Press Release – Heroic Celebrations – 11.20.21
Monday, November 8, 2021
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: CALEB BAILEY, 860-443-2876, [email protected]
Click here for downloadable .pdf version
Check out our full 75th Anniversary Season Brochure
Heroic Celebrations – Saturday, November 20, 2021, 7:30pm
Garde Arts Center, 325 State St., New London, CT 06320
Front-line workers join the ECSO as special guests to open the second concert of its 75th anniversary season with You Raise Me Up, popularized in this country by Josh Groban’s 2003 cover version. Next comes Danse Nègre, the final movement of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s African Suite of 1898. The son of an English woman and a surgeon from Sierra Leone—descended from enslaved Africans freed by the British during the American War of Independence—Coleridge-Taylor studied at London’s Royal College of Music, made three tours of the U.S., and was received at the White House by Teddy Roosevelt.
Closing out the first half is the world premiere of Tom Myron’s Bell Harbor, the second of the Massachusetts-based composer’s works to be performed by the ECSO, following Katahdin: Greatest Mountain in 2010. Myron states, “I am extremely pleased and happy to be working with the Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra on the premieres of Bell Harbor and the 75th anniversary New London Skyline Fanfare. Toshiyuki Shimada has been both an advocate of my music and a great personal friend for more than 25 years. I think of him whenever I write for orchestra and these two works speak directly to that ongoing friendship and musical collaboration. I’ve been listening to the ECSO for 10 years now and I admire them tremendously. They are a superb, highly dedicated ensemble with a terrific venue. I know that each member of this orchestra will bring great color and artistry to the music that I have written.”
The evening’s concluding work is Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5. Composed in 1888, with Tchaikovsky on the podium for its premiere in Saint Petersburg, it was performed in that renamed city during the Nazi siege of Leningrad, even as bombs began to fall at the start of the second movement.
COVID-19 protocols:
In order to safely celebrate our 75th anniversary season, we are implementing new concert attendance guidelines. All audience members will need to provide proof of a full course of vaccination for COVID-19 or a negative COVID-19 PCR test taken within 72 hours from the start of the concert. Items you should bring for admission to the hall includes a photo ID, photo or copy of your vaccination card, OR a photo, text, or email of a negative test result, where applicable. Masks will be required indoors at all times unless actively eating or drinking. Anyone unable or unwilling to comply with these guidelines may be asked to leave the concert, however refunds will be available in such cases.
Additionally, there will be no pre-concert chats in the hall or post-concert receptions in the upper lobby as there have been in the past until it is deemed safe to resume these once more. These guidelines are subject to change as the circumstances require and if government and venue recommendations evolve.
ECSO general copy:
We are thrilled to announce our 75th Anniversary Season’s lineup, curated by Music Director and Conductor Toshiyuki Shimada. This season marks the 12th year under the musical leadership of Music Director and Conductor Toshiyuki Shimada.
Visit www.ectsymphony.com for more information and follow us on social media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube) @ectsymphony
The ECSO offers a range of affordable seating options from $65 to as low as $12 for attendance to one concert. The ECSO will continue to offer those under 40 years of age and active or retired military members $12 tickets in premium sections.
Founded in 1946, the mission of the Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra is to inspire, educate, and connect our communities through live orchestral music.