LACO to Present WESTSIDE CONNECTIONS, 3/17

Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra (LACO) explores how the brain works when a musician improvises as well as the impact of auditory loss on music by Beethoven and Smetana composed when they could no longer hear during the first program of Westside Connections, a chamber music series with a twist, on Thursday, March 17, 2016, 7:30 pm, at the Moss Theater in Santa Monica. Curated and hosted by LACO Concertmaster Margaret Batjer, Westside Connections' 2015-16 season features LACO musicians and cutting-edge neuroscientists exploring "Music and the Mind" through performance and conversation, followed by Q&A with audiences. Among ideas probed during the three-concert series are how music moves us (and why), the possibility of pinpointing the location of creativity in the brain, and where the next wave in brain management research may to take us.

During Westside Connections' March program, Dr. Charles Limb, Professor and Chief of Otology/Neurotology and Skull Base Surgery at UCSF, a self-described "music addict," shares his findings on hearing loss against performances of Smetana's tone poem "From My Life" and two works by Beethoven: Cavatina from String Quartet in B-major and a selection from his Bagatelles for Solo Piano featuring LACO music director Jeffrey Kahane. Also featured during the performance are LACO Assistant Concertmaster Tereza Stanislav and artists Susan Rishik, violin; Robert Brophy, viola; and Trevor Handy, cello. In a collaborative demonstration with Kahane at the keyboard, Limb reveals what happens in the brain during improvisation.

Limb, whose expertise covers the full scope of otology and neurotology with a focus on the treatment of hearing loss and auditory disorders, is also the Director of the Douglas Grant Cochlear Implant Center at UCSF and holds a joint appointment in the Department of Neurosurgery. He received his undergraduate degree at Harvard University and his medical training at Yale University School of Medicine, followed by surgical residency and fellowship in Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital. His postdoctoral research fellowship at the Center for Hearing Sciences at Johns Hopkins studied the development of the auditory brainstem, and a second postdoctoral fellowship at the National Institutes of Health studied neural mechanisms of musical improvisation and perception using functional neuroimaging methods. He was at Johns Hopkins Hospital from 1996 to 2015, where he was Associate Professor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery and a Faculty Member at the Peabody Conservatory of Music and School of Education at Johns Hopkins University. He specializes in all surgery of the temporal bone, with particular expertise in acoustic neuroma surgery, cochlear implant surgery, implantable hearing aids, stapes surgery, cholesteatoma surgery, and cancers of the ear. His current areas of research focus on the study of the neural basis of musical creativity as well as the study of music perception in deaf individuals with cochlear implants. He is the past Editor-in-Chief of Trends in Amplification, the only journal explicitly focused on auditory amplification devices and hearing aids, and an Editorial Board member of the journals Otology and Neurotology and Music and Medicine.

Each year, LACO's trademark three-part Westside Connections, now in its eight season, steps outside the proverbial "music "box" to illustrate with fascinating intellectual discourse and superb artistry the myriad ways music is woven into society and our lives. The 2015-16 Westside Connections series continues with a performance on April 7 of youthful works by child prodigies Mozart and Mendelssohn, with LACO musicians joined by special guests Dr. Robert Bilder, Professor of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Sciences and Professor of Psychology, UCLA, and Dr. Susan Bookheimer, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, UCLA. It concludes May 5 when the evening centers on breathtaking songs by Schumann and Ravel, each of whom suffered severe mental collapse, with LACO musicians joined by special guest Dr. Linda Liau, Neurosurgeon, Professor and Director of the UCLA Brain Tumor Program, and guest artists Heidi Grant Murphy, soprano, and Robert Thies, piano. In previous seasons, Westside Connections has explored connections between music and such disparate topics as architecture, the culinary arts, poetry, stories and the influences of Los Angeles on creativity.

Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra is considered one of the world's premier chamber orchestras as well as a pacesetter in presenting wide-ranging repertoire and adventurous commissions. Its 2015-16 season, features a compelling mix of beloved masterpieces and genre-defying premieres from firmly established as well as notable up-and-coming composers programmed by Jeffrey Kahane, one of the world's foremost conductors and pianists, who marks his 19th season as LACO's music director.

Tickets (beginning at $65) are available online at laco.org, by calling LACO at 213 622 7001, or at the venue box office on the night of the concert, if tickets remain. Subscriptions to all three Westside Connections concerts are available for $150. Student rush tickets ($12), based on availability, may be purchased at the box office one hour before the concert. Also available for college students is the $30 "Campus to Concert Hall All Access Pass" - good for LACO's three Westside Connections concerts at the Moss Theater, seven Orchestral Series concerts at either the Alex Theatre or UCLA's Royce Hall and Discover Bach's Cantata "Sleepers Awake" at Ambassador Auditorium. Discounted tickets are also available by phone for groups of 12 or more. The Moss Theater at New Roads School is located at 3131 Olympic Boulevard, Santa Monica, CA, 90404.

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