Handel and Haydn Society announces Celebration 2009

Handel and Haydn Society OBSERVES ANNIVERSARIES OF NAMESAKe COMPOSERS IN 2008-2009 Season with Celebration 2009

Premier chorus and period-instrument orchestra presents Celebration 2009, commemorating 250^th and 200^th anniversaries of deaths of Handel and Haydn. Musical offerings include all-Handel program conducted by Harry Christophers; the Society’s 155^th annual performance of Handel’s Messiah, led by Paul Daniel; and two Haydn programs conducted by Sir Roger Norrington, including concert performance of the seldom heard Haydn opera L’anima del filosofo.

Celebration 2009 culminates in free, outdoor performance of Haydn’s masterwork, The Creation, on Boston’s Esplanade, on May 31, 2009, conducted by Grant Llewellyn.

Celebratory season demonstrates renewed community commitment with the launch of cultural and educational partnerships throughout the greater Boston area.

July 17, 2008 (Boston, MA) — The Handel and Haydn Society, America’s oldest continuously-performing arts organization, marks an important musical anniversary year with Celebration 2009, in observance of anniversaries of the deaths of George Friderick Handel (1685–April 14, 1759) and Franz Joseph Haydn (1732–May 31, 1809), as well as the births of Henry Purcell (1659–1695) and Felix Mendelssohn (1809–1847). The Handel and Haydn Society’s celebratory season features music of these four composers, as well as of Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms. In addition to Artistic Advisor Sir Roger Norrington and Principal Conductor Grant Llewellyn, the Society welcomes back regular guest conductor Harry Christophers, and the Society’s Associate Conductor and Chorusmaster, John Finney. Celebration 2009 will culminate on May 31, 2009, with a free concert of Haydn’s masterwork The Creation on Boston’s Esplanade.

During the 2008-2009 season, the Handel and Haydn Society bolsters its tradition of community outreach, presenting performances, forums, and educational programs through newly developed partnerships with leading area universities and colleges, and unprecedented collaborations with some of Boston’s finest cultural institutions. The Celebration 2009 project is intended to generate civic dialogue around the role of great music, past and present. When the Handel and Haydn Society was founded in 1815, its stated purpose was to perform “the best of the old and the new”—represented by Handel (considered at the time a composer of an earlier age) and Haydn (a relatively “new” composer who had passed away just a few years earlier). The 2009 anniversary year enables the Society to commemorate its namesake composers in a relevant and entertaining way; it also presents an important opportunity to translate the Society’s historical charter to the 21^st century, and to develop a performing arts model for engaging audiences in the role of classical music—past, present, and future—in their lives and their communities.

Celebratory season of both well-known and rarely-heard repertoire features renowned conductors along with established and emerging soloists

The 2008-2009 season features important works of the past and the present, from Haydn’s rarely heard opera L’anima del filosofo (Orfeo ed Euridice) and his authoritative The Creation, to music for the theater by Purcell, to a new work by Boston composer Thomas Vignieri that reflects on the influence of Handel. The Society has engaged conductors of international renown to lead energetic programs throughout the season; in addition to Artistic Advisor Norrington and Principal Conductor Llewellyn, and Harry Christophers (Music Director of The Sixteen) with whom Handel and Haydn has enjoyed an acclaimed partnership over the past three years, the Society welcomes to the podium period specialists Richard Egarr, Paul Daniel, Paul Goodwin, and Jean-Marie Zeitouni in their debuts with Handel and Haydn. Soloists include distinguished singers Sarah Coburn, Nathalie Paulin, Kendra Colton, and Andrew Kennedy, cellist Phoebe Carrai and Russian violinist Ilya Gringolts in his Boston debut, as well as rising young performers such as mezzo-soprano Paula Murrihy, who began her solo career with the Handel and Haydn Society.

