FALL/WINTER 2020
A special newsletter for our Mann family
TOGETHER WE ARE RESILIENT!
MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT AND CEO We Miss You! Nothing could have prepared any of us for 2020. The pandemic and the re-energized social justice movement have changed our world. For the Mann, it has been a time to pivot, show solidarity with our neighbors, and — with your support! — to create new ways of bringing the power of music to our community. Although we could not welcome you in person, thousands of you tuned in to our virtual Roots Picnic. We launched the Mann Music Room to bring you music from around the globe, and have just expanded its offerings. When we moved our Party in the Park gala online, you partied with us! We were honored to host The Philadelphia Orchestra’s first return performance earlier this fall. Our fabulous Education Department created an online music curriculum that was snapped up by schools not only in our area, but also throughout the country. And the amazing team that produces our All City Orchestra Summer Academy (ACOSA) brought the entire program online – including rehearsals and master classes – with a rousing orchestra performance conducted by Philadelphia Orchestra Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin that was nothing less than miraculous and recognized as such on national network TV! Our wonderful friends and neighbors in Parkside were hit hard when several businesses were severely damaged, including the only grocery store in the area. As I noted in my statement after that tragedy, they continue to inspire us and we are proud to stand by their side. Our executive team personally donated funds to the food drive, and we continue to look for new ways to help. It all adds up to resilience. We can’t wait to see you under the stars again soon! Meanwhile, if our music matters to you, please join your fellow Mann lovers who are supporting our Resiliency Fund, so that we can continue to reinvent and reimagine ways to keep music’s power alive in this unprecedented time.
Catherine M. Cahill President & CEO
Cover Photo: When the Philadelphia Eagles announced their season with a video shot utilizing 250 drones above our campus, they kindly spelled out the Mann for us! And Mann House Photographer Jordan August captured it in this photo. Photo enhancement by Phil B. Welcome. We are proud to have our name in lights!
As of 10.20.20
MANN MUSIC ROOM WANTS YOU Share Your Mann Memories
The Mann’s online Music Room has expanded into four separate sections. In this newsletter you can see items from Learn (education) and Vault (archives). Stream is a great place to do just that for select Mann performances. And Remember — that’s for your Mann memories! So if you saw your first concert, had your first date, learned something great, or even performed at the Mann, go to MannCenter.org/Remember and tell us about it. We’re waiting!
MANN MUSIC ROOM: LEARN
Teaching World Culture Through Music Early in the pandemic, Vice President of Education and Community Engagement, Naomi Gonzalez, asked her teaching artists to create short videos representing different musical cultures and styles. When she realized that elementary school students had little access to this information, Gonzalez, a former teacher, “stretched a muscle that I haven’t used in a long time.” She quickly wrote a curriculum to accompany the videos from six different regions: India, Cuba, the United States of America, Syria, Trinidad & Tobago, and Puerto Rico. The program, designed in partnership with the School District of Philadelphia and aligned with Pennsylvania’s educational standards, was an immediate hit. And when Gonzalez shared it with teachers in Detroit and Maryland, they snapped it up, too. Lesson Plans for Grades K-2 & 3-5 Extension for Grades 6-9
MannCenter.org/MannMusicRoom
Our education programs qualify for your EITC (Education Improvement Tax Credits) donation.
RESILIENCY CAMPAIGN
Let The Music Play Strikes a Chord When the pandemic caused the loss of our traditional 2020 concert season, the Mann had to close a substantial gap for the year. We launched the Let the Music Play Resiliency Fund, a historic emergency fund to support our annual fund and the outstanding Education and Community Engagement programming that has expanded virtually during this time – inspiring student and adult audiences in our region and beyond. Thanks to you, we are making positive progress! If you have not yet responded, please take a moment now and head to MannCenter.org/LetTheMusicPlay. Your support will help us continue our work with Philadelphia students and families and ensure that the shows can go on when we come back together next summer.
YOUR WORDS MEAN SO MUCH…KEEP THEM COMING! We are overwhelmed by the positive messages that accompanied your generous donations to our Resiliency Fund! One came from a new board member: When I was growing up, the City’s recreation department had a huge talent show for kids in the arts. I sing; I performed on the Mann stage. Music helps bring people together. There’s nothing else in our world that transcends everything — gender, race, class — we need to support institutions that help to keep that alive. I would like to see the Black community taking more advantage of the new Mann and their programming. And what they have been doing for kids in the school district is phenomenal: educating them about different cultures through music. This helps young people become citizens who don’t just take from the world but give back. We won’t solve the ills of our city and our world without programs that foster that. We have to support the things that we know work. — HON. LORI A. DUMAS, JUDGE, FIRST JUDICIAL DISTRICT, PHILADELPHIA
VIRTUAL
in the
park
2020
PARTY IN THE PARK
Virtual Gala Knocks It Out of the Park! What’s the next best thing to a party in the park with a picnic under the stars? How about a virtual party packed with stars — and that picnic, too! Music lovers tuned into a gala video celebration of Music and Mann Memories on September 21, in support of the Mann’s outstanding Education and Community Engagement programs. Those activities, which normally reach some 30,000 children in our region, were made available this summer online through the Mann Music Room to students around the country. Ticket holders enjoyed specially prepared dinners and wine at home as they watched a rich musical tapestry weaving past Mann performances by the Roots and Phish with exclusive guest appearances by Adam Weiner of Low Cut Connie, Philadelphia’s own Time for Three, singer-songwriter Amos Lee, and Philadelphia Orchestra Concertmaster David Kim. Celebrities ranging from the Franklin Institute’s Chief Astronomer Derrick Pitts to State Senator Vincent Hughes to media personalities Matt O’Donnell (6ABC), Patty Jackson (WDAS), and Peter Sagal (NPR) shared their
Mann memories, while celebrity host Dyana Williams led “guests” on a backstage stroll through a star-studded photo gallery. The evening’s finale? What else but the Fabulous Philadelphians playing Tchaikovsky’s rousing 1812 Overture – truly What Summer Sounds Like! The event received fabulous coverage from 6ABC, WXPN, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Weekly, and more. Thanks to an “angel” donor and because of this unusual Covid year, we offered an encore showing for the community on October 15. A great time was had by all!
