Carnegie Hall Bound
The New York Times gives Houston Symphony love & Mayor Parker goes along for theNY ride
Guess who was featured in the New York Times?
Houston Symphony's own maestro, Hans Graf, appeared in the Arts & Leisure section earlier this month as a teaser to Carnegie Hall's upcoming Spring for Music 2012 festival, which runs May 7 to 12.
The week-long music bacchanal, dubbed "Uncommon Concerts for $25," highlights the creative programming strategies of orchestras around the United States.
Mayor Annise Parker plans on introducing the performance via a pre-concert question-and-answer session with Elliott Forrest of WQXR, which will be broadcasting the concert on New York's airwaves.
The Bayou City's premier classical music ensemble will open the festival with an all Shostakovich program.
That the mayor is traveling to the Big Apple for the occasion is not a surprise. A former junior high school sax player, Parker once told CultureMap that the symphony is "one of the cultural pillars of the community, not just from an artistic standing, but as an essential part of our pragmatic efforts to market the city of Houston."
The Bayou City's premier classical music ensemble will open the festival with an all Shostakovich program including his Antiformalist Rayok and Symphony No. 11 in G Minor Opus 103 "The Year 1905," followed by appearances from the Edmonton, New Jersey, Alabama, Milwaukee and Nashville Symphony Orchestras.
When Houston Symphony last appeared in Carnegie Hall in 2010, boldface types like Margaret Alkek Williams, Houston Endowment president Larry Faulkner and wife Mary Ann, Todd Frazier, Methodist Center for Performing Arts Medicine's Dr. Richard Stasney, Elizabeth and Peter Wareing, Betty and Jesse Tutor, Diane Lokey Farb, Dancie and Jim Ware, Gib Walton and Sharon Adams went along for the musical ride.
We expect many Houston elites will show up this year as well.
