Tiempo Libre
Location: Civic Center Music Hall
Price Range: $12-$65
Dates: Friday, February 12, 2010, 8:00pm
Saturday, February 13, 2010, 8:00pm
Artists
Guest: Tiempo Libre
Tiempo Libre Website
Three-time Grammy-nominated Tiempo Libre is one the hottest young Latin bands today. Equally at home in concert halls, jazz clubs and dance venues, the members of the Miami-based band are true modern heirs to the rich tradition of the music of their native Cuba.
Tiempo Libre’s members were all classically trained at La ENA, Cuba’s premiere conservatory during a time when it was illegal to listen to American songs on the radio. Now, the group is a hit in the U.S. and abroad, celebrated for its incendiary, joyful performances of timba, an irresistible, dance-inducing mix of high-voltage Latin jazz and the seductive rhythms of son.
Program:
Cuban Overture by George Gershwin opens the program. This symphonic overture is inspired by the composer's two-week trip to Havana, Cuba in 1932.
Rumba Sinfonica by Ricardo Lorenz and Jorge Gomez. -- A dynamic new work celebrating Cuban music fuses the urban rhythms of past and present Cuban music with the sophisticated sounds of the classical symphony orchestra and allows the Cuban rumba to infuse a symphonic work and guide its musical content as well. At one level, the piece is a symphonic tribute that pays homage to the music of Cuba. At another level it is the story in sound of how decades of rich, authentic, emotionally charged music can result from the natural interplay and porous borders between the classical and popular traditions. The result is a celebration and can be described in two words: "symphonic party," English for "Rumba Sinfonica."
A Symphonic Night in Havana arranged by Jorge Gomez (of Tiempo Libre) and Raul Murciano (faculty member at the University of Miami's Frost School of Music and one of the founders/music director of Miami Sound Machine). The OKC PHIL presents the world premiere of this medley of traditional cha-cha-chas, a medley of traditional sones (Cuban folk songs including "El Manicero", "Son de la Loma" and "Guantanamera"), and two selections from Tiempo Libre's Grammy nominated Bach in Havana - "Air on a G String" and "Baqueteo con Bach".
Tiempo Libre timba set -- Tiempo Libre will perform a set of joyful tima music, an exciting combination of Latin jazz and traditional Cuban son. They will play songs from their recently released and Grammy-nominated Sony CD Bach in Havana, which uniquely fuses Cuban music and Bach and was featured on "Dancing with the Stars," as well as selections from their two Grammy-nominated timba albums Lo Que Esperabas and Arroz Con Mango.
Guest Conductor: Constantine Kitsolpolous
Constantine Kitsopoulos has made a name for himself as a conductor whose musical experiences comfortably span the worlds of opera and symphony, where he conducts in such venues as Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall and Royal Albert Hall, and musical theater, where he can be found leading orchestras on Broadway. In the 2009-2010 season, Mr. Kitsopoulos is in his fourth year as music director of the Queens Symphony Orchestra and continues as general director of Chatham Opera, which he founded in 2005. He will make return conducting appearances with the Baltimore Symphony, Detroit Symphony, New Jersey Symphony and Westchester Philharmonic.
Last season, Mr. Kitsopoulos made debuts with the Colorado Symphony, Houston Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, Elgin Symphony, Westchester Philharmonic and The New York Pops Orchestra at Carnegie Hall. Highlights of previous seasons include appearances with the symphony orchestras of Baltimore, Detroit, Madison, Milwaukee, San Francisco and Santa Barbara, National Arts Centre Orchestra, Calgary Philharmonic, Brooklyn Philharmonic, Blossom Festival Orchestra, New York Virtuosi Chamber Symphony, Hong Kong Philharmonic, and a complete performance of Stravinsky’s L’Histoire du Soldat with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra
Mr. Kitsopoulos has also continued to show his ability and interest in performing new works and conducting a wide variety of genres. In 2005 he conducted the Red Bull Artsehcro, an orchestra consisting of students from the top conservatories and university music programs in the country, in a concert at Carnegie Hall featuring a program of world premieres by Raul Yanez and Laura Karpman.
In the 2008-2009 season, Mr. Kitsopoulos conducted the Indiana University Opera Theater’s production of The Most Happy Fella. Previous seasons’ operatic highlights include the Dicapo Opera Theatre’s productions of The Merry Widow, Gounod’s Faust and all three versions of Puccini’s Madame Butterfly, the Chatham Opera's debut production of Menotti's Amahl and the Night Visitors, the Hong Kong Municipal Opera production of Carmen in both Hong Kong and Beijing, and Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice at Alice Tully Hall. Mr. Kitsopoulos also served as Music Director and created the orchestrations for the world premiere production of Ed Dixon’s Fanny Hill at the Goodspeed Opera House in Connecticut.
In addition to his orchestral and classical commitments, Mr. Kitsopoulos is much in demand as a theatre conductor, both on Broadway and nationwide. In 2008, Mr. Kitsopoulos was Conductor and Musical Director of the Tony-nominated musical A Catered Affair. In 2007, he conducted the Tony-nominated musical Coram Boy and the American Conservatory Theatre's production of Kurt Weill's Happy End, for which he recorded the cast album at Skywalker Ranch. Other musical theater highlights include serving as Music Director and Principal Conductor of Baz Luhrmann’s highly acclaimed production of Puccini’s La Bohème, conducting the new musical Mambo Kings in San Francisco in 2005, serving as Music Director of Frank Wildhorn’s Dracula and Les Misérables in 2001-2002 and conducting Matthew Bourne’s Broadway production of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. His upcoming project will be to serve as Musical Director and Musical Supervisor of a performance run and DVD recording of The Molly Maguires at the Scranton Cultural Center at the Masonic Temple in Scranton, PA.
Constantine Kitsopoulos studied conducting with Vincent La Selva, as well as Gustav Meier, Sergiu Commissiona, and Semyon Bychkov. He studied piano with Marienka Michna, Chandler Gregg, Ed Edson, and Sophia Rosoff.
His first recording – Baz Luhrmann’s production of La Bohème – was released by Dreamworks in 2002. His recording of Happy End, the only English language recording of the work, was released in 2007 by Ghostlight. The original Broadway cast album of A Catered Affair was released in 2008 by P.S. Classics.
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