NPR’s Hit Show From the Top Returns to Kimmel Center to Record an All-Philadelphia Episode April 10
March 20, 2007
Julia Sherrif
Tickets for From the Top on April 10 are $15 and $30 and can be purchased by calling 215-893-1999, online at www.kimmelcenter.org, or at the Kimmel Center box office, open daily from 10pm to 6pm and later on performance evenings. (Additional fees may apply.) For group sales call 215-893-5883.
A limited number of $10 tickets are available for every Kimmel Center Presents performance at the Kimmel Center. Tickets go on sale the day of the event and can be purchased at the Kimmel Center box office beginning 2.5 hours prior to curtain time and 11:30am for matinees. Limit one ticket per person.
This episode is scheduled to air June 9, 2007 in Philadelphia, and will feature an all-Philadelphia line-up of young musicians, including:
- The Youth Chamber Orchestra of the Temple University Music Preparatory Division under the direction of Luis Biava will perform the Chaconne for Violin, Organ and Strings by Tomas Vitali as orchestrated by Ottorino Respighi. The soloists will be 12-year-old organist Maria Markovitch from Elkins Park, PA and violinist Fabiola Kim, 16, from Englewood Cliffs, NJ.
- The Youth Chamber Orchestra is the centerpiece of the Center for Gifted Young Musicians at Temple Music Prep. Founded in 1986, it is directed by The Philadelphia Orchestra’s Conductor in Residence (retired) and Temple University’s Boyer College of Music and Dance faculty member Luis Biava. For ten years, the YCO participated annually with the Conservatory of Puerto Rico in the Festival of Young Musicians, an exchange program sending it to Puerto Rico for a week and then hosting the students of Puerto Rico in Philadelphia. Alumni hold prominent positions in the Philadelphia, Cleveland, Boston, and many other major symphony orchestras, have been winners of the Naumberg and Sphinx competitions, and are leading teachers. In recognition of highest excellence, ten of the orchestra’s violinists receive scholarships bestowed to Music Prep by the Dorothy Richard Starling Foundation. Orchestra members are selected through competitive auditions each September. Participants range from 12 to 18 years in age and travel from all over the eastern United States for weekly rehearsals, chamber music coaching, and other instruction.
- Maria Markovitch is in seventh grade at Abington Junior High School. A resident of Elkins Park, PA, Maria began learning piano at age six before making the switch to organ. Maria participated in The Kimmel Center's first Teen Summer Arts Camp for Organ with newly inaugurated The Fred J. Cooper Memorial Organ and the 2006 Organ Festival and Competition in Moscow. A member of the Temple University Youth Orchestra, Maria speaks fluent Russian and enjoys ballet, art and playing with her pets.
- Violinist Fabiola Kim will also play The Devil’s Trill by Giuseppe Tartini, arranged by Fritz Kreisler, accompanied by Christopher O’Riley. Fabiola is a Dorothy Richard Starling Foundation scholarship recipient in Temple Music Prep’s Center for Gifted Young Musicians. Fabiola studies at Music Prep with C.J. Chang, principal viola of The Philadelphia Orchestra. She was 2005 winner of the Violin Competition of the American Academy of Conducting at Aspen, and has been featured soloist with the Broward (FL) and the Livingston (NJ) Symphony Orchestras. Fabiola has enjoyed summer study at the Aspen Music Festival in Colorado, Courchevel Music, in France, and the Ishikawa Music Festival in Japan. Her mother Sungeun is also a violinist and her father Daejin is one of Korea’s most respected concert pianists.
- Sixteen-year-old pianist Julia Sheriff, from Elkins Park will perform the third movement of Gargoyles, Op. 29 by Lowell Liebermann. Julia is a student of Boyer College and Temple Music Prep faculty member and renowned pianist Charles Abramovic. She has participated in the Kimmel Center Teen Summer Music Camp for Chamber Music and at the Tanglewood Festival. In February, 2006, she soloed with the Temple University Symphony Orchestra as winner of the Concerto Competition for Music Prep students. Julia was a finalist in the Junior Division of The Philadelphia Orchestra’s highly competitive Greenfield Competition in 2007. In addition to her study as a scholarship student of Temple Music Prep, she participates in the Myer Schwartz Advanced Study Piano Trio at Settlement Music School.
