Press Release – Spring Strings – 3.19.22

Wednesday, February 23, 2022

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

Spring Strings
Saturday, March 19, 2022, 7:30pm
Garde Arts Center, 325 State St., New London, CT 06320

ECSO’s 75th anniversary season continues with Franz Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 75, completed in 1781. The composer of an astounding 107 symphonies, “Papa” Haydn is considered the father of the four-movement form, expanded by his sometime pupil Ludwig van Beethoven, whose nine symphonies are the heart of the repertoire. Spanish composer Joaquín Rodrigo’s 1939 work for classical guitar and orchestra, Concierto de Aranjuez, was inspired by the centuries-old gardens at a royal palace south of Madrid.

This performance, postponed from March of 2020, marks the ECSO debut of soloist Jason Vieaux, co-founder of the guitar department at Philadelphia’s prestigious Curtis Institute of Music and winner of the 2015 Grammy Award for Best Classical Instrumental Solo. George Walker, composer of Lyric for Strings, which follows, was the first African American graduate of the Curtis Institute and the first African American to appear with the Philadelphia Orchestra. Expanded from a piece composed at Curtis, Lyric for Strings is dedicated to Walker’s formerly enslaved grandmother. After intermission, a rare treat: Georges Bizet’s Symphony No. 1, written when the composer of Carmen was a 17-year-old student of Charles Gounod at the Paris Conservatory.

Covid Policy:

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.

About Jason Vieaux:

Grammy-winner Jason Vieaux, “among the elite of today’s classical guitarists” (Gramophone), is the guitarist that goes beyond the classical. His most recent solo album, Play, won the 2015 Grammy Award for Best Classical Instrumental Solo.

Jason Vieaux has performed as soloist with over 100 orchestras in the U.S. and abroad. Additional recent and future highlights include performances at Caramoor Festival as Artist-in-Residence, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, the National Gallery of Art, San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre, Buenos Aires’ Teatro Colon, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, New York’s 92Y, Ravinia Festival, Domaine Forget International Festival, Carmel Bach Festival, and many other distinguished series. A first-rate chamber musician and programmer, he frequently collaborates with artists such as the Escher Quartet, harpist Yolanda Kondonassis, accordion/bandoneon virtuoso Julien Labro, and violinist Anne Akiko Meyers. His passion for new music has fostered premieres by Jonathan Leshnoff, Avner Dorman, Jeff Beal, Dan Visconti, David Ludwig, Vivian Fung, José Luis Merlin, Mark Mancina, and more. 

Vieaux’s latest CD release, Dance (Azica) with the Escher Quartet, includes works by Boccherini, Castelnuovo-Tedesco, and Aaron Jay Kernis. Later this season, he will release a new solo Bach album on Azica. Additional recordings include Jonathan Leshnoff’s Guitar Concerto with the Nashville Symphony Orchestra (Naxos); Jeff Beal’s “Six Sixteen” Guitar Concerto with the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra (BIS); Infusion (Azica) with accordionist/bandoneonist Julien Labro; Ginastera’s Guitar Sonata, which is featured on Ginastera: One Hundred (Oberlin Music) produced by harpist Yolanda Kondonassis; and Together (Azica), a duo album with Kondonassis.

In 2012, the Jason Vieaux School of Classical Guitar was launched with ArtistWorks Inc., an interface that provides one-on-one online study with Vieaux for guitar students around the world. In 2011, he co-founded the guitar department at the Curtis Institute of Music, and in 2015 was invited to inaugurate the guitar program at the Eastern Music Festival. Vieaux has taught at the Cleveland Institute of Music since 1997, heading the guitar department since 2001. He has received a Naumburg Foundation top prize, a Cleveland Institute of Music Distinguished Alumni Award, GFA International Guitar Competition First Prize, and a Salon di Virtuosi Career Grant. His primary teachers were Jeremy Sparks and John Holmquist. Vieaux was the first classical musician to be featured on NPR’s “Tiny Desk” series. Jason Vieaux plays a 2013 Gernot Wagner guitar with Augustine strings.

For more information, visit www.jasonvieaux.com.

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 by Norwegian immigrant, Victor Norman, the mission of the Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra is to inspire, educate, and connect our communities through live orchestral music.