The Fox Valley Symphony Orchestra was awarded a grant
from the National Endowment for the Arts to support outreach activities
associated with our upcoming concert featuring Grammy-nominated composer and
trombonist Chris Brubeck.
The $10,000 “Challenge America” grant will underwrite the
costs for Brubeck and Fox Valley Symphony Orchestra musicians to share the
music of modern American legends with veterans and audiences in rural areas, as
well as support Brubeck’s appearance with at the symphony’s February 3 concert
at the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center’s Thrivent Financial Hall.
Brubeck’s outreach events will include an interactive
workshop at the Gerold Opera House in Weyauwega focusing on performance and
music composition with band students from the Weyauwega area. He’ll follow that up with a lecture and performance
at the Wisconsin Veterans Home at King. The
FVSO’s Brass Circle quintet will accompany Brubeck at both appearances.
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| Photo Credit: Stephane Colbert |
“Working with the local youth is part of our mission.
Helping to provide the opportunity to be inspired and informed by Chris Brubeck
and members of the symphony is very exciting,” said Kathy Fehl, Artistic
Director of WEGA Arts. “The effort to
work with us and other places in the area is wonderful; encouraging kids to
consider a life in the arts is very important.”
Brubeck said he hopes that he can contribute to the creative
spirit in the young music students.
“We still live in a society where a creative thinker,
player, visual artist, dancer, film maker, author or singer can still have a
significant impact. If I can connect with, encourage and inspire one young
person to pursue their dreams then I feel that the mission was
accomplished,” said Brubeck. “The Arts are a reminder of our wonderful human
potential.”
Brubeck’s performance at the Veteran’s Home at King inspired
some memories of his father, jazz musician and composer, Dave Brubeck.
“Through the years, my Dad told me many stories about his
going into hospitals and playing music for Veterans which seemed to connect
with them in a special way,” said Chris Brubeck. “If the Vets can't come to a
concert, I am happy to go to see them and reach out through music.”
On February 3, Brubeck will be featured as the guest artist
for the symphony’s “Modern American Legends” concert. He will also participate in a discussion with
FVSO’s Sandra Lemke & Monroe Trout Music Director Brian Groner before the
concert in the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center’s Kimberly-Clark Theater.
The NEA Challenge America grant program offers support for
projects that extend the reach of the arts to those whose opportunities to
experience the arts are limited by geography, ethnicity, economics, or
disability.
ABOUT THE National
Endowment for the Arts
Established by Congress in 1965, the NEA is the independent
federal agency whose funding and support gives Americans the opportunity to
participate in the arts, exercise their imaginations, and develop their
creative capacities. Through partnerships with state arts agencies, local
leaders, other federal agencies, and the philanthropic sector, the NEA supports
arts learning, affirms and celebrates America’s rich and diverse cultural
heritage, and extends its work to promote equal access to the arts in every
community across America. Visit arts.gov to
learn more about NEA. (Source, arts.gov/news)
ABOUT Chris Brubeck
Grammy-nominated
composer Chris Brubeck continues to
distinguish himself as a multi-faceted performer and creative force. An award-winning writer, he is clearly tuned
into the pulse of contemporary music. The respected music critic for The
Chicago Tribune, John von Rhein calls Chris: “a composer with a real flair for lyrical
melody--a 21st Century Lenny Bernstein.”
Chris has created an impressive body of symphonic work
while maintaining a demanding touring and recording schedule with his two
groups: the Brubeck Brothers Quartet
(with brother Dan on drums), and Triple Play, an acoustic trio featuring Chris
on piano, bass and trombone along with guitarist Joel Brown and harmonica player
extraordinaire Peter Madcat Ruth. Additionally, Chris performs as a soloist
playing his trombone concertos with orchestras and has served as Artist in
Residence with orchestras and colleges in America, coaching, lecturing, and
performing with students and faculty.
Chris is a much sought-after composer, and has been
commissioned to write many innovative works. Current projects include a
concerto for the Canadian Brass Quintet to be premiered with the Lexington
Philharmonic in November 2017. As
Composer in Residence with the New Haven Symphony, Chris premiered Time Changes
for Jazz Combo and Orchestra. He had two
new commissions premiere in 2016:
"Fanfare for a Remarkable Friend" and "Sphere of
Influence". His "Affinity:
Concerto for Guitar & Orchestra" was written for celebrated guitarist
Sharon Isbin, and premiered in April, 2015.
To commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Allied Liberation of France
in June, 2014, Chris and French composer Guillaume Saint-James wrote Brothers
in Arts: 70 Years of Liberty, which premiered to much acclaim in Rennes,
France. Chris's long list of commissions are varied and range from a
Russian-American cooperative project commissioned by the Hermitage Museum and
the National Gallery ("The Hermitage Cats Save the Day"), to the
Kennedy Center for the National Symphony Orchestra; to concertos written for
violinist Nick Kendall; the exciting trio Time for Three, a song cycle for
Frederica von Stade ("River of Song") as well as many chamber and
orchestral pieces commissioned by the Concord Chamber Music Society, the Muir
String Quartet, 3 commissions from The Boston Pops, and multiple commissions
from consortiums including The Boston Pops, Baltimore Symphony, Colorado Music
Festival in Boulder, Indianapolis Symphony, Portland Symphony, Oakland East Bay
Symphony, and many others.
His highly acclaimed Concerto for Bass Trombone and
Orchestra, has been played by many of the top bass trombonists in the world and
was recorded with Chris as soloist with the London Symphony Orchestra. It can be heard on the Koch International
Classics recording "Bach to Brubeck".
He also wrote a second trombone concerto, The Prague Concerto which he
premiered and recorded with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra on the Koch
cd, "Convergence". Reviewing
that disc, Fanfare Magazine wrote "Brubeck's skill both as composer and
soloist is extraordinary." April, 2009 saw the premiere of “Ansel Adams:
America”, an exciting orchestral piece written by Chris and Dave Brubeck. It was commissioned by a consortium of eight
orchestras and is accompanied by 100 of Ansel Adams’ majestic images projected
above the orchestra. In 2013,
"Ansel Adams: America" was nominated for a Grammy for Best
Instrumental Composition.
Join us for the Concert on Saturday:
February
3 at 6:40 pm: Pre-show lecture in the
Kimberly-Clark Theatre at the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center.
February
3 at 7:30 pm: Concert with the Fox
Valley Symphony in Thrivent Hall at the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center.
