Spring Concert, May 13

 

Sage City Symphony performs its final Spring Concert at 4pm on Sunday, May 13 in Greenwall Auditorium in the VAPA building of Bennington College. The venue is handicapped accessible and admission is free.

The program features Symphony No 1 in C Major Opus 68 by Brahms, Mozart arias Deh Vieni, Non Tardar from Le Nozze di Figaro (the Marriage of Figaro) and Ach, Ich Fuhls , soloist Alice Tolan-Mee, and Dies Bildnis ist bezaubernd schön, soloist Michael Gallagher, from The Magic Flute, the Grand Partita for thirteen winds by Mozart and Premiere of Table of Toys and Numbers , a new work by Nick Brooke.

This concert is sponsored by TD Bank, Bennington

logo for TD Bank

Stay for Dinner, Beat the Crowds!

 

The concert will be followed by short reception, then our Annual Dinner. The menu includes vegetarian lasagna and home-made dishes such as turkey, ham, chicken and dumplings, macaroni and cheese, salad, vegetable dishes and desserts. Beverages include wine, coffee and tea. We will have enough food for two serving lines, making it faster than earlier years, so please stay and help us eat it all! The donation for the dinner is $20 per person.

More on the Artists and Program

photo of Nick Brooke

Nick Brooke is an accomplished composer. His work Tone Test premiered at Lincoln Center Festival in 2004 and reviews on NPR and in the New York Times noted its innovative aesthetic. His instrumental works have been performed by the Paul Dresher Ensemble, the Nash Ensemble of London, Orchestra 2001, Dan Druckman, Speculum Musicae, and New York's Gamelan Son of Lion; in venues across the U.S. and in Europe including the Lincoln Center Festival, the Spoleto Festival, and the MATA Series. He has received awards and residencies from the Guggenheim Foundation, ASCAP, the Rockefeller Foundation, Djerassi, and the MacDowell Colony. He holds degrees in music composition and philosophy from Oberlin, and a Ph.D from Princeton. Nick Brooke teaches at Bennington College. There is more information at his web site here.

Composer's Comments on The Table of Toys and Numbers - "This 8-minute piece grew out of the awed feeling one gets sitting at the console of a pipe organ (and my first feeling when I found out I was composing for Sage): Here's this table of toys and numbers, where to go? The sounds of organs, and Sage's winds, fill this piece, which grows out of a single motivic "blob" that starts the piece (the "blob", in turn, was probably inspired by the first piece I heard SCS play, when I was 16, called "Plankton Rising"). This whirring theme turns into a 4-chord passacaglia, a fugue, and a polyrhythmic ostinato that works the piece into a lather. The title is borrowed with permission from the band Deerhoof, whose quirky, assymetrical rhythms fill the piece."

photo of soprano Alice Tolan_Mee

Soprano Alice Tolan-Mee finished her degree in Music at Bennington College in December 2011. She studied voice with Tom Bogdan, focusing in classical singing, and plays cello. Now living in her hometown of Brooklyn, NY, she is excited to return and sing with wonderful Sage City Symphony.

Brahms Symphony No 1 and Mozart Grand Partita

 

Symphony No 1 in C Major Opus 68 by Brahms is a fully mature work, completed when he was 43 after over 20 years composing in less complex forms. He completed three more symphonies before his death in 1897.

Serenades were popular music in Mozart's time, often written for occassions such as engagement parties or special dinners. Mozart's Grand Partita is much more challenging, written for Anton Stadler to perform using the best musicians in Vienna. This Grand Partita includes two more movements than were typical for the era, a Romanze and a set of variations between the second minuet and the finale. The work was received enthusiastically in its time and remains a favorite work.

Thanks to Our Friends

 

Thanks to our sponsors for our 2011-2012 season: TD Bank, Bennington, sponsor of the May 13 2012 Spring Concert; E.P. Mahar and Sons Funeral Home, Madison Brewing Company, and State Farm Insurance (James Thibodeau), sponsors for the March 18 2012 Youth Concert; Board of Sage City Symphony, sponsor of the February 12 2012 chamber concert; and People's United Bank, sponsor of our Fall Concert on November 13 2011. Thanks to Mount Anthony Union High School and Bennington College for providing performance space, and band director Marj Rooen of MAUHS and staff of Bennington College for use of percussion equipment.