
Leonard Bernstein’s Divertimento, a cheeky work full of nods to other composers, inside jokes and extraverted humor was commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra to celebrate its 100th anniversary in 1980.
Samuel Barber, best known for his Adagio for Strings, composed his Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 14, just before his 30th birthday. The neo-romantic work looks nostalgically to the past in its first two movements while the finale, which is more irregular and aggressive, looks to the future.
Gomyo (pronounced “GAHM-yo) has performed with top American orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra and Cleveland Orchestra in the United States as well as with the Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Danish National Symphony, and Tokyo Symphony Orchestra.
Born in Tokyo to a French-Canadian father and a Japanese mother, Gomyo moved to Montreal at age 2 where she began studying Suzuki violin. At age 11, Gomyo moved to New York City to study at The Juilliard School with violinist Dorothy DeLay, the legendary pedagogue whose students include Itzhak Perlman and Sarah Chang as well as violinists such as Midori and Anne Akiko Meyers, all of whom previously have graced the Grand Rapids Symphony’s stage.
At 15, she became the youngest violinist ever accepted on the management roster of Young Concert Artists. In 2008 at age 26, she was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant.
Gomyo, who served as violinist, host and narrator for a documentary about Antonio Stradivarius titled The Mysteries of the Supreme Violin, performs on a 1703 Stradivarius violin that was bought for her exclusive use by a private sponsor. Unlike many Stradivari, the instrument dubbed “Aurora, ex-Foulis” never was owned previously by a renowned violinist. Through the entire 20th century, it only had three owners, including Gomyo, which also is rare for an instrument of this caliber.
Gomyo said it took her years to get acquainted with the instrument because an instrument such as a Stradivarius has its own character.
“It comes with a strong personality and you can’t impose yourself on it. You have to let it speak,” Gomyo told Utah based classical music writer Edward Reichel in October 2015. “I’ve had my Stradivarius for 10 years, but it’s only been in the last few years that I can say that I have bonded with it.”
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall.
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony box office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm, at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
There’s nothing better than being outside and hearing music in the distance. As you get closer, the music gets louder, and soon you find yourself at one of the many outdoor concerts right here in West Michigan. Performances in West Michigan range from local acts in the park to national headliners performing on some of the area’s biggest stages. No matter your taste, there’s an outdoor music event for you to check out this summer and into the fall.
Music Series Throughout the Summer
Music Series in Southern West Michigan
With a stacked music schedule throughout the summer, Vineyard 2121 in Benton Harbor has everything you need to enjoy your summer evenings. Couple this with their food and drink specials and you have the epitome of relaxation. For a full schedule of music, visit Vineyard 2121’s website.
The Dockside Bar at the Inn at Harbor Shores in St. Joseph is hosting live music on their Dockside Bar all summer long. Running through Labor Day, these three-hour concerts will be held every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
As part of their First Thursdays Market, Virtue Cider in Fennville features live local music the first Thursday of each month from now through October. In addition to these monthly performances, they’ll also have music throughout the summer. Visit Virtue Cider’s website for a full schedule of events.
The City of Hastings has partnered with the local arts council to create the free, 12-week Hastings Live! Summer Concert Series, starting Wednesday, June 6th. These Wednesday and Friday evening concerts feature the very best local and regional musical talent
Dablon Vineyards in Baroda hosts music throughout the year. While you’re sipping their world-class wine, enjoy the music that fills the air during your visit. For a schedule of performances, visit Dablon Vineyard’s website.
The Michigan Maritime Museum in South Haven is hosting their summer concert series.
Each month this summer, the Michigan Maritime Museum in South Haven is hosting their summer concert series. These performances take place on the Michigan Maritime Museum Campus, with a beautiful Lake Michigan backdrop. For more information, including dates and who’s performing, visit the Michigan Maritime Museum’s website.
Make the most of summer at Round Barn Winery in Baroda and their concert series, Jammin’ in the Vineyard! Round Barn’s annual jamfest features 26 weekends of the best live regional music, paired with world-class wines, hand-crafted spirits, and fresh craft beers. For a full lineup, visit Round Barn’s website.
Summer music atBell’s Brewery’s Beer Garden starts in June and continues until September. Enjoy a Bell’s beer surrounded by sculptures, beautiful trees, flowers, and hops in a lush garden in the heart of downtown Kalamazoo. To see who’s performing this summer, visit Bell’s website.
Arcadia Brewing Company is hosting their Summer Music Series each month, with local music, tasty food, and frothy beers aplenty!
St. Joseph has two weekly concert series, both of which are free. Their Wednesday Brown Bag Concerts run through August 22nd while the Friday Night Concerts go through August 31st. For a full schedule, including who’s performing, visit St. Joseph Today’s website.
Downtown Coldwater is once again hosting their Entertainment Under the Star series of free outdoor concerts every Tuesday from June 19th to July 31st. Bring a lawn chair and enjoy the sounds of folk, bluegrass, classic country, and rock.
Music Series in Central West Michigan
Located in Montague, the Trailway Campground is the perfect place to stay if you want to enjoy the free concerts held at the nearby Montague Bandshell each Tuesday this summer. Starting on June 19th, these live performances bring a wide range of music to the White Lake area.
Boatwerks Waterfront Restaurant in Holland hosts live music every evening this summer! Enjoy the performance while you eat some of the area’s finest food on their spacious deck overlooking Lake Macatawa. To see who will be performing, visit Boatwerks’ website.
LowellArts in Lowell has concerts that promote the best of the region’s talented musicians, featuring music groups exclusively from Michigan. The concerts range from blues and world music to rock, swing, big band, and jazz. Shows are every Thursday evening starting on June 14th and running through August 23rd.
The Fox Barn Market & Winery in Shelby has live outdoor music now through Labor Day Weekend. The series is called “Fridays @ Fox’s” and brings together regional talent in a farm setting. Pair the music with a wine or their specialty food to enhance your summer evenings.
Grand Rapids Symphony heads to Cannonsburg Ski Area for the Picnic Pops.
The Grand Haven Musical Fountain is a synchronized water and light show accompanied by music of all varieties. Each 25-minute show features a variety of well-known music and plays daily at dusk through Labor Day, as well as Fridays and Saturdays in September.
Enjoy relaxing summer evenings with the Grand Rapids Pops performances by the Grand Rapids Symphony. This unique outdoor concert experience at Cannonsburg Ski Area is a sure way to create lasting memories with friends and family. For a schedule these events, visit the Grand Rapids Pops’ website.
The annual Fifth Third Bank Summer Concerts at Frederik Meijer Gardens continue to bring the finest national and international musicians to Grand Rapids, thrilling music lovers across all genres and all generations. For tickets and information on their lineup, visit Frederik Meijer Gardens’ website.
The Mecosta area has a variety of live music during the summer months. Your choices include the Bandshell Concert Series on Wednesdays, Pocket Park Music Series on Friday afternoons, and Music on the River on Fridays. For more information on all the music in Mecosta County, visit the Mecosta County CVB’s website.
Mt. Pleasant’s wide variety of live entertainment will have you out and about all summer long. The local concert series is celebrating 10 years, bringing family fun to downtown Mt. Pleasant. Nearby Soaring Eagle Casino is also hosting outdoor shows, including Chris Young, Little Big Town, Nickelback, and more. For a full calendar of outdoor music, visit Mt. Pleasant’s website.
Music Series in Northern West Michigan
Indigo Bluffs in Empire is surrounded by outdoor music that you can enjoy this summer. One of the fan-favorites is Friday Night LIVE in Traverse City, hosted each Friday in August. The streets are closed for a fun-filled block party featuring live music.
The Village at Bay Harbor in Bay Harbor hosts live music every Thursday this summer, through August 30th. They’re also hosting a Fourth of July event on Tuesday, July 3rd, with a performance by the Petoskey Steel Drum Band. For a full schedule of events, including who’s performing this summer, visit Bay Harbor’s website.
Visit Crystal Mountain in Thompsonville to ride the Crystal Clipper chairlift and enjoy panoramic views of three counties and top-of-the-mountain attractions, including live musical entertainment, a family sandbox, snack bar, cash bar, and more. Rides are offered on select summer evenings on Wednesdays and Saturdays.
TheMackinac State Historic Parks is hosting Music in the Park on Mackinac Island every Thursday evening starting on June 21st and running through August 16th. Music in the Park takes place in Marquette Park in the heart of Mackinac Island and is free to the public.
TheTraverse Tall Ship Company in Traverse City will be featuring the folk band Song of the Lakes on their evening sails every Wednesday in July and August. The band will be playing lively jigs, chanteys, and ballads of sailing and life on the sea!
Every Thursday from June 28th to August 30th, Washington Park in Cheboygan will be filled with a wide variety of music. Each week is something different, with genres ranging from rock and blues to country and folk. This is a great summertime family tradition in northern Michigan.
Music in the Park is hosted every Wednesday at the Soo Locks Park in Sault Ste. Marie. Each week features a new performer, and best of all, these outdoor performances are completely free!
Each summer, the Music in Mackinaw Concert Series offers live entertainment in the Mackinaw area. With performances taking place at the Roth Performance Shell in Conklin Heritage Park throughout the summer, you won’t have trouble finding outdoor music to enjoy. For a schedule of all events, including outdoor music, visit their website.