Free community concert on Boston Esplanade on May 31, 2009, features Haydn’s Creation

The Society will perform a free, outdoor concert for the City of Boston, featuring Principal Conductor Grant Llewellyn conducting the Handel and Haydn period-instrument ensemble and chorus in Haydn’s masterwork The Creation. Held on Boston’s famed Esplanade, which has a capacity for more than 16,000 people, this community event is planned for national broadcast on radio and podcast, with the potential of reaching several hundred thousand more people throughout the United States. This marks the third time the Society has performed on the Esplanade, the last time in 1990. A pre-concert performance will showcase the Handel and Haydn Youth Choruses, now in their 24^th year.

This event holds significance for two reasons: Handel and Haydn Society performed the American premiere of The Creation in 1819; additionally, while preparation for celebrations of the 2009 musical anniversaries has been underway in Great Britain and Europe for some time, Handel and Haydn is uniquely positioned to take the lead on an American observance. The Society is one of the only music organizations in the United States to take part in an international observance of the 200^th anniversary of Haydn’s death on May 31, 2009, when The Creation will be performed on the same day around the world by other renowned ensembles.

Society expands Educational and Community Outreach Programs

In the 2008-2009 season, Handel and Haydn will invigorate its educational and community outreach programs with expanded programs, venues, and access for children and adults. As part of Celebration 2009, Handel and Haydn will offer the children and schools it currently serves even greater access to music and music education, and will also reach new people in the community, by giving free performances and musical demonstrations in public spaces, such as the Boston Public Library, the Museum of Fine Arts, the Boston Athenaeum, and other collaborating venues. Celebration 2009 will also build on the Society’s use of electronic media in recent seasons by using podcasts; music, conductor’s insights, and lectures on the Society’s website; and video broadcasts as an important educational and audience-development tool. Handel and Haydn Society will make a live recording of L’anima del filosofo under Sir Roger Norrington on the Signum Records label for release in May 2009, commemorating the anniversary of the composer’s death.

In Celebration 2009, the Society also explores new and enhanced partnerships with New England Conservatory, Longy School of Music, Northeastern University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Tufts University to train the players and singers of the future in Baroque and Classical performance styles and techniques through masterclasses, symposia, interaction with professional conductors and musicians, access to rehearsals and performances, and collaborations between musicians and music faculty. These partnerships are the first step toward the Handel and Haydn Academy, a pre-professional period-performance training program that the Society plans to launch in the 2009-2010 season.

This expanded outreach draws on the Society’s longstanding tradition in the community, dating back to the 19^th century when the Society organized large-scale charity events and made great music available to the people of Boston. Over the past 24 years, Handel and Haydn’s award-winning Educational Outreach Program, founded in 1984 to address the lack of music education in public school systems due to funding cuts, has grown significantly and won accolades for bringing vocal training and performance opportunities to thousands of children in some of Greater Boston’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods.

Interdisciplinary collaborations with American and international music organizations

In addition to its cultural and educational partners in Boston, Handel and Haydn will also partner in 2008-2009 with the Haydn Festival in Eisenstadt, Austria, at which Handel and Haydn performed in September 2006, and which is organizing the worldwide performances of The Creation on May 31, 2009; the Haydn Society of North America, dedicated to promoting the legacy of Haydn; and Handel House Museum in London, with whom the Society has a longstanding relationship. Handel and Haydn Society has named the president of the Haydn Society of North America, Dr. Michael Ruhling, its 2008-2009 HIP Fellow (program annotator and scholarly contributor to Handel and Haydn’s musical programs); Handel and Haydn also partners with Longy School of Music to host the Haydn Society of North America’s 2009 conference, which takes place in Cambridge and Boston, MA, the week of May 25, 2009, and will close with the outdoor performance of The Creation.

