On Saturday, October 14 at 2:00 p.m.,Orchestra of St. Luke's returns to Carnegie Hall as three fantastic family-friendly stories are brought to life through music. Prokofiev's classic Peter and the Wolf is performed alongside two new compositions: Caroline Shaw's adaptation of The Mountain That Loved a Bird byAlice McLerran, commissioned by Carnegie Hall, and Robert Xavier Rodriguez's take on a favorite children's book, The Dot and the Line by Norton Juster, author of The Phantom Tollbooth, with the author in attendance for the performance. Edwin Outwater conducts, and renowned actor John Lithgow narrates this special Family Concert in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage.
Rodriguez's work is a co-commission by
Carnegie Hall and the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and is receiving its New York premiere at this concert. Shaw's piece will receive its world premiere and was commissioned by
Carnegie Hall as part of the 125 Commissions Project, launched during the 2015-2016 season to celebrate
Carnegie Hall's 125th anniversary-in which 125 new works by established and emerging composers will be performed over five seasons (from 2015-2016 through 2019-2020). In addition, the performance of Peter and the Wolf will include vibrant visuals from a retelling of the story by illustrator Chris Raschka.
Orchestra of St. Luke's (OSL) is one of America's most versatile and distinguished orchestras, collaborating with the world's greatest artists and performing approximately 80 concerts each year, including its
Carnegie Hall Orchestra Series, Chamber Music Series at The Morgan Library & Museum and Brooklyn Museum, and summer residency at Caramoor Music Festival. In its 43-year history, the orchestra has commissioned more than 50 new works, has given more than 175 world, U.S., and New York City premieres; and has appeared on more than 100 recordings, including four Grammy Award winners and seven releases on its own label, St. Luke's Collection. In 2017, OSL announced that renowned Baroque and Classical conductor Bernard Labadie will join the orchestra as Principal Conductor in the 2018-2019 season. Previous music directors and principal conductors are Sir Roger Norrington, Sir
Charles Mackerras, Donald Runnicles, and Conductor Laureate, Pablo Heras-Casado.
Orchestra of St. Luke's grew out of a chamber ensemble that began giving concerts at The Church of St. Luke in the Fields in Greenwich Village in 1974. Today, the 21 virtuoso artists of St. Luke's Chamber Ensemble make up the orchestra's artistic core.
John Lithgow's roots are in the theater. In 1973, he won a Tony Award three weeks after his Broadway debut, in
David Storey's The Changing Room. Since then he has appeared on Broadway twenty more times, earning five more Tony nominations, another Tony, four Drama Desk Awards, and induction into the Theatre Hall of Fame. In the early 1980's, Lithgow began to make a major mark in film. At that time, he was nominated for Oscars in back-to-back years, for The World According to Garp and Terms of Endearment. In the years before and after, he has appeared in over forty films. Lithgow has also been nominated for twelve Emmy Awards for his work on television. He has won five: one for an episode of Amazing Stories, and three for his work on the hit NBC comedy series 3rd Rock from the Sun, as the loopy character of the alien High Commander, Dick Solomon. During the show's six-year run, Lithgow also won a Golden Globe, two SAG Awards, The American Comedy Award, and, when it finally went off the air, a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Additionally, his diabolical turn as the Trinity Killer in a twelve-episode arc on Showtime's Dexter won him his second Golden Globe and his fifth Emmy. Most recently, Lithgow starred as
Winston Churchill in Netflix's original series, The Crown. Both the series and Lithgow have received numerous accolades. Lithgow received a Golden Globe nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in the series, won a Critics' Choice Award for Best Supporting Actor, and won a SAG Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor. He also received a nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor for this year's Emmy Awards.
Since 1998 he has written nine New York Times best-selling children's picture books, most recentlyNever Play Music Right Next to the Zoo. He has performed concerts for children with major American orchestras and has released three kids' albums, Singin' in the Bathtub, Farkle & Friends, and the Grammy-nominated The Sunny Side of the Street. Lithgow has been honored with the New Victory Theater Arts Award for his work "bringing kids to the arts and the arts to the kids." In 2011, HarperCollins published Lithgow's memoir, Drama: An Actor's Education, presenting his life and career up to the age of 35.