Based out of Traverse City, MyNorth is dedicated to sharing stories and photos about vacations, restaurants, wineries, the outdoors and more from Traverse City to Sleeping Bear Dunes and up to Mackinac Island. They have a calendar of events, featuring music, art, and more, on their website.
Ionia Free Fair is July 12-21.
Festivals & Events
Festivals & Events in July
Located near Hotel Walloon in Walloon Lake, Village Green Park is hosting live music as part of their Independence Day celebration. Stop by on Wednesday, July 4th to enjoy all the live entertainment, before heading back to the hotel for a good night’s rest.
With nine days of family-fun entertainment, theIonia Free Fair returns to the Ionia Fairgrounds from July 12th to 21st. Enjoy the music, rodeo, rides, monster trucks, camping, and more at this fun annual event.
Idlewild Festival, held in Idlewild on July 14th and 15th, commemorates and celebrates the history of well known African-American entertainers and professionals who owned property and performed at the Historic Resort prior to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Known as the “Black Eden,” this location was one of the few resorts in the United States where African Americans could vacation and purchase property.
Located in Suttons Bay, the Inland Seas Education Association is hosting their two-hour music sail, Music with a Purpose, on Thursday, July 19th. Once you leave the dock, participants will have the opportunity to help raise the sails. Then, Dan Hall will entertain guests with lively sea chanties and stories.
Battle Creek’s Leilapalooza is Saturday, July 28th. This all-day music festival features over 60 acts on multiple stages. Rounding out the summer is the Michigan Metal Fest on Saturday, August 11th at the Leila Arboretum. Listen to metal music as 40 acts perform on four stages.
Kalamazoo Ribfest is Aug. 2-4.
Festivals & Events in August
AtKalamazoo Ribfest, the ribs may be the star of the show, but national entertainment and local bands will provide plenty of entertainment as you feast. Kalamazoo’s largest annual downtown festival brings plenty of ribs and even more live entertainment when it takes over Arcadia Creek Festival Place from August 2nd to 4th.
Come to Heritage Landing in Muskegon from August 8th to 11th for the biggest Christian music festival in Michigan:Unity Christian Music Festival! There’ll be three stages featuring more than 45 acts. Unity Christian Music Festival has quickly become one of the country’s premier events for live Christian music.
GRandJazzFest in Grand Rapids is West Michigan’s only free, weekend-long jazz festival! This year’s festival is August 18th and 19th, at Rosa Parks Circle, a central location in the heart of downtown. The festival brings to the stage notable jazz performers as well as up-and-coming artists for diverse audiences.
Originally started in Columbus, Ohio,Breakaway Music Festival expanded to Grand Rapids last year for a new music experience, with this year’s festival on August 24th and 25th. Featuring a well-curated musical lineup of national and local artists, local vendors and food trucks, and more, Breakaway is your release from the everyday life.
Muskegon’s Pere Marquette Beach will ignite on Saturday, August 28th, for the 4th AnnualBurning Foot Beer Festival. Serving as Michigan’s only barefoot beer festival on the sand, festival goers can enjoy some of the finest craft beer found in the Great Lakes region, revel in local art and food, groove to local and national music acts, and take in the beautiful shoreline of Lake Michigan.
The Allegan County Fair Sept. 7-15.
Festivals & Events in September
TheAllegan County Fair is home to many live entertainment events throughout its September 7th to 15th runtime, including musical and stage acts! The event includes performances by 5 Seconds of Summer, Pentatonix, Travis Tritt, the Charlie Daniels Band, and the Marshall Tucker Band. Tickets are available now for the fair’s many entertainment events.
Held from September 13th to 16th in Muskegon, theMichigan Irish Festival features live Irish entertainment daily under five large covered stages, from traditional Irish and folk music and contemporary Celtic rock to storytelling and Irish dance. The Pub will be serving traditional Irish beverages and food, adding to the cultural experience.
PRIME Music Festival returns to Lansing on September 14th and 15th. The multi-genre festival brings local and national performers together for a fantastic weekend of live music. Keep an eye out for their much-anticipated lineup coming soon!
The Grand Rapids Symphony’s three maestros, Associate Conductor John Varineau, Music Director Marcelo Lehninger, and Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt, kick off the D&W Fresh Market Picnic Pops July 12 and 13.
In the summertime, when the weather is hot, nothing beats good food, good friends and good music in the great outdoors.
The sweet, symphonic sounds of summer in West Michigan return to Cannonsburg Ski Area with theGrand Rapids Pops’ D&W Fresh Market Picnic Pops in July and August.
The 24th annual summer of picnicking at the pops will be back with orchestral blockbusters and fireworks, with the biggest hits of 1980s featuring Starship’s Mickey Thomas, and with a musical mashup of Beethoven and Coldplay.
Special events include high-voltage merengue and mambo from Tito Puente Jr., and the quirky songs of the one-and-only Ben Folds, back in Grand Rapids by popular demand.
The Grand Rapids Symphony opens the D&W Fresh Market Picnic Pops on July 12-13 with Classical Fireworks and The 3 Maestros featuring not one, not two, but three conductors. Music Director Marcelo Lehninger, Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt, and Associate Conductor John Varineau pass the baton and share podium for an evening of patriotic melodies and much more.
“It’s a chance to make the event something that’s ‘All in the Family’ with an Americana theme,”Bernhardt said. “I’m not sure that it’s legal to have three conductors on one program, but we’re going for it!”
The Grand Rapids Pops’ three-concert series, held on Thursdays and Fridays in July, opens with Classical Fireworks and The 3 Maestros at 8 p.m., 30 minutes later than then rest of the season’s concerts to allowfor the pyrotechnic display following Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture at the end of the show.
The D&W Fresh Market Picnic Pops remembers the days of George Michael and Wham, R.E.M. and INXS with 80s Rewind! on July 19-20 at 7:30 p.m.
Ben Folds performs Aug. 3.
Hosted by Mickey Thomas, lead singer of Starship, the show includes such classic 1980s hits as theScorpions’ Rock You Like A Hurricane, Billy Joel’s Uptown Girl, and U2’s Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For.
The Grand Rapids Pops pits classical music and pop/rock against each other in a mashup titled Beethoven vs. Coldplay on July 26-27 at 7:30 p.m.
Guest conductor Steve Hackman leads the Grand Rapids Symphony plus special guest singers inhighlights from Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony No. 3 juxtaposed against songs such as Paradise, 42and Every Teardrop is a Waterfall by the British rock band.
Capping off the D&W Fresh Market Picnic Pops are two one-night only special events in August, one with the sultry salsa rhythms of Tito Puente Jr. on Thursday, August 2, and the other with the smart- alecky songs and whiz-kid piano playing of Ben Folds on Friday, August 3.
Tito Puente Jr. performs Aug. 2.
Puente Jr. carries on the musical tradition of his father, the seven-time Grammy Award winning percussionist and band leader Tito Puente Sr.
Folds, who appeared with the Grand Rapids Symphony in DeVos Hall in October 2014, led the Ben Folds Five to a series of platinum recordings and an appearance on “Saturday Night Live” in 1998. He’ssince served as a judge on NBC’s “The Sing-Off” and currently is artistic adviser to the National Symphony Orchestra at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington D.C.
About Cannonsburg Ski Area
Gates at Cannonsburg Ski Area open at 5:45 p.m. each night for picnicking and pre-concert entertainment, including free, kid-friendly activities such as face painting, crafts, and a musicalinstrument petting zoo. Kids’ Activity Area sponsor is Dave & Linda Mehney.
Pack your own picnic baskets and coolers or purchase food from the grill at the Cannonsburg concession stand. Alcoholic beverages are permitted on the grounds, and parking is free for concertgoers. VIP Parking upgrades will be available for a small fee beginning in June.
Concert Tickets
Lawn tickets to Classical Fireworks, 80s Rewind!, Beethoven v. Coldplay, or Tito Puente Jr., are $20 for adults ($25 day of show) or $5 for ages 2-18 ($10 day of show). MySymphony360 members can attend for $15 ($20 day of show). Active duty, reserve and National Guard members of the U.S. Militarymay purchase up to two tickets for $15 each ($20 day of show). Children younger than age 2 are admitted for free.
Members of the community receiving financial assistance from the State of Michigan or U.S. Military households can receive up to four free tickets through the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Symphony Scorecard.
Other individual tickets are $30 for reserved chairs ($35 the day of the show), $51 for single table seats ($56 the day of the show), and $408 for a full table of eight ($448 day of show).
Lawn tickets to Ben Folds are $40 for adults ($45 day of show) or $5 for ages 2-18 ($10 day of show).MySymphony360 members can attend for $25 ($30 day of show). Active duty and reserve members of the U.S. Military may buy up to two tickets for $25 each ($30 day of show). Children younger than age 2 are admitted for free.
Other individual tickets are $50 for reserved chairs ($55 the day of the show), $60 for single table seats ($65 the day of the show), and $480 for a full table of eight ($520 day of show).
Tickets for the 3-Concert Series, Flexpass, and individual table and chair tickets can be purchased through the GRS box office by calling (616) 454-9451 ext. 4 weekdays or (616) 885-1241 evenings; or in person at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100; or online at GRSymphony.org.
Lawn seats only also may be purchased through Ticketmaster at (800) 982-2787, or at Ticketmaster outlets at select D&W Fresh Markets, Family Fare Stores and Walmart. Tickets purchased at these locations will include a Ticketmaster service fee.