*~*~*~*~* HANDEL AND HAYDN SOCIETY 2008-2009 SEASON CALENDAR

1. Masterclass with Harry Christophers

Week of September 29

Tufts University

2. Celebrate Handel!

Friday, October 3 at 8.00 pm

Sunday, October 5 at 3.00 pm

Symphony Hall

Harry Christophers, conductor

Gillian Keith, soprano

Handel and Haydn Society Chorus

Handel: Coronation Anthems; Arrival of the Queen of Sheba (from Solomon)
Selections from Jephtha and Semele

3. Haydn’s Legacy: Mozart and Beethoven

Friday, November 7 at 8.00 pm

Sunday, November 9 at 3.00 pm

Symphony Hall

Richard Egarr, conductor & fortepiano

Mozart: Symphony No. 1 in E-flat Major, K. 16; Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488

Beethoven: Creatures of Prometheus Overture; Symphony No. 8 in F Major, Op. 93

4. Messiah

Friday, December 5 at 7.30 pm

Saturday, December 6 at 3.00 pm

Sunday, December 7 at 3.00 pm

Symphony Hall

Paul Daniel, conductor

Kendra Colton, soprano

Paula Murrihy, mezzo-soprano

Brian Stucki, tenor

Brett Polegato, baritone

Handel and Haydn Society Chorus

5. A Bach Christmas

Thursday, December 18 at 8.00 pm

Sunday, December 21 at 3.00 pm

New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall

John Finney, conductor

Handel and Haydn Society Chorus Sponsored by

Boston Private Bank & Trust Company

Bach: Magnificat, BWV 243

Cantata No. 151, Süßer Trost, mein Jesus kömmt

Cantata No. 191, Gloria in excelsis Deo

6. Haydn’s Orfeo

Friday, January 23 at 8.00 pm

Sunday, January 25 at 3.00 pm

Symphony Hall

Sir Roger Norrington, conductor

Sarah Coburn, Euridice

Andrew Kennedy, Orfeo

Christopher Maltman, Creonte

Handel and Haydn Society Chorus

Haydn: L’anima del filosofo (Orfeo ed Euridice)

7. Haydn Symposium

Saturday, January 24 in the afternoon

Location: TBA

Sir Roger Norrington and Haydn scholars discuss the myth of Orfeo and L’anima del filosofo. Members of the Handel and Haydn Society join in a chamber music performance of Haydn’s works.

8. Baroque Grand Tour

Friday, February 27 at 8.00 pm

Sunday, March 1 at 3.00 pm

New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall

Paul Goodwin, conductor

Handel and Haydn Society Chorus

Couperin: Concert dans le goût théâtral

Purcell: Funeral Sentences; The Masque from Dioclesian

Bach: Brandenburg Concerto, No. 3

9. Noon Concert at the Boston Athenaeum

Thursday, March 5

10. Romantic Brahms

March 20 at 8.00 pm

March 22 at 8.00 pm

Symphony Hall

Grant Llewellyn, conductor

Ilya Gringolts, violin

Handel and Haydn Society Chorus

Mendelssohn: Violin Concerto in E Minor, Op. 64

Brahms: Symphony No. 1 in C Minor

Vignieri: Fanfare for Voices (Tribute to Handel; World Premiere)

11. Music at Fever Pitch

Friday, April 3 at 8.00 pm at Old South Church

Sunday, April 5 at 3.00 pm at New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall

Jean-Marie Zeitouni, conductor

Phoebe Carrai, cello

Telemann: Burlesque de Don Quixote

C.P.E. Bach: Cello Concerto in A Major

Handel: Concerto Grosso in G Minor, Op. 6, No. 6

Rebel: Les Élémens

12. Haydn in London

Friday, April 24 at 8.00 pm

Sunday, April 26 at 3.00 pm

Symphony Hall

Sir Roger Norrington, conductor

Nathalie Paulin, soprano

Haydn: Symphony No. 99 in E-flat Major

Cantata: Scena di Berenice for soprano and orchestra

March for the Prince of Wales

Adagio from Divertimento for nine instruments in F Major

English Songs: “Sailor's Song,” “Sympathy,” “She Never Told Her Love,” “Fidelity”

Symphony No. 92 in G Major, “Oxford”

13. Haydn Symposium

Saturday, April 25 in the afternoon

Location: TBA

Sir Roger Norrington and Haydn scholars discuss Haydn’s London period and its influence on his later work. Members of the Handel and Haydn Society join in a chamber music performance of Haydn’s works.