- The Gray Charitable Trust Piano Trio, all of whom study at the Settlement Music School will play Astor Piazolla’s La Muerte de Angel and Gershwin’s "They Can’t Take That Away from Me." The trio includes Ben Odhner, violin, 18 from Huntington Valley, PA; Michael Dahlberg, cello, 17 from Philadelphia; and Peter Dugan, piano, 18, from Upper Darby PA. Peter is a private piano student of Professor Harvey Wedeen of the faculty of Temple’s Boyer College of Music and Dance.
- Additional performer tba
Caeli Smith, a 14 year old freshman at JR Masterman School in Philadelphia, has been a Roving Reporter on From the Top for past year. In that role, she contributes live and pre-produced reports and interviews with the young musicians who appear on the program and appears in the program's occasional comedy sketches. An accomplished violinist, Caeli has been featured on the radio program as a soloist and on From the Top: Live From Carnegie Hall, the new PBS series, with her quartet Seraphina.
The Kimmel Center taping of From the Top is made possible, in part, by a generous gift from The Presser Foundation.
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From the Top is one of the most popular weekly programs on public radio (along with such established hits as A Prairie Home Companion and Car Talk), and can be heard on nearly 250 stations across the country. NBC’s Today described the program as "Exquisite musical performances, punctuated with off-beat interviews and campy skits. This is classy reality programming. And you don’t have to love classical music to love From the Top."
From the Top is distributed by NPR and sponsored by UBS. It is made possible through grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, and Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism. It also supported through the generous contributions of individuals and foundations as well as public radio stations. From the Top radio program is produced in association with WGBH Radio Boston and New England Conservatory of Music, its home and education partner.
From the Top is a non-profit organization that encourages and celebrates the commitment of young people to music and the arts. Through its multiple media platforms, From the Top provides a forum for young artists to present themselves, share their passion, and develop into important cultural leaders.
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Since the dedication of the Merck Arts Education Center in September 2002, the Kimmel Center's Education Department has offered school groups in Grades 5-12 from the Tri-state area free arts education classes in music, dance and theater arts. All sessions are hands-on, interactive activities designed to stimulate creativity and promote arts appreciation. Additional educational activities for students and adults include a tuition-free teen summer arts camp, a youth jazz ensemble, master classes, a series of student concerts, artists chats before and following concerts, and outreach programs to schools in the community for dance and pre-school arts and literacy programs.
Kimmel Center Presents' 2006/2007 season is supported by: Mellon Financial Corporation, University of Pennsylvania Health System, National Endowment for the Arts, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, ARC Wheeler, The William Penn Foundation, The Wachovia Foundation, Verizon Foundation, The Presser Foundation, Philadelphia Music Project and Dance Advance, Initiatives of The Pew Charitable Trust administered by The University of the Arts. American Airlines is the Official Airline of Kimmel Center Presents. Toyota is the Official Vehicle of Kimmel Center Presents Jazz and World Pop programming. NBC-10 is a Media Partner for Kimmel Center Presents. The Philadelphia Inquirer, the Philadelphia Daily News, and Philly.com are media sponsors for the Great Orchestras on Tour series.
Kimmel Center, Inc., a charitable, not-for-profit organization, owns, manages, supports and maintains The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, which includes Verizon Hall, Perelman Theater, Innovation Studio and the Merck Arts Education Center. Kimmel Center, Inc. also manages the Academy of Music, owned by The Philadelphia Orchestra Association. The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts and the Academy of Music serve as home to eight Resident Company performing arts organizations, including The Philadelphia Orchestra, Opera Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Ballet, Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, American Theater Arts for Youth, PHILADANCO, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society and Peter Nero and the Philly Pops<®>. Kimmel Center, Inc.’s mission also includes arts in education, community outreach and a rich diversity of programming through its Kimmel Center Presents and Broadway at the Academy series of performances.
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Founded in 1908, Settlement Music School is the largest not-for-profit organization in the United States providing community-based instruction and activity in the arts to students of all ages, backgrounds and abilities. More than 15,000 students from every zip code in the Greater Philadelphia area participate in programs and activities in music, dance and visual arts at six branches: Jenkintown, Germantown, South, Northeast, West Philadelphia, and Camden, New Jersey and through outreach services. Forty percent of those students receive $2million in financial aid and scholarship assistance. There are Settlement Music School graduates in every major symphony in the United States. Two Pulitzer prize-winning composers and many of the region's best-know jazz artists attended Settlement. Former students have served as members of Philadelphia City Council, as Mayor of Philadelphia, as Commonwealth of PA Senators, Representatives and as United States Congressmen. With a faculty of 250 and a staff of 50, Settlement Music School is the largest employer of musicians in Pennsylvania and provides an income base for many of the free lance musicians who perform with numerous other performing organizations in the region.