The Wege Foundation has awarded the Grand Rapids Symphony a four-year grant worth more than $1 million to enhance initiatives in diversity, equity and inclusion to engage a broader audience and share live orchestral music with everyone in its community.
With help from the Wege Foundation, the Grand Rapids Symphony is creating a 21st century orchestra to serve a 21st century audience that’s made up, not just of classical music lovers, but of the entirecommunity.
Money will add new positions, create new concerts and events, and develop new educational opportunities alongside the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Gateway to Music, a matrix of 17 education and access programs that already reach 86,000 children, students and adults across 13 counties in West Michigan.
Music is supposed to be for everyone, and that includes music presented by symphony orchestras, according to Grand Rapids Symphony Music Director Marcelo Lehninger.
“Sometime people feel they don’t belong,” Lehninger said. “But I have a passion and a mission to reach the hearts and souls of everyone in this community. We’re trying to show them that, yes, they do belong.Hopefully, they’ll understand that it’s their orchestra, too.”
Marcelo Lehninger, GRS Music Director
The Wege Foundation’s total package of $1.1 million over four years will nurture the Grand Rapids Symphony by weaving diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives into all of the orchestra’s activities.
“A symphony orchestra in the 21st century has become a service organization,” Lehninger said. “We’rehere not only to entertain our audience but also to serve our community.
Thanks to the Wege Foundation, the Grand Rapids Symphony will expand opportunities for more people to engage with orchestral music.
“The Wege Foundation is pleased to support the Symphony in enhancing the diversity of itsprogramming, musicians and staff, as well as the inclusivity of its outreach,” said Wege Foundation President Mark Van Putten. “By transforming itself the Symphony can help transform West Michiganin enduring ways that reach beyond the performing arts.”
President Peter M. Perez called the Wege Foundation grant “truly transformational.”
“In the past, a symphony orchestra’s goal was to perform great works of classical music. Today, theGrand Rapids Symphony aspires, not just to play music for the community, but to make music together with its community,” Perez said. “Truly serving our entire community means we have to genuinely and faithfully be a reflection of everyone in the community.”
Grand Rapids Symphony’s Mosaic Scholar program
Past successes in collaborating with community partners include the Grand Rapids Symphony’sSymphony with Soul concert, launched in 2002, and Celebration of Soul dinner and awards ceremony, which has fostered connections between the orchestra and West Michigan’s African-American community for more than a dozen years.
Though the Grand Rapids Symphony touches the lives of 200,000 attendees per year, many more in West Michigan have never experienced great orchestral music performed live.
“The Grand Rapids Symphony is a community resource that provides a venue for all community members to enjoy the art of the symphony and to come together as a community to do so. This grant willprovide the resources to make it happen,” said Paul Doyle, founder and CEO of Inclusive Performance Strategies, which develops and implements progressive organizational transformation.
Three years ago, the Grand Rapids Symphony launched Symphony Scorecard to open its concert hall doors to a wider audience by providing free tickets to those with financial challenges or economic barriers. Since 2015, the program launched with funding from the Daniel and Pamella DeVos Foundation has supplied more than 8,000 free tickets to members of the community who receive financial assistance from the state or to the families of men and women serving in the U.S. Military on active, reserve or guard duty.
Grand Rapids Symphony Musical Instrument Petting Zoo
Opening doors and extending an invitation can be life changing, said Doyle, who grew up in Brooklyn and was introduced to classical music by his grandmother, who originally was from Trinidad. Doyle was in third grade when he attended his first concert in New York City’s Carnegie Hall, where the Grand Rapids Symphony recently performed. Doyle later played French horn through high school.
“Our community in Grand Rapids is growing. It’s exploding. But how do we make sure that everyone feels a part of it?” Doyle said. “We know the ‘why.’ This is working on the ‘how.’
Thanks to the Wege grant, the symphony’s next steps will be to take the orchestra out of the concert hall and into the neighborhood with a series of concerts and engagement events both large and small that foster authentic artistic and cultural expression by diverse communities within the larger community.
Community concerts begin in July with a free, outdoor concert in John Ball Park. Associate conductor John Varineau will lead a program of light classical music, featuring local special guests, at 7 p.m. on Saturday, July 21 in the park on the West Side of downtown Grand Rapids adjacent to John Ball Zoo. Future concerts will be held in familiar venues in other neighborhoods in the city.
Planning is underway to develop a series of neighborhood events that later will merge into a centralized major event, similar to Grand Rapids Symphony’s wildly successful LiveArts, which drew more than 7,000 people to the Van Andel Arena in 2015 for an evening of multicultural, multi-genre entertainment.
But the Wege grant also will transform the orchestra from within through new positions in the organization. Funds will establish:
A Community Engagement position on staff to develop, manage and coordinate all Grand RapidsSymphony activities to serve an audience that’s growing more diverse every day.
A Musician Fellow who will perform with the Grand Rapids Symphony. During the two-year fellowship, the musician will be mentored by GRS musicians and gain practical experience toward launching a career as a professional musician.
The Wege Grant also will fund the expansion of the Grand Rapids Symphony’s successful Mosaic Scholarship program, a mentoring program for African-American and Latino music students, created with funding by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Teens ages 13 to 18 are provided with musical instruments and private lessons with GRS musicians along with opportunities to perform and to attend concerts. A new component, Mosaic Music Majors, will collaborate with music students of color in local universities and colleges to mentor, advise and develop the skills and talents of musicians of color seeking to become professional musicians.
Over the next four years, the Wege grant will be a game changer for the Grand Rapids Symphony, according to Associate Conductor John Varineau, who just completed his 33rd season on staff with the Grand Rapids Symphony.
“It’s going to change the way we ‘do business’ and the way we approach all of our already outstandingartistic products. Without compromising our lofty artistic vision, and without sacrificing our dedication to the best in our symphonic heritage, I am confident that, with the help of the Wege Foundation, the GrandRapids Symphony is going to look and sound differently,” Varineau said. “In just a few short years, howand what we present will be even more representative of the entire Grand Rapids community so thateveryone will be able to truthfully call us ‘our Grand Rapids Symphony.’”
The challenge is to create and sustain intentional relationship building so that the wider community notonly participates in Grand Rapids Symphony’s activities, it also sees that it plays a role in supporting and providing for the orchestra.
“The key to this work is continuous commitment and effort. It’s about progressive improvement, not postponed perfection,” Doyle said. “I think we have the opportunity to create a best-practice model. For Grand Rapids to be on the front end of enhancing quality of life and community, I think is very cool.”
In the end, the goal is to have an orchestra in Grand Rapids that’s of the community, by the communityand for the community.
“The Grand Rapids Symphony is your symphony, and it’s my symphony,” Perez said. “And by workingtogether, we can make it our symphony.”
Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 is one of the greatest achievements, not only in classical music, but in all of Western culture.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, Leonard Bernstein on Christmas Day conducted an international orchestra in performances of Beethoven’s Ninth in East Berlin that was televised throughout the world.
Sopano Jessica Rivera
Beethoven’s last symphony and his only symphony to use voices began as a defiant statement of freedom hurled at the repressive monarchies of Europe. Today, “Ode to Joy,” from the finale of Beethoven’sNinth Symphony, is the official anthem of the European Union. It’s not hard to see why.
“We should all be friends and get along and respect each other and fight together for a common goal,”said Grand Rapids Symphony Music Director Marcelo Lehninger of Beethoven’s Ninth. “What an incredible piece of music.”
Grand Rapids Symphony ends its 2017-18 season with Beethoven’s Ninth at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, May 18-19, in DeVos Performance Hall.
Mezzo–soprano Susan Platts
Lehninger will lead soprano Jessica Rivera, mezzo-soprano Susan Platts, tenor John Matthew Myers and baritone Richard Zeller plus the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus in the 10th and final concerts of the 2017-18 Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series. Guest artist sponsor is the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund. Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus Sponsor is Mary Tuuk.
The piece is an emotional journey from darkness to light, from minor to major from chaos to order.
Tenor John Matthew Myers
“When I conduct Beethoven’s Ninth, I’m always immersed in these emotions,” Lehninger said. “Beethoven’s music does that like no other.”
The concerts also will include two contemporary pieces inspired by Beethoven. The concert opens with Variações Temporais, Beethoven Revisitado (Temporal Variations, Beethoven Revisited) by Brazilian composer Ronaldo Miranda, a witty, series of short, orchestral portraits, each inspired by another of Beethoven’s musical works. In 2014, Lehninger conducted the world premiere with the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra in Brazil.
Baritone Richard Zeller
Rounding out the program will be the world premiere of Testament by Grand Rapids composer Alexander L. Miller, who also is assistant principal oboist of the Grand Rapids Symphony.
Commissioned by the Grand Rapids Symphony, Testament, Beethoven’s 1802 “Heiligenstadt Testament” for Bass-Baritone, Chorus and Orchestra, takes its text from a letter that Beethoven wrote in 1802 to his brothers, expressing his anger and frustration at losing his hearing. Though he considers suicide, Beethoven declares he will live on for the sake of the music he has yet to write.
It’s also a letter that Beethoven never sent. It was discovered among his private papers following his death in 1827.
The concerts will be the first time Lehninger has conducted the Grand Rapids Symphony in one of Beethoven’s nine symphonies. It won’t be the last.
