The Arkansas Symphony Orchestra introduces a new three-concert chamber orchestra
series in Little Rock. ASO’s Stella Boyle Smith Intimate Neighborhood Concert
Series features an opportunity for concertgoers to hear works in unique
acoustical settings just like the composers intended.
“We are very excited to be able launch the new Stella
Boyle Smith I.N.C. Intimate Neighborhood Concert Series. Our mission is to
engage, inspire, connect, and advance Arkansas through the power of music. These
concerts achieve each point. Performing in
churches will allow the audience to hear the music of Mozart, Rossini and
Vaughan Williams in intimate spaces that allow the music to be felt, absorbed,
and experienced. To accommodate busy work weeks, these concerts will be short.
For those that want to socialize, the musicians will stay after the performance
to connect with the audience over refreshments,” said Christina Littlejohn,
Executive Director.
Capacity is limited. There will be two general admission
seating sections. Premium section subscriptions are $52.50 and Regular section
subscriptions are $37.50 for all three concerts. Single tickets are $35 and $25.
Tickets for students and active military are $10. Tickets can be purchased
online starting January 1, 2013 at
www.ArkansasSymphony.org, over the phone at (501) 666-1761, or
at the door.
2013 Stella Boyle Smith Intimate Neighborhood Concert
Series
January 17, at 7 p.m. Pulaski Heights Methodist
Church
Featuring Justin Bischof, organ
ROSSINI: Barber of Seville: Overture
POULENC: Concerto for Organ
IVES: The Unanswered Question
MOZART: Symphony No. 35 in D, “Haffner”
March 14, at 7 p.m. Christ Church
Featuring Quapaw Quartet, Rockefeller Quartet, and Beth
Wheeler, English horn
ELGAR: Introduction and Allegro, op. 47
HIGDON: Soliloquy
VAUGHN WILLIAMS: Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas
Tallis
BARTOK: Romanian Folk Dances
Mozart Requiem with Arkansas Chamber Singers: May
16, at 7 p.m. First United Methodist Church
Featuring Arkansas Chamber Singers with John Erwin, ACS
Music Director
MOZART: Requiem
Philip Mann, Music Director
Hailed by the BBC as a “talent to watch out for, who
conveys a mature command of his forces,” American conductor Philip Mann is
quickly gaining a worldwide reputation as an “expressively graceful yet
passionate” artist with a range spanning opera, symphonic repertoire, new music,
and experimental collaborations. Philip is in his third season as Music
Director of the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra, which has seen audience and
artistic growth, new energy, and financial health under his tenure. Formerly as
the San Diego Symphony’s Associate Conductor, he conducted hundreds of
performances of Jacobs Subscription Masterworks, Symphony Exposed, family, young
people’s concerts, Kinder Konzert, pops, and other special programs and
projects. As an American Conducting Fellow, the San Diego Union Tribune raved,
“Mann was masterful… a skilled musical architect, designing and executing a
beautifully paced interpretation, which seemed to spring from somewhere deep
within the music rather than superimposed upon it.”
As winner of the Vienna Philharmonic’s Karajan Fellowship
at the Salzburg Festival, Mann has relationships with orchestras and operas
worldwide: including the Cleveland Orchestra, l’Orchestre symphonique de Québec,
Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Georgian State Opera, and the National Symphony
of Cyprus. His recent Beethoven 9 was described as “Titanic” and his Canadian
debut with the OSQ was dubbed by Le Soleil as a “Tour de Force” and led to an
immediate reengagement in 2013. Other upcoming engagements include the Grand
Rapids Symphony, New Mexico Philharmonic, Little Orchestra Society of NY, and
the Georgian State Opera. Previously, the music director of the Oxford City
Opera and Oxford Pro Musica Chamber Orchestra, he has also held conducting
positions with the Music in the Mountains Festival and Indianapolis Symphony.
Mann has worked with leading artists such as Joshua Bell, Sharon Isbin, Dmitri
Alexeev, Midori, and Marvin Hamlisch and has given premiers of major composers
including John Corigliano, Jennifer Higdon, Michael Torke, Lucas Richman, and
many others. He maintains a lively schedule as a guest conductor having
conducted at New York’s Avery Fischer Hall and London’s Barbican Center.
Elected a Rhodes Scholar, Mann studied and taught at
Oxford, and has served as assistant conductor to Franz Welser-Möst, Simon
Rattle, Leonard Slatkin, Jaime Laredo, Mario Venzago, Bramwell Tovey, Pinchas
Zukerman, and many others. At Oxford, he won the annual competition to become
principal conductor of the Oxford University Philharmonia. Under his leadership,
the Philharmonia’s performances and tours received international press and
acclaim. Mann studied with Alan Hazeldine of London’s Guildhall School of Music
and Drama, Colin Metters at the Royal Academy of Music, and Marios Papadopolous
of the Oxford Philomusica. He worked with Leonard Slatkin and the National
Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center’s National Conducting Institute and
Michael Tilson Thomas at the New World Symphony. Mentorship with Esa-Pekka
Salonen and Jorma Panula followed at the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Conducting
Masterclasses, and Robert Spano with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s
international Mozart Requiem masterclass for the League of American Orchestras
annual conference. He has also worked under Imre Pallo, David Effron, John
Poole, and Thomas Baldner at Indiana University, where he was appointed visiting
lecturer in orchestral conducting, and worked as assistant conductor at the IU
Opera Theater. Additional studies came under the Bolshoi Theater’s music
director, Alexander Vedernikov at the Moscow State Conservatory, Gustav Meir,
Kenneth Keisler, and with Pulitzer Prize winning composer Robert Ward. He is the
recipient of numerous awards including commendations from several cities, and
the state of California.
Arkansas Symphony
Orchestra
The Arkansas Symphony Orchestra celebrates its
47th season in 2012-2013 under the leadership of Music Director
Philip Mann. ASO is the resident orchestra of Robinson Center Music Hall, and
performs more than thirty concerts each year for more than 42,000 people through
its Stella Boyle Smith Masterworks Series, ACXIOM Pops LIVE! Series and River
Rhapsodies Chamber Series, in addition to serving central Arkansas through
numerous community outreach programs and bringing live symphonic music education
to over 24,000 school children and over 200 schools.
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