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WRTI-FM is a 24-hour member-supported public radio station anchored in Philadelphia, licensed to Temple University. The station’s broadcast signal in Pennsylvania extends west to Harrisburg and north to Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. We reach listeners as far south as Dover, DE and at the shore in Atlantic City, NJ and Cape May, NJ. Many listen to WRTI's mix of classical and jazz music live via the Internet. WRTI features weekly programming of opera, locally produced shows such as Crossover and Creatively Speaking!, and specialty jazz and classical programs. Excellence and commitment is woven into every broadcast, creating the integrity that WRTI possesses, resulting in a correlation of success and recognition within the community. WRTI-FM is one of the highest rated public radio stations in the tri-state area and the only public radio station in Philadelphia dedicated to the presentation and promotion of great classics and real jazz music.
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Temple Music Preparatory provides high quality non-credit learning opportunities in music and dance to the Greater Philadelphia community. As a division of Temple University’s Boyer College of Music and Dance, Music Prep uniquely combines university expertise with Philadelphia’s outstanding cultural assets, to assure excellence in students’ experience and results. Programming includes Early Childhood Music Foundations, beginning with newborns, Creative Movement and Dance Classes, individual instruction in all instruments, and classes specially designed for adults. A major component is the Center for Gifted Young Musicians, which serves those students with exceptional ability and motivation. The Community Music Scholars Program serves students with need from over 50 public schools, allowing access to affordable quality instruction. Recently, Music Prep has collaborated with the Boyer College’s renowned Music Therapy Department to create the Temple University Music Therapy Clinic at Music Prep to provide the community with access to this valuable service.Temple Music Prep is a member of the National Guild of Community Schools of the Arts and the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance.
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Founded in 1900, The Philadelphia Orchestra has distinguished itself as one of the leading orchestras in the world through a century of acclaimed performances, historic international tours, best-selling recordings, and its unprecedented record of innovation in recording technologies and outreach. The Orchestra has maintained an unparalleled unity in artistic leadership with only six music directors piloting its first century. This rich tradition is carried on by Christoph Eschenbach, who became music director in 2003. Recent Philadelphia Orchestra highlights include a three-year partnership with Ondine Records begun in 2005; the launch of the Orchestra’s Online Music Store in September 2006; regular Orchestra broadcasts on NPR beginning in April 2006; a five-year, $125 million endowment campaign launched in 2003; the Orchestra’s move to The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in 2001; and the Orchestra’s 100th anniversary in 2000.
The Philadelphia Orchestra annually touches the lives of more than one million music lovers worldwide through its performances, publications, recordings, and broadcasts. The Orchestra presents a subscription season in Phila¬delphia, in addition to education and community partnership programs, and appears annually at Carnegie Hall. Its summer schedule includes a series at The Mann Center for the Performing Arts, free Neighborhood Concerts, and residencies at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center and Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival.
KIMMEL CENTER PRESENTS
in association with The Philadelphia Orchestra, Settlement Music School, Temple Music Preparatory Division and WRTI-FM
Tuesday, April 10, 2007 | 8pm
Verizon Hall
FROM THE TOP
TOMAS VITALI: Chaconne for Violin, Organ and Strings
Temple University Music Preparatory Division Youth Chamber Orchestra
Fabiola Kim, violin
Maria Markovitch, organ
Luis Biava, conductor
GIUSEPPE TARTINI: The Devil’s Trill
Fabiola Kim, violin
Christopher O’Riley, piano
LOWELL LIEBERMANN: Gargoyles, Op. 29 (third movement)
Julia Sheriff, piano
ASTOR PIAZOLLA: La Muerte de Angel
GEORGE GERSHWIN: They Can’t Take That Away from Me
The Gray Charitable Trust Piano Trio
Ben Odhner, violin
Michael Dahlberg, cello
Peter Dugan, piano
Additional performer, tba.
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