“One of my goals is to work in one or two Beethoven symphonies every season,” Lehninger said.
The story of the first performance of Beethoven’s “Choral” Symphony No. 9 in D minor is one of the legendary stories of music history. At the premiere in May 1824, Beethoven, with his back to the audience, stood near the conductor, giving tempos and following the score. When the performance ended, the alto soloist approached Beethoven and turned him around so that he could see the enthusiastic applause he no longer could hear.
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall.
The complete Beethoven’s Ninth program will be rebroadcast on Sunday, June 3, 2018, at 1 p.m. on Blue Lake Public Radio 88.9 FM or 90.3 FM.
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
Film composer John Williams starts every Star Wars movie with a bang. With one iconic opening chord, viewers are instantly swept into a cinematic universe that’s held together not by one director or writer, but by one composer.
Williams, whose prodigious output of film and musical scores has earned him 24 Grammy Awards, five Academy Awards, and 41 Oscar nominations over the course of his 5 decades-long career, has defined, through music, the heroes and villains of more movie franchises than even Luke, Leia, or Harry could summon with all of their powers.
The Grand Rapids Pops presents Star Wars and More: The Music of John Williams with some of Williams’ best known music, with a few surprising melodies thrown in for good measure, on May 11-13 in DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW. Shows are at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, May 11-12 and at 3 p.m. Sunday, May 13.
With musical selections from all 3 Star Wars trilogies, the concert features standout Star Wars pieces, alongside cherished songs from the Harry Potter film franchise, the Jurassic Park franchise, and several other films where Williams’ scores exquisitely craft the emotionality of characters and their world.
For the finale of this year’s Fox Motors Pops series, Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt will conduct the symphony in the formidable task of playing 14 selections from Williams’ scores.
“Star War” guests mingle with Grand Rapids Symphony patrons before the performance.
The concert sponsored by the Peter C. & Emajean Cook Foundation features five selections from the Star Wars franchise, including one suite from The Force Awakens and the hopeful “The Rebellion is Reborn,” from The Last Jedi, the most recent installment of the final trilogy.
The Grand Rapids Symphony Youth Chorus, directed by Sean Ivory, will be featured with music including the dramatic “Battle of Heroes,” from Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith and the joyful “Exultate Justi” from Empire of the Sun. Sure to be a concert highlight, “Exultate Justi,” sung in Latin, is an ardent celebration of a young protagonist’s indomitable dignity and courage, earning Williams another Grammy and Academy Award nomination, respectively.
Costumed characters from the Star Wars franchise will patrol the lobby of DeVos Hall, greeting guests and posing for pictures at each show. Characters from the Great Lakes Garrison of the 501st Legion, a worldwide Star Wars costuming organization, are expected to include Darth Vader, Kylo Ren, Rey, assorted Storm Troopers, and more.
John Williams, whose long tenure with the Boston Pops stretched for 14 seasons before he became the Pops’ Laureate Conductor, personally hired Bob Bernhardt as a guest conductor of the Boston Pops. So it makes sense that Bernhardt, who is in his third season as the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Principal Pops Conductor, is conducting works written by the man of whom Bernhardt has said, “He’s my hero.”
Williams, it seems, knows something of heroes and villains. Whether fictional or otherwise, Williams’ compositions, particularly for franchise films like Star Wars, feature short musical themes that identify characters, motivations, situations, and locations. Those themes, repeated again and again, help define characters as threating or hopeful; as brave or defiant or tender.
A menacing shark, for instance, has a two-note theme repeated throughout the score, and a villain is born for Jaws. A French horn solo, brief and longing, as a young man gazes out at a binary sunset on a desert planet introduces Luke Skywalker to Star Wars viewers.
The Julliard-trained Williams won his third Academy Award for Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope. That original score, with its sweeping sonic landscape, helped define the entire Star Wars franchise and cinematic universe.
More mixing and mingling with the “Star Wars” Darth Sidious and Darth Vader.
Drawing from numerous classical music influences – from Wagner to Tchaikovsky to Holst – Williams’ capability to write evocatively and create characters out of musical thin air seems to know no bounds.
Maestro John Reineke of the New York Pops, prior to a performance of the musical score for The Force Awakens in Carnegie Hall, summed it up: “John has a way to capture the visual element of the film, and the feelings, the emotions … and transfer that into music. So when you take the music out of the film,” he explained to AM New York, “and play it on a concert stage with no visuals and just listen to it, it takes you right back to that film and what it’s about – you can picture it in your mind.”
The final Star Wars trilogy, with The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi, will see its final film premier in December 2019. Williams, now 86, says that the as-of-now untitled Star Wars IX, will be his last Star Wars film.
“We know J.J. Abrams is preparing one now for next year that I will hopefully do for him, and I look forward to it,” Williams said while speaking to University of Southern California’s Classical music radio station, KUSC. “It will round out a series of nine and be quite enough for me.”
Tickets
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the GRS ticket office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
Music lovers and concert goers often ask classical musicians to name their favorite composer. Typically, the answer leads to the music of whomever they’re currently rehearsing or performing. Or to composers who wrote often or wrote well for their chosen instrument.
For conductors whose job it is to see the big picture, the answer sometimes is surprising.
“Often people ask me who my favorite composer is. I don’t know how to answer that,” said Grand Rapids Symphony Music Director Marcelo Lehninger. “But if I were going to a desert island, and I had to choose one composer, I probably would pick Chopin.”
That might come as a surprise because, while figures such as Maurice Ravel and Richard Strauss were great composers as well as great orchestrators, Frédéric Chopin was a great composer whose skills at arranging for orchestra were, at best, only adequate.
Yet the Polish-born musician, one of the greatest pianists of all time, revolutionized composition and piano performance to a degree that no one else has ever done.
“He completely changed the way you play the instrument,” said Lehninger, a pianist. “No one else, not even Paganini, did that for his instrument, the violin.”
Grand Rapids Symphony celebrates the music of Chopin with guest pianist Rafał Blechacz at 8 pm Friday and Saturday, April 27-28, in DeVos Performance Hall. The program titled Chopin & Dvořák is part of the 2018 Gilmore International Keyboard Festival, centered in Kalamazoo.
Joining the Grand Rapids Symphony for Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 1 is Blechacz, the 2014 Gilmore Artist of the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival. Guest artist sponsor is the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
The ninth concerts of the 2017-18 Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series also include Antonín Dvořák’s Symphony No. 8 in G Major. It opens with Canto, a brief work by contemporary American composer Adam Schoenberg.
Joining the Grand Rapids Symphony for Chopin’s Piano Concerto in E minor is Polish pianist Rafał Blechacz, the 2014 Gilmore Artist of the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival. The concert is in partnership with the Gilmore International Keyboard Festival. Guest artist sponsor is the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
Not only is Blechacz a fellow Pole, he was the winner of the 15th International Chopin Competition in 2005, becoming the first Polish pianist to win the competition since Krystian Zimerman in 1975.
And not only did Blechacz win the top prize, he won all four of the additional prizes for best performance of a polonaise, a mazurka, a sonata, and a concerto with orchestra. No other pianist in the 91-year history of the event, held once every five years in Warsaw, has ever captured every award in the competition.
Lehninger, who made his Grand Rapids Symphony debut in February 2015 conducting Dvorak’s popular Symphony No. 9 “From the New World,” will lead the Grand Rapids Symphony in Antonin Dvorak’s sunny Symphony No. 8
The concerts open with Adam Schoenberg’s Canto, which in Italian means “I sing.” One of the most frequently-heard composers in today’s concert halls, Schoenberg composed the brief work as a lullaby in honor his son, Luca, who was born in 2013.
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall.
The complete Chopin & Dvorak program will be rebroadcast on Sunday, May 28, 2018, at 1 p.m. on Blue Lake Public Radio 88.9 FM or 90.3 FM.
Tickets
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the GRS box office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm, at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 am-6 pm or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
Grand Rapids Symphony Music Director Marcelo Lehninger leads the symphony in the Jan. 5 performance of music of Tchaikovsky and Dvorak.
Tonight’s joint concert with the Grand Rapids Symphony and Cornerstone University Chorale at Cornerstone University has been canceled due to weather.
Titled “Classically Inspired Hymns,” the program had been scheduled for 6 p.m., Sunday, April 15, in Christ Chapel on the Cornerstone University campus. The concert in the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Sacred Dimensions series may be rescheduled at another time. More information will be provided when it’s available.
Ticket buyers should retain their tickets. Tickets will remain valid if the concert is rescheduled or will be exchangeable next season for a Grand Rapids Symphony concert in either its Classical or Great Eras series. (Some restrictions will apply).
The kitchen is the heart of the home. It’s where family and friends gather not only to cook and eat but also to talk and spend time together.
The best kitchens look good, function well, and make everyone feel comfortable and welcome.
The Grand Rapids Symphony’s Symphony Friends welcome you to come and see some of the finest kitchens in the greater Grand Rapids area.
“Well-Orchestrated Kitchens,” featuring six fabulous kitchens, will be held on Sunday, May 5, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Delightful music and home demonstrations are part of the “heart of the home” tour that’s a fundraiser for the Grand Rapids Symphony’s music education programs. For more information, go to kitchentourgr.com.