SPOTLIGHT
Lucinda Hudson: From Bulldozer to Board Member Back in 1977, Parkside resident Lucinda Hudson made a fateful decision. The mother of two boys ages 2 and 4 learned that the City was about to replace the grassy park across from her home with a parking lot for audiences at the new Mann Center. Hudson made “SAVE OUR PARK” signs with her children’s crayons, hung them around their necks, and stood with them in front of the bulldozer. Neighbors soon joined her, a petition was created, and Center founder Frederic Mann asked to meet with them at Memorial Hall. What happened next? “We still have our grass,” Hudson answers. But that was just the beginning. From that protest grew The Parkside Association, a community development corporation that Hudson now leads. “We have rehabbed 60 properties and rebuilt the whole street,” she explains. “We went from being a food desert to creating the Parkwest Town Center with a Shoprite and a Lowe’s.” Frederic Mann became one of the neighborhood’s strongest supporters. And in 1997, Hudson joined the Mann Center board. She is proud of her 23 years of serving as a sounding board and guide, while the Center deepened its commitment to its neighbors. It’s a commitment to not only solve problems, but also anticipate them. When an overflow crowd from a big rock concert left a mess in the surrounding neighborhood, Mann leaders personally cleaned it up. The next time, fences and security guards were in place. The community gets a heads up when fireworks are scheduled. It’s now standard practice to discuss plans for new projects, like the Roots Picnic, to iron out any potential concerns. The Mann has also diversified its board through what Hudson calls a “herculean, ongoing effort.” Then there are the programs. “They do events that speak to us,” Hudson explained, “and they give us tickets for the community – not just to those, but all the concerts. And education! You should see the thousands of kids coming in from across Philadelphia. That’s a wonderful thing.” Hudson is especially grateful for the Mann’s support under President and CEO Catherine M. Cahill. “Her staff donated to the food program we started during the pandemic. And when the area was attacked by looters last spring, Cathy was one of the first to come out and support our businesses.” Hudson’s message to the community? “The Mann is one of the best venues in the world. You can sit in the cool breeze and listen to the music, have a glass of wine, dinner in the restaurant. And they are a great partner.”
FROM THE VAULT Frank Sinatra’s Surprise Performance
by Jack McCarthy, Archivist/Historian In May of 1945, the great Frank Sinatra (aka “The Voice”) set out on an eight-week USO tour to entertain the troops in Europe. Immediately upon his return, he accepted an invitation to attend the July 6th concert of his friend, singer Dinah Shore, who was making her debut that evening at the Robin Hood Dell (the predecessor to the Mann) with conductor Andre Kostelanetz and Orchestra. After finishing her final song, Shore called Sinatra to the stage, to wild applause from the audience. Before singing, Sinatra asked for quiet, telling the audience: “I don’t want to sound pampered, but I just entertained the greatest audience in the world — our fighting men. And I guess I’m spoiled because you could hear a pin drop. They appreciate any entertainment over there.” Sinatra sang Gershwin’s “Embraceable You” and Kern’s “Old Man River,” then he and Shore finished with a duet on Gershwin’s “Summertime.” As the Inquirer reported, “the audience applauded uproariously” at this unexpected performance. It was the only time Frank Sinatra would appear at the Dell or its successor, the Mann Music Center.
The Show Must DID Go On! Rehearsing on Zoom. Exploring radio technology. Yoga classes. Performing in an online orchestra concert conducted by the music director of The Philadelphia Orchestra. Despite the pandemic, these were all part of 90 student musicians’ experience in the 2020 All City Orchestra Summer Academy (ACOSA) for two weeks this past July. Thanks to the dedication and ingenuity of Philadelphia Orchestra Acting Associate Principal Bass Joseph Conyers and Principal Timpani Don Liuzzi, teachers from the Philadelphia School District, partners from WRTI, Menchey Music, and the Mann’s education department, each student was given a “camp in a bag,” which included a t-shirt, notebook for composing, a music stand, and earbuds with a microphone — important for recording themselves on their cell phones. They practiced their parts for the “Farandole” from Bizet’s L’Arlesienne with a click-track and followed the conducting video pre-recorded by Philadelphia Orchestra Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin. When they put it all together, the performance was shown on the Mann’s Facebook page and even on CBS News. A co-presentation of lead artistic partners the Mann Center, The School District of Philadelphia, The Philadelphia Orchestra, and Project 440, the program this year also included workshops with members of the Network for New Music, Eastman Artists, Catalyst Quartet, Sphinx Virtuosi, and the Curtis Institute of Music. ACOSA’s educational success was possible because of a new technological format developed by the Mann’s Vice President of Education and Community Engagement, Naomi Gonzalez, and Manager of Education Operations, Alec Fertel. The format worked so well that the School District of Philadelphia asked to expand the collaboration with the Mann and ACOSA partners into this school year for the 200 students of the All City high school orchestra and band. The team hopes to continue opening new horizons for students in music and beyond.