14. Gala Benefit: “The Society Ball”

Saturday, April 25

15. Haydn: The Creation

Sunday, May 31 at 3.00 pm

The Hatch Shell on the Esplanade, Boston

Grant Llewellyn, conductor

Elizabeth Watts, soprano

Stanford Olsen, tenor

Eric Owens, bass

Handel and Haydn Society Chorus

Pre-concert performance by the Handel and Haydn Society Youth Choruses

All programs and artists are subject to change.

NEC's "Sick Puppy" Presents Seminars, Week of Free Public New Music Concerts

NEC’s Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice (SICPP) Features Composer-in-Residence Jo Kondo, June 16-22

Pianist Aki Takahashi is Guest Artist

"Each sound must have its own entity and life. What I am doing in my compositions is to create a web of intertonal relationships, while trying to safeguard the possibility of aurally perceiving the individual entity and life of every single tone in that relationship." - Jo Kondo

Jo Kondo, arguably Japan’s most eminent composer who has described his music as “the art of being ambiguous,” will be BnG Foundation Composer-in-residence at this year’s Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice (fondly and forever known as “Sick Puppy”). Under the artistic direction of pianist Stephen Drury, the Institute takes place June 16—20 at New England Conservatory. It will also feature pianist Aki Takahashi as guest artist.

SICPP is an intensive performance seminar on new music for advanced pianists, percussionists, and instrumentalists. This year’s faculty features Kondo, Takahashi, and Drury, along with pianists Louis Goldstein and Yukiko Takagi; percussionists Scott Deal and Mathias Reumert; and voice faculty Pamela Wood.

Along with the daytime workshops offered to registered students, SICPP will also present free public concerts every evening in NEC’s Jordan Hall or Williams Hall. The concerts will highlight Kondo’s music and feature performances by the faculty and the Callithumpian Consort. Student compositions and other works will be featured in the marathon concert June 21.

The Summer Institute for Contemporary Performance Practice is made possible by a generous grant from the BnG Foundation, The Gaudemus Foundation, Nomura, and Mode Records.

Biographies

Born in Tokyo in 1947, Jo Kondo graduated from the composition department of Tokyo University of Arts in 1972. He spent a year in New York on a scholarship from the John D. Rockefeller III Fund in 1977-78. In 1979 he taught as guest lecturer at University of Victoria, British Columbia, invited by the Canada Council, and in 1986 resided in London as a British Council Senior Fellow. In 1987 he was composer in residence at Hartt School of Music, Hartford, Connecticut, USA, and taught at Dartington International Summer School in England. At present he is Professor of Music at Ochanomizu University in Tokyo, and also teaches at Tokyo University of Arts and Elisabeth University of Music in Hiroshima.

In 1980 Kondo founded the Musica Practica Ensemble, a chamber orchestra devoted to contemporary music, and was artistic director of the group until its disbandment in 1991.

He has written more than eighty compositions, ranging from solo pieces to orchestral and electronic works, which have been widely performed in Japan, North America and Europe and recorded on Hat Art, ALM, Fontec Deutsche Grammophon and other labels. He has received commissions from numerous organisations, and his music has been featured at many international music festivals. Performers associated with his music include the conductor Tadaaki Otaka, the pianist Aki Takahashi, the Ives and Nieuw Ensembles in the Netherlands, the London Sinfonietta and many others.

Kondo has written extensively on musical matters, and since 1979 he has published four books spelling out in detail his own aesthetic and compositional ideas. He is also an associate editor of Contemporary Music Review. During 2000 he directed the composition classes at the Dartington International School of Music and was on the jury of the Gaudeamus International Composer's competition, and was a featured composer at the 2005 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival.