Sponsored by Symphony Friends, tickets are $25. Tickets are available at the Grand Rapids Symphony offices at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. Call (616) 454-9451. Advance tickets also are available at D&W Fresh Market locations at Gaslight Village, Breton Village, Knapp’s Corner and Cascade.
Photo courtesy of Sear Architects
Tickets will be available at all six homes on the tour. Tickets are not available online.
The event features a tour of six kitchens, uniquely designed, and well-appointed, in the Grand Rapids area. The six homes include two mid-century remodels, one with an outdoor kitchen, and one with a wine cellar. A printable map of the six homes is available online at kitchentourgr.com.
“Though we’re showing off kitchens, there is much more to see as visitors make their way to the kitchens,” said Bonnie Monhart, president of Symphony Friends, which formerly was known as the Grand Rapids Symphony Women’s Committee.
In addition to seeing these magnificent kitchens, “Well-Orchestrated Kitchens” will offer a variety of food and home-related activities including demonstrations such as flower arranging with Easter Floral and easy appetizers and summer entertaining from Art of the Table.
Musicians from the Grand Rapids Symphony and Youth Symphony will perform during the tour.
If you’re planning a kitchen renovation and are in search of ideas or if you simply appreciate creativity and design you won’t want to miss this event.
Last year, Symphony Friends’ spring fundraiser, “Blandford Enchanted” welcomed over 1,300 guests and raised more than $13,000 to support the Grand Rapids Symphony, the Grand Rapids Youth Symphony and other education programs that are part of the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Gateway to Music, a network of 17 access points for people of all ages and walks of life to engage with orchestral music.
Earlier this year, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Fifth Grade Concerts welcomed more than 15,000 youngsters to DeVos Performance Hall for a live concert experience.
On April 20, the Grand Rapids Symphony plus the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus and a world-renowned pianist will return to Carnegie Hall for an astounding evening of Spanish and Brazilian-flavored music. But first, you can hear the entire program in DeVos Hall on Friday and Saturday, April 13-14.
Brazilian pianist Nelson Freire, one of the world’s greatest pianists, will be soloist in Momoprecoce by Brazilian’s most famous composer, Heitor Villa-Lobos. The boisterous fantasy for piano and orchestra is inspired by children at play during Carnival. Here’s a YouTube video of Freire performing “Momoprecoce” with Brazil’s most important orchestra, the Sao Paulo Symphony, on tour with American conductor Marin Alsop in London.
Freire also will play Manuel de Falla’s Nights in the Gardens of Spain, a sensuous piece whose inspiration comes from the same region in southern Spain that influenced Anila Quayyum Agha’s “Intersections,” winner of Grand Rapids’ ArtPrize in 2014.
Grand Rapids Symphony’s Brazilian-born conductor Marcelo Lehninger leads the orchestra in Maurice Ravel’s Bolero, back by popular demand. The Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus will join the orchestra for Villa-Lobos’ Villa-Lobos Chôros No.10 “Rasga o Coração” (It Tears your Heart) a piece that’s inspired by music of the streets of Brazil in the 1920s and 30s.
Freire, who has performed four times in Carnegie Hall, is a lifelong friend of the Lehninger family. Lehninger, who led the Boston Symphony Orchestra in Carnegie Hall in 2011, has performed “Momoprecoce” previously with Freire and the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood.
Tickets
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the GRS box office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm, at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
In the early days of comedy, classical music, like a newly wound music box, played in the background, providing a musical laugh track for gags and slapstick. Thanks to characters including the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote, Warner Bros.’ Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons only cemented the connection with hi-speed tonics and jet-propelled pogo stick, all made by Acme.
But it’s not often that the music itself is the subject of comedic mirth. As part of Gilda’s LaughFest, the Grand Rapids Symphony welcomes The Second City comedy troupe to DeVos Performance Hall for plenty of laughs about the worlds of symphony orchestras and classical music.
Grand Rapids Pops presents Second City: Guide to the Symphony, a blend of original sketch comedy with orchestral works by the great masters, on March 16-18 in DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW. Shows are at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, March 16-17 and at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 18, part of the Fox Motors Pops series. Fair warning: The show may not be suitable for children and teens under age 15.
A humorous celebration of the symphony orchestra, the show with new music and songs by Mathew Reid lovingly satirizes all things orchestral – the hard-working musicians, the all-powerful maestro, the vast orchestral repertoire, and even the quirks of the audience.
Associate Conductor John Varineau will be on the podium with The Second City performers for the final weekend of LaughFest, which runs March 8 through March 18. The annual 10-day festival of laughter welcomes Trevor Noah on March 10 for LaughFest’s Signature Event.
The Second City – the world’s premiere comedy theater and school of improvisation – offers a cadre of comedic talent from Toronto’s Second City, where the Guide to the Symphony first was performed along with Toronto Symphony Orchestra under Peter Oundjian in 2014.
The sketches riff on and feature pieces from classical masterworks including Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro and Glinka’s Ruslan and Ludmila.
Second City Tornato joins the Grand Rapids Symphony for LaughFest
Hailed by the Toronto Star as “the funniest two hours I spent in a theatre this year,” the show has reached symphony newcomers unfamiliar with Glinka and Mahler, as well as regular symphony-goers.
Most recently, Second City: Guide to the Symphony was at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts with the National Symphony Orchestra last season. The Washington Post labeled the performances as “self-aware and funny…a fun departure from what unconverted members of the audience assumed a symphony was.”
With theatrical wit, charm, and lampooning, Second City: Guide to the Symphony, according to DC Metro Arts, left “…the audience laughing even as they headed for the door. And in many cases, with a sudden desire to go to the symphony.”
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the GRS ticket office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616-454-9451, ext. 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
The Grand Rapids Symphony will perform “Green Eggs and Ham” this Saturday to celebrate Dr. Seuss’ birthday.
The 45-minute concert is geared toward pre-school an dearly elementary school-age children ages 3-7. The performance is a fun children’s style operetta featuring soprano and actress Diane Penning, who first appeared 10 years ago with the Grand Rapids Symphony in this production, and Abby Deller as “Sam I Am.” GRS Associate Conductor John Varineau will conduct the performance.
The operetta features a timeless parable about not judging others, with symphonic music especially designed to engage and delight children. For a colorful touch, Grand Rapids Symphony musicians wear colored t-shirts to show their membership in the string, woodwind, brass, or percussion families, respectively.
The performance is at 10:30 a.m. at DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW. For more information, visit grsymphony.org.
The Grand Rapids Pops will host its annual “Symphony with Soul” Saturday, Feb. 24, at 8 p.m. at DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW. The program will feature a statue to thematic of Ella Fitzgerald.
Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt leads the concert with three guest female vocalists performing songs including “A-Tisket, A-Tasket,” “How High the Moon,” “The Lady is a Tramp,” and many more. Guest singers Harolyn Blackwell, Aisha de Haas and Nova Y. Payton all are stars of jazz, Broadway and opera.
The Grand Rapids Symphony Community Chorus, a gospel choir led by Duane Shields Davis, joins the orchestra for the performance that also features an appearance by the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Mosaic Scholars, a training program for young African-American and Latino musicians including private lessons with members of the Grand Rapids Symphony.
Davis, retired director of vocal music at Grand Rapids Community College, will lead the orchestra in “Portrait of a Leader,” a tribute to Martin Luther King Jr., narrated by Eddie L. Stevens, who played the role of Dr. King in Grand Rapids Civic Theatre’s production of “All the Way.”
The evening program will be preceded by the Celebration of Soul dinner, honoring the accomplishments of individuals and organizations in the community that emphasize and celebrate the importance of cultural awareness and inclusion in West Michigan This year’s recipients of the Dr. MaLinda P. Sapp Legacy Award are Herschell Turner, Skot and Barbara Welch, and Celebration! Cinema.
For more information about this program or other Grand Rapids Symphony performances, visit grsymphony.org.
The Grand Rapids Symphony unveiled its 2018-19 season with classical blockbusters, eminent soloists, pop/rock music favorites, great films and much more.
Pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet
The Classical Series led by Music Director Marcelo Lehninger welcomes world-renowned pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet and rising star violinist Karen Gomyo to DeVos Hall for a season of music including Beethoven’s stirring Symphony No. 7, Rimsky-Korsakov’s sultry Scheherazade, Schubert’s beautiful “Unfinished” Symphony No. 8, and Rachmaninoff’s mighty Piano Concerto No. 2.
Three-time Grammy Award winner Michelle DeYoung, a mezzo-soprano who was born in Grand Rapids and attended Calvin College, returns to DeVos Hall for the first time in 12 seasons. Also meet Marcelo’s mother, Brazilian pianist Sonia Goulart, who’s enjoyed an international career as a concert artist. will be performing with the Grand Rapids Symphony.
The Pops Series under Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt features jazz guitarist John Pizzarelli playing the music of Paul McCartney; trumpeter Byron Stripling with ragtime, jazz and blues; and singer and pianist Tony DeSare with great songs of Frank Sinatra.
Enjoy many nights at the movies with live music from the Grand Rapids Pop accompanying Tim Burton’s “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” Johnny Depp in “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl,” and Macaulay Culkin in “Home Alone.”
Cirque de la Symphonie will return for Christmas for the 10th annual Cirque de Noel. Local soloists will include violinist and concertmaster James Crawford and principal oboist Ellen Sherman.
