Coming in October

Join the GSO for its 2010-2011 season premier! The GSO will be performing Grieg's In Autumn, Glazunov's "Autumn" from The Seasons, Vaughan Williams' Tuba Concerto in F Minor, and Brahms' Symphony No. 2 in D Major, to name a few!
Friday, October 22nd, 2010
8:00pm
Patty Granville Arts Center

Coming in November

The GSO will be performing Piazolla's "Otoņo Porteņo" (Buenos Aires Autumn), Mozart's Symphony No. 36 in C Major "Linz", Beethoven's Concerto for Violin, Cello, and Piano. This performance will also feature Vivaldi's "Autumn" from The Four Seasons.
Friday, November 19th, 2010
8:00pm
Patty Granville Arts Center
October November December January February March April May > This Season
Friday, May 6th, 2011 | 8:00pm | Patty Granville Arts Center

This performance will feature:

Susan Demetris, violin

Antonio Vivaldi – “Summer (L’estate)” from The Four Seasons (Le Quattro stagioni), Op. 8, No. 2 

Timing:  10’37

The Four Seasons (Le quattro stagioni) is a set of four violin concertos by Vivaldi. Composed in 1723, The Four Seasons is Vivaldi's best-known work, and is among the most popular pieces of  Baroque music.  The texture of each concerto is varied, each resembling its respective season. For example, "Winter" is peppered with silvery staccato notes from the high strings, calling to mind icy rain, whereas "Summer" evokes a thunderstorm in its final movement, which is why the movement is often dubbed "Storm."

The concertos were first published in 1725 as part of a set of twelve concerti, Vivaldi's Op. 8, entitled Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione (The Contest between Harmony and Invention). The first four concertos were designated Le quattro stagioni, each being named after a season. Each one is in three movements, with a slow movement between two faster ones. At the time of writing The Four Seasons, the modern solo form of the concerto had not yet been defined (typically a solo instrument and accompanying orchestra). Vivaldi's original arrangement for solo violin with string quartet and basso continuo helped to define the form.
  • Concerto No. 1 in E Major, Op. 8, RV 269, "La primavera" (Spring)
    1. Allegro
    2. Largo
    3. Allegro Pastorale
  • Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, Op. 8, RV 315, "L'estate" (Summer)
    1. Allegro non molto
    2. Adagio e piano - Presto e forte
    3. Presto
  • Concerto No. 3 in F Major, Op. 8, RV 293, "L'autunno" (Autumn)
    1. Allegro
    2. Adagio molto
    3. Allegro
  • Concerto No. 4 in F Minor, Op. 8, RV 297, "L'inverno" (Winter)
    1. Allegro non molto
    2. Largo
    3. Allegro

Hugo Alfven ­ - Midsommarvarka (Mid Summer Vigil), Op. 19      

Timing:  13’30

The first rhapsody - Swedish Rhapsody No. 1, also known as Midsommarvarka (Midsummer Vigil) - was written in 1903 and is often simply called the "Swedish Rhapsody." It is the best-known piece composed by Hugo Alfvén, and also one of the best-known pieces of music in Sweden.There are several pop culture references to the main theme of Alfvén's "Swedish Rhapsody No. 1":
  • It was arranged and recorded as a finger style guitar solo in 1957 by American guitarist Chet Atkins, and became one of Atkins' best-known recordings.
  • The original version of a popular song "Mah Nà Mah Nà" interpolates its melody.
  • It is featured in The Simpsons episode Little Orphan Millie erroneously depicting Danish culture.
  • The melody has been used on ice cream vans in some parts of the United Kingdom.
  • The melody is used throughout The Wiggles Big Big Show.
  • It is featured in the film Matchstick Men.
  • An arrangement, formed from a couple of bars, was used as the interval signal for a German language numbers station as recently as 2009. As a result, the station is known as the "Swedish Rhapsody" station.
Anton Webern – Im Sommerwind (In the Summer Wind)              

Timing:  14’48

Anton Webern (3 December 1883 – 15 September 1945) was an Austrian composer and conductor. He was a member of the Second Viennese School. As a student and significant follower of Arnold Schoenberg, he became one of the best-known exponents of the twelve-tone technique; in addition, his innovations regarding schematic organization of pitch, rhythm and dynamics were formative in the musical technique later known as total serialism.
Richard Wagner – Ride of the Valkyries
Igor Stravinsky – The Rite of Spring                      

Timing:  33’

The Rite of Spring, original French title, Le sacre du printemps, is a 1913 ballet with music by the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky, original choreography by Vaslav Nijinsky, and original set design and costumes by archaeologist and painter Nicholas Roerich, all under impresario Serge Diaghilev. The music's innovative complex rhythmic structures, timbres, and use of dissonance have made it a seminal 20th century composition.The composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein said of one passage, "That page is sixty years old, but it's never been topped for sophisticated handling of primitive rhythms...", and of the work as a whole, "...it's also got the best dissonances anyone ever thought up, and the best asymmetries and polytonalities and polyrhythms and whatever else you care to name."