Pianist Aki Takahashi, is a new music interpreter who has attracted the attention of many composers. Cage, Feldman, Takemitsu, Yun, Oliveros, Ruders, Satoh, Lucier and Garland, to name a few, have all created works for her.
Ms. Takahashi received the first Kenzo Nakajima prize in 1982, and was recipient of the first Kyoto Music Award (1986). She directed the "New Ears" concert series in Yokohama (1983-97), was artist-in-residence at SUNY Buffalo (1980-81) and guest professor at the California Institute of the Arts (1984).
Her landmark recording of 20 contemporary piano works, Aki Takahashi Piano Space, received the Merit Prize at the Japan Art Festival (1973). Her series of Erik Satie concerts (1975-77) heralded a Satie boom in Japan, resulting in her editing all of his piano works for Zen-On and recording them on Toshiba-EMI. She created the Hyper-Beatles project with Toshiba, which invited 47 international composers to arrange/recompose their favorite Beatles tunes.

Concert Schedule:

Monday, June 16

8 p.m. NEC’s Jordan Hall

Aki Takahashi, piano

Callithumpian Consort

Iannis Xenakis: Morsima-Amorsima, for piano and strings

Erik Satie: Nocturnes

Morton Feldman: Extensions 3

Christian Wolff: Pianist: Pieces.

Tuesday, June 17

8 p.m. NEC’s Williams Hall

SICPP Faculty members

Nicholas Vines: Terraformation: Sonata for Piano with Yukiko Takagi, piano

Helmut Lachenmann: Allegro Sostenuto

Brian Ferneyhough: Terrain by with violinist Gabriela Diaz and the Callithumpian Consort

Andrew Estel: Scrape the Colour with Louis Goldstein, piano.

Wednesday, June 18

8 p.m., NEC’s Williams Hall

Recital by Stephen Drury, piano

Jo Kondo: A Dance for Piano, "Europeans"

Helmut Lachenmann: Serynade

John Zorn: Fay Ce Que Vouldras

Toshio Hosokawa: Nacht Klange.

Thursday, June 19

8 p.m. NEC’s Williams Hall

Performances by SICPP faculty.

Jo Kondo: Aquarelle for piano and percussion, and Dithyramb for flute and guitar. Toshio Hosokawa's Lied for flute and piano

James Romig: Piano Sonata

Stephen Mosko: Rendering

Friday, June 20

8 p.m. NEC’s Jordan Hall

Percussion extravaganza!

Jo Kondo: Pendulums with Nicholas Tolle, percussion, and Trio (Moor) for viola, bassoon, and piano.

Dorothy Hindman: new percussion work with Scott Deal, percussion

Brian Ferneyhough: Bone Alphabet

Christina Viola Oorebeek: Edges with Mathias Reumert, percussion

Steve Reich: Sextet.

Saturday, June 21

4 p.m. NEC’s Brown Hall

The legendary SICPP Iditarod! Six hours of new music, performed by the faculty and fellows of SICPP!

Jo Kondo: Luster Gave Her the Hat And He And Ben Went Across the Backyard, Strands II (for three pianos), Standing, An Elder's Hocket, The Shape Follows Its Shadow, and Under the Umbrella

New works by: Liza White, Megan Beugger, David Carter, Juhi Bansal, Marti Epstein, Mischa Salkind-Pearl, and David Grant

Frederic Rzewski: Moonrise with Memories and Bring Them Home!

Lee Hyla: We Speak Etruscan

George Crumb: Voice of the Whale and Madrigals

Louis Andriessen: Workers Union;

Toru Takemitsu: Toward the Sea;

Helmut Lachenmann: temA;

Giacinto Scelsi: Okanagon;

Niels Roensholdt: Hammerfall;

Tan Dun: Elegy: Snow in June for cello solo and four percussionists;

Luciano Berio: Linnea;

Michael Finnissy: Post-Christian Survival Kit

For further information, check the NEC Website www.newenglandconservatory.edu/concerts, the SICPP website www.sicpp.org or call the NEC Concert Line at 617-585-1122. NEC’s Jordan Hall, Brown Hall, Williams Hall and the Keller Room are located at 30 Gainsborough St., corner of Huntington Ave. St. Botolph Hall is located at 241 St. Botolph St. between Gainsborough and Mass Ave.