Season tickets are on sale now with select concerts also on sale to subscribers. Subscriptions are available at a discount of up to 50 percent off select series and seats for new package orders. Current subscribers have until February 28 to renew their subscriptions. Single tickets will be available beginning July 31.
Tickets are available at the GRS ticket office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm, at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616-454-9451, ext. 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $4 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Astrology argues that the positions of the planets, from the time we’re born, influence our personalities and destinies. English composer Gustav Holst, though he didn’t believe in astrology, was intrigued enough to compose a symphonic suite, The Planets.
Whether the alignment of the stars on the day we’re born influences our destiny is open to debate. That Holst’s suite has influenced composers for the past 100 years is not. In movies such as Star Wars, if you’ve heard the menacing musical theme of the Imperial Forces, you’ve heard the same sinister, martial rhythm found at the beginning of Holst’s seven-movement suite.
In fact, Star Wars producer George Lucas encouraged composer John Williams to take inspiration from “Mars, the Bringer of War.”
“Gustav Holst can be seen as unintentionally being one of the greatest movie composers of all time, inspiring many film scores of the last 50 years,” according to blogger Nathan Spendelow on the website Inside Film.
Grand Rapids Symphony Musical Director Marcelo Lehninger
Come to DeVos Performance Hall on Friday and Saturday, February 2-3, and you’ll hear even more music that has inspired film composers. Grand Rapids Symphony presents The Planets the fifth concerts of the 2017-18 Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, February 2-3, in DeVos Performance Hall.
Music Director Marcelo Lehninger will lead the concerts that also feature Mozart’s Symphony No. 41, nicknamed “Jupiter,” and Haydn’s Overture to Il mondo della luna (The World on the Moon).
Vibration Research is the Concert Sponsor. The Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund is the guest artist sponsor. Bell’s Brewery is the Beverage Partner for The Planets.
The Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus, directed by Pearl Shangkuan, will be featured on The Planets. Mary Tuuk is the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus Sponsor.
Concerts in DeVos Performance Hall feature video provided by the Roger B. Chaffee Planetarium of the Grand Rapids Public Museum. Film from spacecraft that have visited the planets and their moons plus animations and simulations of galaxies, nebulae and other deep-space objects add to the musical experience.
Composed between 1914 and 1916, prior to the discovery of Pluto, The Planets still sounds fresh today.
In fact, three movements, “Mars, the Bringer of War,” “Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity,” and “Neptune, the Mystic,” are among the most frequently quoted compositions of all time.
Musical scores for such well-known films as Aliens, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home and The Terminator all suggest inspiration from The Planets. In the original 1977 Star Wars film, in the concluding act that sees Luke Skywalker firing his proton torpedo into the exhaust port of The Death Star, the dramatic film score by John Williams, which becomes louder and louder, building tension, follows the same format as “Mars” from The Planets.
Other TV shows and movies use portions directly. The 2010 TV series Sherlock, starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman, features music from “Jupiter.” The 2008 film Hellboy II: The Golden Army with Ron Perlman and Selma Blair, uses passages from “Mars.”
The 1983 film The Right Stuff, the story of the original Mercury 7 astronauts, starring Sam Shepard, Scott Glenn and Ed Harris, uses excerpts from “Jupiter,” “Mars” and “Neptune.”
Holst’s starting point for the music was the astrological character of each planet. The composer himself pointed out there was no connection with the deities of classical mythology or the planetary bodies themselves. Holst’s daughter wrote that once her father had determined the format, “he let the music have its way with him.”
Haydn’s Il mondo della luna, a romantic comedy about a bogus astronomer, opens with an overture that sets the stage for the antics yet to come.
Mozart’s Symphony No. 41 in C Major has nothing to do with astrology or astronomy. Its nickname did not come from Mozart. Likely it came from the impresario Johann Peter Salomon who dubbed it “Jupiter” to promote it as a grand and glorious piece of music. With a duration of 30 minutes, it was the longest symphony Mozart ever composed. As fate would have it, it also would be his final symphony before his death at age 35. Today, it remains one of the most popular works Mozart ever composed.
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall.
The complete The Planets program will be rebroadcast on Sunday, April 15, at 1 p.m. on Blue Lake Public Radio 88.9 FM or 90.3 FM.
Tickets
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the GRS box office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm, at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Ticketsprogram. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
The Grand Rapids Symphony performs the music of “The Prisoner of Azkaban.”
The Harry Potter Film Concert Series returns to DeVos Performance Hall with Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban in Concert, the third film in the Harry Potter series. On Friday and Saturday, Feb. 9-10, 2018, the Grand Rapids Symphony will perform the magical score live from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban while the entire film plays in high-definition on a 40-foot screen. The Harry Potter Film Concert Series, which is another magical experience from J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World, kicked off in June 2016 with Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone and is scheduled to include hundreds of performances across more than 35 countries around the world through 2018.
“When the Grand Rapids Symphony brought the Harry Potter Film Concert Series to town last year, we sold out three performances of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone in Concert,” said Peter Perez, President and CEO of the Grand Rapids Symphony. “Afterwards, the Symphony’s Facebook page lit up with comments from fans who said it was ‘absolutely phenomenal.’ We’re thrilled to be able to bring the Harry Potter Film Concert Series back to DeVos Performance Hall along with our fabulous Grand Rapids Symphony.”
In Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry, Ron and Hermione, now teenagers, return for their third year at Hogwarts, where they are forced to face escaped prisoner, Sirius Black, who seems to pose a great threat to Harry. Harry and his friends spend their third year learning how to handle a half-horse, half-eagle creature known as a Hippogriff, repel shape-shifting Boggarts and master the art of Divination. They also visit the wizarding village of Hogsmeade and the Shrieking Shack, which is considered the most haunted dwelling in Britain. In addition to these new experiences, Harry faces a werewolf and must overcome the threats of the soul-sucking Dementors. With his best friends, Harry tackles advanced magic, crosses the barriers of time and impacts the course of life-changing events for those around him.
Earning an Oscar-nomination for the score, the spellbinding and incredible music composed by John Williams became an instant classic, conjuring beautiful, soaring motifs that continue the adventures of Harry Potter on his magical journey.
This film concert series has been created by CineConcerts, in partnership with Warner Bros. Consumer Products, and will be conducted by its creator and Producer, Justin Freer. He explains, “The Harry Potter film series continues to be a once-in-a-lifetime cultural phenomenon that delights millions of fans around the world. It is with great pleasure that we introduced for the first time ever an opportunity to experience the award-winning music scores played live by a symphony orchestra, all while the beloved film is simultaneously projected onto the big screen. This will be another unforgettable event.”
Brady Beaubien of CineConcerts and Concert Producer for the Harry Potter Film Concert Series added, “Harry Potter is synonymous with excitement around the world, and we hope that by performing this incredible music with the full movie, audiences will enjoy returning to this world, and to the many wonderful magical characters that inhabit it.”
Tickets, starting at $18, are now on sale for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban in Concert. Call the Grand Rapids Symphony at (616) 454-9451 ext. 4 or go online to GRSymphony.org for tickets for performances at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 9, and at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 10, 2018.
At the height of the Cold War in October 1957, the former Soviet Union sent Sputnik into orbit, the first shot in the race for space. Six months later, a lanky, 23-year-old Texan fired back on behalf of the United States.
In Moscow before a Russian audience, Van Cliburn gave dazzling performances of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 and Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 to win the inaugural International Tchaikovsky Competition.
Pianist Gabriela Montero (Photo by Shelley Mosman)
Cliburn returned home to a ticker-tape parade in New York City, a cover story in Time magazine and a recording contract from RCA Victor. Soon, his Grammy Award-winning recording of Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto became the first classical recording in the world to sell 1 million copies, helping the concerto become an all-time favorite among audiences.
In January, Grand Rapids Symphony returns to DeVos Performance Hall with an All-Tchaikovsky concert including the perennially popular piano concerto.
Music Director Marcelo Lehninger leads the orchestra in Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 and in the Polonaise from Tchaikovsky’s opera, Eugene Onegin, at 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, Jan. 12-13, in DeVos Performance Hall.
Guest pianist Gabriela Montero will be soloist in Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 for the fourth concerts of the 2017-18 Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series. Guest artist sponsor is the Edith I. Blodgett Guest Artist Fund.
The Latin Grammy Award-winning pianist and twice Grammy nominated artist, who performed at the inauguration of President Barack Obama in 2008, won the Bronze Medal at the 13th International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw in 1995.
A native of Caracas, Venezuela, Montero gave her first public performance at age 5. Three years later, she made her concert debut with the Simon Bolívar Youth Orchestra, earning a scholarship from the Venezuelan government to study in the United States. At age 12, she won the Baldwin National Competition and AMSA Young Artist International Piano Competition, leading to a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to her interpretations of classical masterworks, Montero is celebrated as a brilliant improviser, a skill that’s almost disappeared among contemporary classical pianists. A fearless barnstormer who often extemporizes on musical themes suggested by the audience, her improvisations astonish listeners for their craftsmanship and clarity as well as their complexity.
Montero began improvising at the piano at age 4. For many years, she kept her improvisational forays a secret. The world-famous Argentinian pianist Martha Argerich encouraged her to do it in public.
“At that point I made the decision,” Montero told the British newspaper The Independent in 2010. “I’m a classical artist and if the classical world shuns me because I improvise, then that’s a risk I have to take, because I have to show myself exactly as I am.”
