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2010-2011 SEASON
September 5, 2010
Free concert, Dogwood Park October 10, 2010 Mozart, Mendelssohn and Strauss November 14, 2010 Beethoven and Prokofiev February 13, 2011 Vaughn Williams and the Derryberry Competition winner March 20, 2011 Haydn, Coates and Elgar April 17, 2011 Bernstein Season Ticket Subscription Form SUPPORT THE BSO 
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Music Director Dan Allcott, currently in his sixth season as conductor and faculty member at TTU, leads the Bryan Symphony Orchestra into 2009 with performances of works by Berlioz, Mozart and Dubois. Photo: TTU
Of all the giants of the Baroque period of music, Bach and Handel reign supreme, says Dan Allcott, music director of the Bryan Symphony Orchestra at Tennessee Tech University. Orchestral suites by both are featured works at the BSO’s next performance, which will end with three Baroque opera arias sung by TTU faculty member Diane Pulte.
The concert, which also includes works by Baroque composers Purcell, Biber and Geminiani, begins at 3 p.m., Sunday, March 22, in Wattenbarger Auditorium. Tickets are $28 for adults and $24 for seniors 65 and up. Call the symphony box office at 931-372-6088 for availability. Advance reservations are limited. The performance is sponsored by Community Bank of Cookeville and Albert and Rosemary Ponte. The March 22 performance is the BSO’s first in several years to focus solely on the Baroque period, but Allcott has chosen very diverse works. The program includes Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D major; Music for the Royal Fireworks, by Handel, as well as selections from his operas Partenope and Rinaldo; an aria from Dido and Aeneas by Purcell; Battalia by Biber; and a concerto grosso by Geminiani. Bach and Handel were contemporaries, with Purcell predating them by a few years. They worked near the end of the Baroque period, from the late 1600s to early-to-mid 1700s. Programming them with Geminiani and Biber gives the audience a chance to sample strikingly different compositions with the common thread of the period and style in which they were written. The works by Geminiani and Biber show the typical and atypical in Baroque style. “Biber is the real iconoclast of this concert,” said Allcott. “His creativity and boldness are actually shocking – all put to dramatic effect. “Bach was a composer of much sacred music and a religious man, while Handel’s triumph was in secular music. Purcell wrote the first true English-language opera, Dido and Aeneas. It’s interesting that both Purcell and Handel were writing opera at roughly the same time, while one – Handel – was hugely successful and the other was not. English opera didn’t become popular until the 20th century.” Including the vocal works on the program is unusual and a rare treat, says Allcott, as is the focus on Baroque music for this concert. "Many orchestras have gotten away from Baroque music, because in the larger cities, there’s often a Baroque ensemble,” he said. “That’s not the case here. I want our audience to hear this music. It’s time.” Pulte last sang with the BSO in April as Suzuki in Madama Butterfly. A regional finalist for the Metropolitan Opera National Council auditions in 1997 and 1998, she was a finalist in the Meistersinger Competition, Austria, in 2000. Pulte is an active soloist, recitalist and chamber collaborator. This month, she performed at concerts sponsored by the U.S.-China Cultural & Educational Foundation in Shandong and Kumming, China. The performances featured Chinese soprano Lydia Wu, who is well known in China for her recordings in the Chinese style of opera and has just finished a degree in western opera at the San Francisco Conservatory. Concert-week activities include:
The Bryan Symphony Orchestra, a member of the League of American Orchestras, is the only professional symphony in a rural area of Tennessee. |