Orchestrating Lifelong Participation in the Arts 1629 22nd Ave SE, Olympia WA 98501 | 360-352-1438 | studentorchestras.org studentorchestras@gmail.com | facebook.com/studentorchestras | Winter 2020 Vol. XX No. 2
SOGO’s Birthday Bash Continues!
SOGO’s 20th Season Birthday Bash continues with the Conservatory Orchestra turning to music from 20th-century America. Music Director Cameron May says the March 1 concert “pairs the familiar with the overlooked.”
By Supporting Teaching Artists, You Are Providing the “Backbone” of SOGO “The Teaching Artists are really the backbone of our operation and, in my mind, what makes SOGO so special,” says Music Director Cameron May.
Teaching Artists are instrument specialists who mentor SOGO musicians by bringing a wealth of experience, skill, and musicianship to full orchestra rehearsals and sectionals. May continues, “Performing together as an orchestra is of course what everyone sees, but having experts on each instrument L-R: SOGO Conservatory Orchestra students Jenny Jang, Helen Hauschka, Gwen Bayer, and Camille McLean
(Continued on p.2)
“Antonin Dvorak’s ninth symphony, From the New World, depicts an outsider’s account of setting foot in the United States for the first time,” says May. Preceding the Dvorak, the Conservatory Orchestra will perform Dances in the Canebrakes, a work composed by African-American female composer Florence Price in 1953. Flute TA Jean Whipple teaching a sectional.
The Familiar: New World Symphony Conservatory students observed Olympia Symphony Orchestra (OSO) rehearsals in November when OSO played Dvorak’s New World Symphony. Now that the Conservatory Orchestra is preparing two movements of the same piece for the March concert, the OSO joined students for a Side-by Side experience January 26, where Olympia Symphony members sat alongside Conservatory students at a rehearsal. “The decision to program a piece that the Olympia Symphony Orchestra was performing earlier in the season was deliberate once the possibility of a Sideby-Side experience became a reality,” says May. “The obvious relevance was for the students to become familiar with the piece before starting to work on it themselves and to make note of the comments OSO conductor Huw Edwards made to the orchestra during these rehearsals.” (Continued on p.2) LEAD • INSPIRE • PERFORM •
}
We are grateful for the support of these organizations Community Foundation of South Puget Sound Dawkins Charitable Trust A new biography of African American composer Florence Price, ‘The Heart of a Woman: The Life and Music of Florence B. Price,’ will published June 2020.
LEAD • INSPIRE • PERFORM •
}
Give Local Irving A. Lassen Foundation Nisqually Tribe LEAD • INSPIRE • PERFORM •
}