Montero has been heard on National Public Radio’s “Performance Today” show, improvising on melodies called in by listeners. Montero also has been profiled on CBS TV’s “60 Minutes” in December 2006.
Her 2006 recording “Bach and Beyond” for EMI, a recording entirely of her improvisation on themes of J.S. Bach, held the top spot on the Billboard Classical Charts for several months. Two years later, her follow-up CD, “Baroque,” garnered a Grammy Award nomination.
Montero won the 2015 Latin Grammy Award for Best Classical Album for her debut recording as pianist performing Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2, as composer of an original work, “Ex Patria,” and as an improviser.
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall.
The complete All Tchaikovsky program will be rebroadcast on Sunday, April 8, 2018, at 1 p.m. on Blue Lake Public Radio 88.9 FM or 90.3 FM.
Tickets
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the GRS box office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm, at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Ticketsprogram, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
Grand Rapids Symphony Music Director Marcelo Lehninger leads the symphony in the Jan. 5 performance of music of Tchaikovsky and Dvorak. (Photo by Terry Johnston)
Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Antonin Dvořák flourished in another time and place, in a world before cars and planes, telephones and television.
In the very same era, nine prominent women of Grand Rapids banded together in 1883 to found St. Cecilia Music Center, to promote the study and appreciation of music.
Music Director Marcelo Lehninger leads the Crowe Horwath Great Eras concert at 8 p.m. in St. Cecilia Music Center, 24 Ransom Ave. NW
Highlights of the evening concert will be given at 10 a.m. that morning for The Romantic Coffee Concert, part of the Porter Hills Coffee Classics series, a one-hour program held without intermission. Doors open at 9 a.m. for complementary coffee and pastry.
The Grand Rapids Symphony itself is the star of the show with music including Dvořák’s Serenade for Wind Instruments, Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings, and a Brass Sextet in E-flat minor by Oskar Böhme.
“It shows off each section of the orchestra, strings, winds and brass,” Lehninger said.
Dvořák, who drew from folk music of his native Bohemia, was inspired by the Old-World atmosphere of the late 18th century when he composed his Serenade for Wind Instruments in 1878.
An excerpt from its third movement is heard in the 2004 film Iron Jawed Angels, starring Hilary Swank as suffragist leader Alice Paul along with Frances O’Connor, Julia Ormond and Anjelica Huston
Tchaikovsky, who loved the music of Mozart above all other composers, paid homage to the German composer in the first movement of his Serenade for Strings, composed in 1881, two years before St. Cecilia Music Society was founded.
The waltz in its second movement was adapted for singer and orchestra and used in the 1945 MGM film Anchors Aweigh. Kathryn Grayson sang the song titled “From the Heart of a Lonely Poet.”
The complete The Romantic Concert: Dvořák & Tchaikovsky program will be rebroadcast on Sunday, April 1, 2018, at 1 p.m. on Blue Lake Public Radio 88.9 FM or 90.3 FM.
Tickets
Tickets start at $26 for the Great Eras series and $16 for Coffee Classics and are available at the GRS ticket office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m., or at the door on the day of the concert prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Ticketsprogram, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
More than 20 years after its initial release, Pokémon fans, ranging from young children to seasoned adult players and entire families, have followed and celebrated one mantra: Gotta catch ‘em all!
Back by popular demand, you can catch Pokémon at the Grand Rapids Symphony this January, where Pikachu and the gang will appear on a 40-foot screen while the Grand Rapids Symphony plays the iconic music of the beloved video game.
Grand Rapids Pops presents Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions in a one-night spectacular on Saturday, Jan. 6, at 8 p.m. in DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW in Grand Rapids.
A concertgoer brings a special friend to the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Pokemon 2016 program. (Photo by Terry Johnston)
Two seasons ago, Grand Rapids Pops presented Pokémon to audiences keen to engage in sights and sounds of the endearing game. Now, with the advent of the location-based, augmented reality game PokémonGo in 2016, more people than ever are participating in Pokémon, capturing and training wild Pokémon to do battle and become Pokémon tournament champions.
As part of the Gerber Symphonic Boom series, this concert gives fans a different kind of immersive experience: a symphonic one.
The fuzzy tones and beeps of the game that originated on the hand-held Game Boy now give way to big-screen images enveloped by the surround sound of the Grand Rapids Symphony, performing musical arrangements timed to the visuals from recent and classic Pokémon video games.
Guest Conductor Chad Seiter, Michigan native who attended Grand Valley State University from 2001 to 2003, conducts the concert produced by Princeton Entertainment. Seiter, a prolific composer, arranger, and orchestrator for film, television, and video games has provided compositions and arrangements for some of Hollywood’s biggest projects, including Lost, Star Trek, and the Medal of Honor video game series.
Grand Rapids Symphony’s Pokemon 2016 program had many bringing special guests. (Terry Johnston)
In 2016 season, guest conductor Susie Benchasil Seiter conducted Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions to an enthusiastic Grand Rapids crowed decked out in Pokémon garb and Game Boys. The husband and wife team also collaborated to orchestrate and conduct The Legend of Zelda: Symphony of the Goddess.
Chad Seiter, originally from Okemos, now serves as the Associate Executive Producer at Princeton Entertainment, and was the lead arranger and music director for all of the Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions concerts.
Together with Benchasil Seiter, he transcribed the score of Pokémon’s original composer Junichi Masuda for symphonic audiences, while crafting additional music to enhance the concert-going experience.
“We started by listening to every single piece of music in all the Pokémon games,” Seiter said. “From there, we narrowed it down to our favorites that tell the story of Pokémon. Then we picked the pieces we thought would work best with a symphony orchestra.”
Their musical efforts have resulted in what iDigital Times called a “once in a lifetime event.”
Memorable musical highlights such as the Pokémon Red and Blue Overture, and the beautiful “Kiseki” from Pokémon X and Y, were handpicked by Masuda for Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions. The concert also features music from the Pokémon anime series and films.
Perhaps Game Music Online puts it best: there are few things as fun as celebrating beloved childhood memories played out in front devoted fans with the help of live, symphonic music.
Tickets
Tickets for Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions start at $18 and are available at the GRS ticket office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Decking the halls with boughs of holly and hanging the stockings by the chimney with care are favorite December traditions for many West Michigan families.
The Grand Rapids Symphony celebrates the season with two enduring holiday traditions in Grand Rapids including the Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops and the Old National Bank Cirque de Noël in DeVos Performance Hall.
The Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops, an institution that’s lasted for decades, draws entire families from children to parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. Join the Grand Rapids Pops to celebrate the season in five performances Dec. 14-17.
Old National Bank Cirque de Noël welcomes Cirque de la Symphonie back to Grand Rapids for cirque artistry accompanied by the Grand Rapids Pops. See amazing acrobats and aerial artists in two appearances Dec. 21 and 22.
The Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops, part of the Fox Motors Pops Series, is home-grown entertainment especially for a hometown audience.
Guest vocalist for the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Holiday Pops performance is Leon Williams.
Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt leads performances including such favorites as Leroy Anderson’s “Sleigh Ride” and highlights from Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker. The Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus, conducted by Pearl Shangkuan, joins the orchestra to sing G.F. Handel’s “Hallelujah” Chorus from The Messiah.
The Grand Rapids Symphony Youth Chorus, directed by Sean Ivory, will be featured on John Rutter’s “Star Carol.” Both choruses will sing music from the 1990 movie Home Alone with orchestra.
Embellish handbell ensemble, directed by Stephanie Wiltse, will join the Symphony Chorus for “Hark the Herald Angels Sing,” and will play a solo number, “Change Ring Prelude on Divinum Mysterium” by Fred Gramann,” on a battery of handbells.
Guest vocalist Leon Williams joins the Grand Rapids Symphony to sing “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” and “Sweet Little Jesus Boy” in his third Holiday Pops appearance with the orchestra.
Though Williams doesn’t live in West Michigan, he’s made many appearances here. In October, he sang for the funeral of Grand Rapids Symphony benefactor and philanthropist Helen DeVos.
The Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops will be held at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 14, and at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Dec. 15-16. Matinees will be at 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 16-17 in DeVos Performance Hall.
Families with children are invited to the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Wolverine World Wide Holiday Pops Spectacular on Saturday, Dec. 16, just before the 3 p.m. matinee concert. Beginning at 1 p.m., children can enjoy festive treats, arts and crafts, games, and much more leading up to the concert at 3 p.m. Tickets for the Holiday Pops Spectacular plus the Holiday Pops are $20. Supporting Sponsor is Meijer, Inc. Community Partners are Amerikam and Calvin College.
The Old National Bank Cirque de Noël, part of the Gerber SymphonicBoom Series, returns to DeVos Performance Hall for the eighth annual holiday show Dec. 21 and 22.
See aerial artists, gymnasts, jugglers and strongmen and hear classical favorites and seasonal music.
Acts include aerial artists Nataliya Tolstikova and Sergey Parshin performing on silk above the DeVos Hall stage while the Grand Rapids Symphony plays the “Waltz of the Flowers” from Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker.
Associate Conductor John Varineau leads the orchestra in music from the 2004 film The Polar Express plus familiar melodies such as “The Parade of the Wooden Soldiers.”
Tickets
Tickets for the Wolverine World Wide Holiday Pops start at $18.
