Wichita Symphony Double Collaboration in 2019 & 2020
We’ll be heading out to Wichita twice next season for two very different programs with the Wichita Symphony. This marks our first time collaborating with the WSO and Maestro Daniel Hege.
For the first set of concerts—a whopping seven total!—we’ll be working on something really cool: the WSO has one of the largest educational concert programs in the country. With six concerts spread across three days, their Young People’s Concerts reach around 24,000 students, grades 3-8, each year. We are excited and honored to be sharing our two Mexico-themed pieces—Pre~Columbia and Mágico—this November 12-14 for a concert series titled, “The Magic of Mexico.”
What makes this even more meaningful is that 40% of the students in the Wichita public school system are of Hispanic heritage. To top off this multi-cultural collaboration, the WSO has arranged for an extra evening concert that will also feature specially themed food, drinks and activities in lobby. The two visual-musical pieces on the program also happen to be our newest. Nicholas Bardonnay, our Creative Director, photographed more than 20,000 images during a yearlong production across 18 states in Mexico. He choreographed the final selections to the thunderous first movement from Revueltas’s La Noche de los Mayas, Copland’s El Salón México and Marquez’s Danzón No. 2. We premiered the two visual pieces last September with the Dallas Symphony in partnership with the city’s Mexican Consulate.
Then in April 2020 we return to Wichita for a double-concert series featuring two pieces from our repertoire: Reflections of the Spirit and Rodeo!. The concert titled, “The Rose of Sonora,” is a tribute to the ruggedly beautiful land and lifeways of the American West. Set to Barber’s hauntingly beautiful Adagio for Strings, the Reflections piece navigates the ruins at Mesa Verde, Canyon de Chelly, Wupatki and the remarkable Chaco Canyon—ancient cliffside cities of the Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi) civilization that are often described as America’s pyramids. Changing up the era—and the pace—is Rodeo!, which is choreographed to Copland’s synonymous work. The piece portrays the excitement of a lively small town rodeo from behind the scenes, on a backdrop of sweeping western landscapes and centuries of ranching heritage in Arizona and Utah.
Adding to that concert are John Williams’ The Cowboy Overture, as well as George S. Clinton’s Rose of Sonora, a Violin Concerto in Five Scenes, featuring the WSO’s new concertmaster Holly Mulcahy.