[Boston] HANDEL AND HAYDN SOCIETY presents ROYAL FIREWORKS! - Jan 25 & 27, 2008

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Nina J. Berger, 617.971.9340, ninajberger@hotmail.com

HANDEL AND HAYDN SOCIETY PRESENTS ROYAL FIREWORKS!

WHEN: Friday, January 25, 8:00 PM
Sunday, January 27, 3:00 PM

WHERE: Symphony Hall, 301 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston

WHAT: After a triumphant Boston debut conducting the Handel and Haydn Society in Handel's Messiah, British conductor Harry Christophers returns to lead a program of Baroque masterpieces by Handel, Purcell, and Bach. Inspired by or composed for the royal court, these orchestral works - some of the Baroque period's most beloved repertoire - create a program full of celebration and royal pageantry.

George Frideric Handel's most famous instrumental compositions will be presented on the program - his Royal Fireworks Music and Water Music Suite in D major. Fireworks was composed to celebrate the 1749 treaty ending the War of Spanish Succession, and debuted in London with a 101-canon salute and a spectacular fireworks display. Recreating the splendor of a night in 1717 when King George II sailed on the River Thames, the Water Music Suite No. 3 is one of the more intimate and charming of Handel's orchestral works. Handel and Haydn Society's period orchestra last performed this work at the Haydn Festival in Eisenstadt, Austria, in September 2006, also under Harry Christophers' direction.

Johann Sebastian Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 3 (1731), composed for his patron, Prince Leopold, is best known for its second movement, the "Air on the G String." The Handel and Haydn Society first performed this work at the Boston Music Hall in May 1871 and offered its most recent performances in 1994.

The Fairy Queen (1692) is Henry Purcell's delightful semi-operatic adaptation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream , which he is thought to have composed for the wedding anniversary of King William III and Mary II. The seven selections on the Handel and Haydn program include Symphony from Act IV; Prelude, Hornpipe and Rondeau from First Music; Symphony While the Swans Come Forward; Dance for the Fairies; Dance for the Green Men from Act II; and finally, Chaconne-Dance for A Chinese Man and Woman, from Act V.

HANDEL: Water Music, Suite No. 3
BACH: Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D major, BWV 1068
HANDEL: Royal Fireworks Music, HWV 351
PURCELL: Selections from The Fairy Queen, Z.629

WHO: Harry Christophers, conductor (Photos and full biography available upon request)

HOW: Tickets: $15-$67 can be ordered 1) by phone at 617-266-3605, 2) online at www.handelandhaydn.org, or 3) in person at Horticultural Hall, 300 Massachusetts Avenue, Boston (M-F 10am-6pm).

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Harry Christophers, founder and conductor of the acclaimed British ensemble The Sixteen, made his American debut with the Handel and Haydn Society in the 2007 performances of Handel's Messiah. Christophers first conducted the ensemble in 2006 at the Haydn Festival in Eisenstadt, Austria. In addition to touring throughout Europe, America and the Far East with The Sixteen, Mr. Christophers has performed at some of the world's most prestigious festivals including Salzburg, Mostly Mozart in New York, the BBC Proms, and the Prague Spring Festival. He has won numerous awards, including a Grand Prix du Disque for Handel's Messiah, the coveted Gramophone Award for Early Music, and the prestigious Classical Brit Award 2005 for his disc entitled Renaissance. As a guest conductor, Christophers enjoys a very special partnership with the BBC Philharmonic including a disc of American-inspired works by Ives, Stravinsky, Poulenc and Tippett which won a Diapason d'Or. He is a regular guest conductor with the Deutsches Kammerphilharmonie, City of London Sinfonia, the Granada Symphony Orchestra and the Orquestra de la Comunidad de Madrid. In demand as an orchestra, choral and opera conductor, he recently made his debut with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, English National Opera, the London Symphony Orchestra and San Francisco Symphony.