Web posted
October 26, 2006
Halloween Symphony-style
Frightful favorites to be played at high school
By TERI TIBBETT
FOR THE JUNEAU EMPIRE
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| David J. Sheakley / Juneau Empire |
 Play on: Elsbeth Ruder, front left, Kathy Maas, front right, and Bob King, back, practice with the Juneau Symphony in preparation for its performances Saturday and Sunday. |
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Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Apprentice are the stars in this week's "Family Fright-acular" concert, performed by the Juneau Symphony.
The two characters are notorious for getting into trouble, and the music representing them is a strong reflection of that mischievous spirit.
The season opener will feature these and other family-friendly selections in a holiday performance of music written by some of the world's most recognized composers.
"It's a great one to bring to people who may not be super familiar with orchestral music, because they will certainly be familiar with these pieces," conductor and music director Kyle Wiley Pickett said.
The Saturday concert at the Juneau-Douglas High School auditorium will begin at 7 p.m. (an hour earlier than the symphony's regular concert time) and will feature a costume contest at intermission. The conductor and musicians will be dressed in costume, and the audience is encouraged to wear them as well. Sunday afternoon's performance, beginning at 3 p.m. also will feature a costume show.
The program will present a suite of pieces by John Williams from the Harry Potter movie soundtracks, which is appropriate because of their Halloween-related themes, Pickett said.
"John Williams is a terrific composer. I mean, obviously he's known mostly for his film music, but he really does some good stuff, and I think his more recent scores have gotten better and better," he said. "I think that the music that he wrote to score the movie(s) actually captures the essence of the books better than the movies themselves do."
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Concert
When: 7 p.m. Sat., Oct. 28, ; Sun. Oct. 29, 3 p.m.
Where: Juneau-Douglas High School auditorium.
Tickets: $20 general, $15 students or seniors.
Costume judging: at intermission on both nights.
On the program: "Harry Potter Suite," John Williams; "Sorcerer's Apprentice," Paul Dukas; "Danse Macabre," Camille Saint-Saëns, featuring Steve Tada on violin; "Night on Bald Mountain," Modest Mussorgsky; "In the Hall of the Mountain King," Edvard Grieg; "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor," Johann Sebastian Bach, orchestrated by Leopold Stokowski; "Funeral March of a Marionette," Charles Gounod.
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Three pieces from Walt Disney's "Fantasia" also top the billing. They include "Night on Bald Mountain," the "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor" and the "Sorcerer's Apprentice."
"I love the 'Sorcerer's Apprentice,'" Picket said. "My parents took me to 'Fantasia' when I was a little kid, and so that music has been familiar to me my whole life. It's tricky, it's difficult, it's a hard piece, but it's a lot of fun to play."
The program includes other recognizable selections as well. Wiley Picket said the Bach piece was once associated with the "Phantom of the Opera" before the Andrew Lloyd Webber show became popular, and Charles Gounod's "Funeral March for a Marionette" was the theme of the "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" TV show.
"Danse Macabre" is a fanciful piece featuring the violin virtuosity of concertmaster Steve Tada.
"It's kind of a really twisted waltz," he said. "It's entertainingly off-beat, not in a musical sense, but it's unique, fantastic and fanciful. ... It gets its overall sinister feeling with some very interesting harmonic devices where the violin actually tunes down a half step, purposely out of tune, and it's that dissonance that gives it that sinister feel."
Tada, who plays first chair with the Juneau Symphony, has also performed for many years with Juneau's Hungarian folk music group the Fiery Gypsies.
Picket said the Halloween concert will feature vivid dramatic pieces, all telling some kind of story. He encouraged people to come dressed in costume and maybe even win a prize.
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