Lithgow was born in Rochester, New York, but grew up in Ohio. He graduated from high school in Princeton, New Jersey, attended Harvard College, and studied at the London Academy of Music & Dramatic Art on a Fulbright Grant. Lithgow has been honored with the Fulbright Lifetime Achievement Medal, induction into The American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Harvard. Lithgow has three grown children, two grandchildren, and lives in Los Angeles and New York.
Robert Xavier Rodríguez was born on June 28, 1946 in San Antonio, Texas, where he received his earliest training in piano and harmony. Subsequent musical education included study in composition with Hunter Johnson, Halsey Stevens,
Jacob Druckman, and Nadia Boulanger. He gained international recognition in 1971 when awarded the Prix de Composition Musicale Prince Pierre de Monaco by Prince Rainier and Princess Grace at the Palais Princier in
Monte Carlo. Other honors include the Prix Lili Boulanger, a Guggenheim Fellowship, four National Endowment for the Arts grants, and the
Goddard Lieberson Award from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters.
Rodríguez's music embraces all genres and often combines Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque techniques with ethnic and contemporary materials. He has had particular success with his operas. His most recent, the one-act comedy La Curandera, has been produced in Colorado, California, and Texas. Frida, based on the life of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, has had acclaimed productions at the American Music Theatre Festival,
The American Repertory Theatre in Boston, the
Brooklyn Academy Of Music's Next Wave Festival, Vienna Schauspielhaus, Theater Nordhausen in Germany, Mexico's Jalisco Filharmonica, Michigan Opera Theater, Long Beach Opera, Cincinnati Opera, and the
Houston Grand Opera. Rodríguez's children's opera Monkey See, Monkey Do is one of the most frequently performed contemporary operas in the United States, with over 2000 performances to date. Rodríguez has served as Composer-in-Residence for the Dallas Symphony and the San Antonio Symphony. He holds an Endowed Chair in Art and Aesthetic Studies and is Director of the Musica Nova ensemble at the University of Texas at Dallas. His music is published by G. Schirmer.
Caroline Shaw is a New York-based musician. She is the youngest ever winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Music, for her enigmatic composition Partita for 8 Voices. Her career defies categorization-she performs as a violin soloist, chamber musician, and as a vocalist in the Grammy-winning ensemble Roomful of Teeth. Recent commissions include works for
Carnegie Hall, the
Guggenheim Museum, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra with Jonathan Biss, and mezzo-soprano Anne
Sofie Von Otter. She also frequently collaborates with
Kanye West. Currently a doctoral candidate at Princeton, Caroline also studied at Rice and Yale. Caroline loves the color yellow, otters, Beethoven opus 74, Mozart opera, the smell of rosemary, and the sound of a janky mandolin.
Program Information
Saturday, October 14, 2017 at 2:00 p.m.
Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage
Carnegie Hall FAMILY CONCERT: PETER AND THE WOLF AND OTHER STORIES
Orchestra of St. Luke's
Edwin Outwater, Conductor
John Lithgow, Narrator
ROBERT XAVIER RODRIGUEZ The Dot and the Line (book by
Norton Juster; NY Premiere, co-commissioned by
Carnegie Hall)
CAROLINE SHAW The Mountain That Loved a Bird (book by Alice McLerran; World Premiere, commissioned by
Carnegie Hall)
Sergei Prokofiev Peter and the Wolf
Support provided by Wetherby-Pembridge School
Thanks to
The New York City Administration for Children's Services and the Department of Homeless Services for supporting families during Family Concerts.
Carnegie Hall Family Concerts are made possible, in part, by endowment gifts from The Irene Diamond Fund, Mr. and Mrs. Lester S. Morse Jr., and the Henry and
Lucy Moses Fund.
Lead support for the 125 Commissions Project is provided by The
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Additional funding is provided by members of
Carnegie Hall's Composer Club.
Bank of America is the Proud Season Sponsor of
Carnegie Hall.
Tickets, priced at $10-$22, are available at the Carnegie Hall Box Office, 154 West 57th Street, or can be charged to major credit cards by calling CarnegieCharge at 212-247-7800 or by visiting the Carnegie Hall website, carnegiehall.org.
