El Paso Symphony ends season with a bang, special guests

El Paso Symphony ends season with a bang, special guests

 

“Holy Cow! There’s no room to hide on this program! It is nothing but fantastic music!”

 

That’s how this weekend’s El Paso Symphony Orchestra guest artist, renowned timpanist Dr. Andrew Spencer, reacted by phone last week when I told him about the program for the season’s last concert: Daugherty’s “Raise the Roof for Timpani and Orchestra!” Bernstein’s “Candide!” Shostakovich’s “Fifth Symphony!”

 

No one is going to get drowsy Friday or Saturday. Be ready to be thrilled.

 

Spencer went on to say just what would make the music selected by our amazing new conductor, Bohuslav Rattay, so exciting for listeners.

 

“‘Raise the Roof’ has this ripping brass, soaring string lines, and, of course, the timpani has five million notes, thank you very much, Mr. Daugherty,” he laughed. “The crowd’s reactions to the piece are always just fantastic.”

 

He added, “‘Candide’ is typical Bernstein – bright and flashy, flamboyantly wonderful and fun music. Everyone in the orchestra loves playing this piece. The Shostakovich is an out-and-out masterpiece – it has one of the most gloriously beautiful third movements that you’ll ever hear in your life and one of the most stirring fourth movements that will get you jumping out of your seat.”

 

Making this weekend’s concert even more special will be the presence of one of the most commissioned, most performed, and most recorded composers of our time, multiple Grammy Award-winner Dr. Michael Daugherty.

 

He’ll be there to watch the El Paso premiere of his popular 2003 piece, commissioned by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. He’s flying in Thursday to attend the last rehearsal and meet the musicians as they prepare his “Raise the Roof” and offer notes or answer questions.

 

“One of the things that I’ll do is sit in the audience and listen to the balance of the various instruments and make suggestions,” he says. “I can be like a mixing board for the orchestra.”

 

Then at 6:30 before the concert on Friday and Saturday, Daugherty will share his thoughts at the pre-concert talk given by the symphony’s resident conductor, Andy Moran, in the Philanthropy Theatre at the Plaza.

 

Daugherty has released 16 CDs and created almost a new genre of music inspired by American icons and popular culture.

 

“Raise the Roof” was written to evoke the Empire State Building and the high ceiling of Notre Dame. His opera “Jackie O,” commissioned by the Houston Grand Opera, was inspired by the life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and 1960s popular culture.

 

“Many people who listen to contemporary music find that it sounds like a foreign language – there was no way for them to connect to the music,” he explains.

 

“By having these metaphors – or icons and references – it provides the key for the listener to open the door and be involved in the process of having the piece performed.”

 

This weekend’s visit to El Paso isn’t his only connection to our city: the National Symphony Orchestra has commissioned him to write a cello concerto inspired by the life of Ernest Hemingway and has tapped Zuill Bailey to perform it at the premiere in Washington, D.C., next year!

 

This weekend also won’t be the first time the composer has worked with Rattay and Spencer. Last year he attended a performance of “Raise the Roof” with Michigan’s Midland Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Rattay in his first season as musical director there, and performed by Spencer, principal percussionist with the symphony.

 

Incidentally, this weekend is not Spencer’s first El Paso visit. His grandparents lived here and he visited often. He played in the Sun Bowl in 1976 with his high school band from Denver.

 

Spencer is delighted to have a piece composed for the timpani, which he has been playing in a number of orchestras since he was 16. “It’s only the world’s greatest instrument,” he says, laughing. “The bug hit me immediately when I realized what an important voice the timpani has in the orchestra as a whole. There’s nothing like sitting in the back of the orchestra playing a Beethoven symphony and just driving the bus from that back seat.”

 

Come out and enjoy how Maestro Rattay can make this weekend’s concerts wicked fun for all of us. He’s ending his inaugural season on a high note!

 

Youthful ‘Don Quixote’

The stars must be shining on the El Paso Youth Ballet, thought Marta Katz, director of the young company and the El Paso Conservatory of Dance, the day their new choreographer knocked on the door.

 

Reniel Basail, a recent immigrant from Cuba and graduate of Cuba’s Escuela Nacional de Ballet, showed up one day out of the blue with two other Cuban dancers.

 

Then, after Katz made the decision to undertake the rarely performed ballet of “Don Quixote,” they were able to buy costumes and borrow sets used by the influential Ballet de Monterey.

 

The results of their good fortune can be seen this weekend when the El Paso Youth Ballet presents the ballet virtually in its entirety in what may be the first time ever in El Paso.

 

“It’s lively, it’s beautiful, and it’s very Spanish,” says Katz. “While variations have been performed in recitals, it’s possible that it has not been performed here, or at least not in recent memory.”

 

The 20 members of the Youth Ballet will be joined by 10 male dancers, including two from Cuba, one from Monterrey, and six from Cordova, Mexico. Graceful El Pasoan Leslie Lopez will perform the female lead of Kitri and Daymel Sanchez from Cuba, a former principal with the National Ballet of Mexico City and the Miami Ballet, will dance the role of Basilio. Two local actors will play the non-dancing roles of Don Quixote (Fonzie Johnson) and Sancho Panza (UTEP professor Brian Giza).

 

In addition to “Don Quixote,” which runs a little over an hour, the dancers will perform a new original contemporary production, “Outside the Box,” creatively choreographed by Basail to the beautiful music of Dulce Ponte, Vangeli and sounds of nature.

 

“It’s a tribute to women,” Katz says of the piece that is around 20 minutes long. “Reniel was inspired by the women in his life in Cuba.”