News Release: 29 April 1999
National Gallery of Art's Fifty-Sixth American Music Festival Begins 2 May 1999
Washington, DC--The National Gallery of Art begins its fifty-sixth American Music Festival on 2 May with a concert of orchestral music by American composers conducted by National Gallery music director George Manos. The program will include Robert Ward's Third Symphony, Aaron Copland's Quiet City, and the Suite for Chamber Orchestra by Douglas Moore. The festival continues every Sunday through 30 May.
It has been the tradition since 1986 to include jazz in the American Music Festival, and this year's jazz offering will be a concert by the Brubeck Brothers Quartet on 16 May. Daniel and Christopher Brubeck, continuing in the great tradition of their father, Dave Brubeck, will present an evening of jazz with keyboardist Pete Levin and guitarist Mike DeMicco.
The festival will also feature pianist William Black, whose recital on 9 May will include works by American composers from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. Violinist Sally McLain and pianist Lisa Emenheiser Logan will perform on 23 May, presenting a program of works commissioned by the McKim Fund of the Library of Congress. Composers Anne LeBaron, Meyer Kupferman, Ned Rorem, and David Baker will be presented. On 30 May, the Bethesda, Maryland-based choir, Musikanten, will bring the festival to a close. Their concert will include choral works by Robert Evett, Nancy Wertsch, Norman Dinerstein, and Dominick Argento, as well as Dante's Praises to the Virgin Mother by the late Russell Woollen, who was active for many years as a composer and performer in the greater Washington, DC area.
Under the direction of Gallery music director George Manos since 1985, the American Music Festival was founded in 1944 and is the longest-running festival specializing in the music of American composers. The festival has been the scene of more than three hundred world premiere performances. Some of these works, such as Charles Ives' Symphony No. 1 and Daniel Pinkham's Symphony No. 4, have continued to attract attention. Other works, however, are not widely known to the public, and each year's American Music Festival provides some of those compositions with a well-deserved repeat Performance.
Concerts at the National Gallery of Art take place on Sundays at 7:00 p.m. in the West Garden Court of the West Building. Concertgoers are admitted on a first-come, first-served basis, beginning at 6:00 p.m. For further information about the concerts, call (202) 842-6941.
Fifty-Sixth American Music Festival
2 May - 30, 1999
MAY |
|
PROGRAM |
2 |
National Gallery Orchestra |
Copland: Quiet City |
9 |
William Black, pianist |
Reinagle: Sonata in D |
16 |
The Brubeck Brothers Quartet |
Jazz concert |
23 |
Sally McLain, violinist |
Anne LeBaron: Devil in the Belfry |
30 |
Musikanten |
Hawley: Six Madrigals |
For more details see Sunday Concerts.
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