|
|
Berkeley Symphony Concludes 2013-2014 Season with Two Bay Area Premieres and Benefit Gala
|
Known as “the Bay Area’s most adventurous orchestra” (Contra Costa Times), Berkeley Symphony has been recognized with the ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming in seven out of the last ten years. The orchestra supports local composers through its Under Construction New Music Reading Series. It also runs a year-long, award-winning Music in the Schools program, providing 4,000 local students with the experience of becoming a performer each year. Berkeley Symphony was founded in 1969 as the Berkeley Promenade Orchestra by Thomas Rarick, a protégé of the great English Maestro Sir Adrian Boult. Reflecting the spirit of the times, the orchestra performed in street dress and at unusual locations such as the University Art Museum.
Kent Nagano became the music director of the orchestra in 1978. He charted a new course by offering innovative programming that included a number of rarely performed 20th-century scores. In 1981, the internationally renowned French composer Olivier Messiaen journeyed to Berkeley to assist with the preparations for his imposing oratorio The Transfiguration of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Nagano and the orchestra, joined by the composer’s wife, pianist Yvonne Loriod, gave a sold-out performance in Davies Symphony Hall. In 1984, the orchestra collaborated with Frank Zappa in a critically acclaimed production featuring life-size puppets and moving stage sets, catapulting Berkeley Symphony onto the world stage. Berkeley Symphony has introduced to Bay Area audiences works by upcoming young composers, many of whom have since achieved international prominence. Celebrated British composer George Benjamin, who subsequently became Composer-in-Residence at the San Francisco Symphony, was first introduced to the Bay Area in 1987 when Berkeley Symphony performed his compositions Jubilation and Ringed by the Flat Horizon; as was Thomas Adés, whose opera Powder Her Face was debuted by the orchestra in a concert version in 1997 before it was fully staged in New York City, London and Chicago. (learn more) |