Student tickets for concerts on Thursday, Dec. 14 and for the matinee on Saturday, Dec. 16 also are available for $5. Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Tickets program, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
Tickets for Old National Bank Cirque de Noël start at $32.
Tickets for both program are available at the GRS ticket office, weekdays 9 a.m.-5 p.m. at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616-454-9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place box office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Rockford will host Santa visits Dec. 6, 8, 13, and 15. Addition activities include Santa’s Live Reindeer on Wednesday, Dec. 13 and a live nativity on Friday, Dec. 15.
The Lakeshore Museum Center hosts Holiday Tours of their Hackley & Hume Historic Site in Muskegon Dec. 25 – 27. The tours on Christmas Day will be special, with ornament painting and holiday treats. Experience the Hackley and Hume home this holiday season in a special candle lit setting.
The Downtown Market in Grand Rapids is hosting three events in December for the holiday season. Running through Sunday, Dec. 10, is the market’s Christmas Tree & Decor Lot. Find the perfect holiday wreath or tree for your home at the Christmas Tree Lot, with everything you need to deal the halls. Santa comes on Dec. 15, 16, and 17, as the big buy himself stops by the market.
Holiday decor at the Downtown Market
Surround yourself in warm and cuddle-worthy luxury at theJW Marriott in Grand Rapids. The Wrapped in Warmth Package includes deluxe overnight accommodations, breakfast for two, hot chocolate and donuts, a JW flannel blanket, and a $50 Tanger Outlets gift card. This package is available through Jan. 31.
The Grand Rapids Ballet presents the Nutcracker the weekend of Dec. 8. Don’t miss Chris Van Allsburg’s breathtakingly reimagined smash-hit featuring live music from the Grand Rapids Symphony, sets by Tony Award winner Eugene Lee, and choreography by Val Caniparoli. The month continues with Christmas with Amy Grant & Michael W. Smith featuring Jordan Smith, Broadway Grand Rapids’ Mannheim Steamroller Christmas on Dec. 12, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Wolverine Worldwide Holiday Pops, and the Grand Rapids Symphony’s Old National Bank Cirque de Noël. Tickets for all events are available both online and at the box office, and make for a great early holiday gift.
Seven Steps Up in Spring Lake is hosting two holiday concerts this month. The Courtyard Concerts presents the Ho-Ho-Holiday Show with Amy Speace on Sunday, Dec. 10, followed by the Standing Room Only Dance Party with May Erlewine on Friday, Dec. 22.
Critter Barn
Through Dec. 30, the Critter Barn in Zeeland transforms into a Christmas tradition with its annual Live Nativity. The display will take you back in time to imagine what the very first Christmas was like, with the sights, sounds, and smells! Each presentation offers families a personal, hands-on look at the way of life in Bethlehem, long ago. You’ll be surrounded by sheep, cows, shepherds, angels, and lights as you listen to carols and hear the Christmas story.
The Holland area is hosting events all month long to celebrate the holidays. The Holiday Kerstmart on Dec. 8 and 9; the Parade of Lights on Friday, Dec. 8, and many more. Each event proves why West Michigan is one of the best places to visit during the month of December.
The Holland Museum invites your family to discover the magic of the Victorian age at the Cappon House on Dec. 9, 10, 16, and 17. Guests will sing Christmas carols, decorate holiday treats, listen to classic Christmas stories, play Victorian games, and design their own holiday card or ornament. Tickets may be purchased in advance, with a discount given to museum members.
Great Legs Winery, Brewery & Distillery
Great Legs Winery, Brewery & Distillery in Holland is hosting events for the holidays. The distillery’s Christmas Wine & Canvas is on Tuesday, Dec. 12, and includes everything that you’ll need to complete your painting, with wine, beer, and snacks available to purchase while you paint. They’re also hosting Christmas Caroling on Saturday, Dec. 23, as they celebrate the sounds of Christmas with musicians Ruth Miller and Ben Ashby.
There’s Christmas events going on all month in the River Country area. The Annual Christmas Festival held in Grant returns for another year on Saturday, Dec. 9, bringing free wagon rides, warming stations, and kids activities. Rounding out the area’s festivities is the Christmas in Croton Hardy on Friday, Dec. 15, which includes many holiday-favorites, from Santa and hot chocolate to horse drawn carriages and crafts.
Pianist Steve Talaga, at right (shown with a jazz trip), will team with Grand Rapids Symphony strings to present two works written by Talaga in a Nov. 26 concert at the GRAM. (Supplied)
The Grand Rapids Art Museum’s Sunday Classical Concert Series, a series of 16 performances during the fall and winter each year, will present a special program featuring local pianist Steve Talaga on Thanksgiving weekend.
“String Fling: The Music of Steve Talaga”, will be presented Sunday, Nov. 26, at 2 p.m. at the museum.
“An ensemble of virtuoso string players from the Grand Rapids Symphony will perform my string quartet and a new quintet for piano and strings, “From Darkness into Light”, Talaga said to WKTV. “This will be the world premier (of the second work) and I’ll be joining them at the piano.”
Talaga wrote the string quartet when was written in 1990 when he was a graduate student at Western Michigan University.
The setting of the concerts is one of the GRAM’s beautiful, natural light filled spaces which showcase the buildings architecture and galleries as well as the music. The concert is open to the public with general admission, and free for all GRAM members. Seating is first come, first served.
The GRAM is located in downtown Grand Rapids. For more information visit artmuseum.org .
One of the best operas Giuseppe Verdi ever wrote calls for no costumes or sets. And one of his best-known sacred works is seldom performed in church. What’s more, both are one in the same.
Verdi’s Requiem has no operatic adventures involving heroes and villains, but it still features some of the most dramatic music ever written by the composer of Rigoletto, La Traviata, Otello and Aida.
Grand Rapids Symphony Music Director Marcelo Lehninger says the work that’s popular with audiences is a particular favorite of his as well.
“It’s one of the pieces I enjoy conducting the most,” he said.
Lehninger, who is in his second season with the Grand Rapids Symphony, will lead the third concert of the 2017-18 Richard and Helen DeVos Classical series at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, November 17-18, in DeVos Performance Hall, 303 Monroe Ave. NW.
The 140-voice Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus will be joined by the 40-voice Calvin College Capella, both directed by Pearl Shangkuan, a professor of music at Calvin College.
All told, there will be upwards of 270 musicians on stage for the performances.
Concerts on Friday and Saturday will be dedicated to the memory of Helen DeVos, the Grand Rapids Symphony’s dear friend and greatest champion, who died in October. A member of the Symphony’s Board of Directors for nearly 20 years and an honorary board member afterwards, Helen DeVos had been awarded the Grand Rapids Symphony’s highest honor, its BRAVO! Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007.
Grand Rapids Symphony musicians and staff will wear yellow ribbons in Mrs. DeVos’s memory. Music Director Marcelo Lehninger and the symphony’s principal first and second violins and principal viola and cello, which together comprise the Grand Rapids Symphony’s DeVos String Quartet, all will wear yellow rose boutonnieres or corsages at both performances.
Verdi, who was spiritual, but not a regular churchgoer, poured his most mature vocal and dramatic gifts into his Requiem. The traditional Mass for the Dead in the Roman Catholic liturgy takes its title from the opening phrase, “Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine,” which translates as, “Grant them eternal rest, O Lord.”
Verdi began the work to honor his operatic colleague, Gioachino Rossini, though he never completed it. Years later, Verdi finished the piece to commemorate the first anniversary of the death of Italian poet and novelist Alessandro Manzoni.
In Verdi’s mind, a big man needed a big sendoff, so he composed a work for double chorus, no fewer than 16 brass instruments, and a pounding bass drum that never goes away.
Portions of the 85 minute-work are well-known in popular culture. The dramatic “Die Irae” or “Day of Wrath” sequence is among the loudest musical moments in the orchestra repertoire. It’s frequently heard in movies, on TV and in commercials including the films “Mad Max: Fury Road” in 2015 and “Django Unchained” in 2012 and in the TV series “X Factor.”
Grand Rapids Symphony last performed Verdi’s Requiem in May 2010 to end its 2009-10 season.
Prior to that, the Grand Rapids Symphony sang Verdi’s Requiem in November 2001, just weeks after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which gave added poignancy to the “Libre Me” section, with its first line that translates as “Deliver me, O Lord, from death eternal on that fateful day.”
Inside the Music, a free, pre-concert, multi-media presentation sponsored by BDO USA, will be held before each performance at 7 p.m. in the DeVos Place Recital Hall.
The complete Verdi’s Requiem program will be rebroadcast on Sunday, March 25, 2018, at 1 p.m. on Blue Lake Public Radio 88.9 FM or 90.3 FM.
Tickets
Tickets start at $18 and are available at the GRS box office, weekdays 9 am-5 pm, at 300 Ottawa Ave. NW, Suite 100, (located across from the Calder Plaza), or by calling 616.454.9451 x 4. (Phone orders will be charged a $2 per ticket service fee, with a $12 maximum.)
Tickets are available at the DeVos Place ticket office, weekdays 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. or on the day of the concert beginning two hours prior to the performance. Tickets also may be purchased online at GRSymphony.org.
Full-time students of any age are able to purchase tickets for only $5 on the night of the concert by enrolling in the GRS Student Ticketsprogram, sponsored by Comerica and Calvin College. This is a MySymphony360 eligible concert.
