Photographs by Nashville adults and children will come to life through the music of the Nashville Chamber Orchestra during two special “photochoreography” concerts on Oct. 14 at the Schermerhorn Symphony Center.
The 8 p.m. concert, “Musical Portraits: Community, Cameras & Classics,” will feature photos submitted by adults that honor Music City as a great place to live, work and raise a family as part of the mayor’s communitywide Celebrate Nashville campaign. Earlier in the day, photos submitted by youngsters showing their “everyday heroes” will be spotlighted during an 11 a.m. concert, “Everyday Heroes: Kids, Cameras & Classics.”
More than a slide show set to music, the photochoreography concerts will weave carefully selected and sequenced photographs projected on three large screens above the orchestra in time with the music.
“Photochoreography is one of the ways the NCO really exemplifies our theme of ‘Music Without Boundaries,’ ” NCO Executive Director Connie Valentine said. “Photochoreographer James Westwater fuses the live performance of the orchestra with the photos representing what makes Nashville special, and the two elements come together in a very powerful presentation.”
The evening concert is set to Don Hart’s Concertino for Two Mandolins and Guitar, commissioned by the NCO in 2004. The concert also features photochoreography to Haydn’s Symphony No. 7. Beethoven’s monumental Fifth Symphony serves as the program’s bookends.
The morning children’s concert will feature photochoreography to songs from the NCO’s GRAMMY-nominated CD, “Kid Pan Alley-Nashville,” and excerpts from Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5.
Tickets for the evening concert range from $19 to $69. General admission to the youth concert is $15. Tickets for students are $7.50. To purchase tickets, call the NCO box office at (615) 256-6546, visit www.nco.org, call the Schermerhorn Symphony Center box office at (615) 687-6400 or visit www.schermerhornsymphonycenter.org.
The Nashville Chamber Orchestra has come to be recognized as one of America’s most creative and innovative orchestras, presenting its unique style of Music without Boundaries. Under the leadership of Music Director Paul Gambill and Executive Director Connie Linsler Valentine, the music making of this ensemble has garnered a steady stream of national media attention plus recordings for Warner Bros., NAXOS, Angel, Almanac and Alabaster Records, and a national award for Adventurous Programming from ASCAP. Its Kid Pan Alley-Nashville CD received three prestigious national media awards, plus a 2006 GRAMMY® nomination.
The NCO is funded in part by grants made available through Metro Nashville Arts Commission, the Tennessee Arts Commission, and the National Endowment for the Arts. The residency of David Balakrishnan is made possible through Music Alive, a residency program of the American Symphony Orchestra League and Meet the Composer.