The Philadelphia Orchestra Featured In Pictures from an Exhibition 6/3

What happens when a composer goes to an art show and takes home a souvenir not in the form of a photo or postcard ... but as music? Before the days of audio tours and museum gift shops, there was Modest Musorgsky, strolling through a friend's exhibit in St. Petersburg, taking musical snapshots, and immortalizing one art form with another with his Pictures from an Exhibition.

It didn't stop there. In a formidable chain of artistic events, the Russian composer's 1874 piano suite was picked up 50 years later by a sophisticated Frenchman named Maurice Ravel. He took the piece and orchestrated it-much like you might take your grandmother's old black and white family photos and transform them into high-tech, digital prints. The result is a glorious and colorful masterpiece with themes so familiar (you might recall the dance scene in the 1998 Jeff Bridges film The Big Lebowski, or the Emerson, Lake, and Palmer cover from the '70s) even the novice concertgoer may think the memory is his own.

Chief Conductor Charles Dutoit, host Gerard McBurney, and The Philadelphia Orchestra will trace the evolution of this inspiring work in a special multimedia concert on Thursday, June 3. The performance-with specially priced tickets from $15 to $55-is part of the Orchestra's Beyond the Score concert series, designed to make classical music accessible to a wide range of listeners.

Beyond the Score is a highly successful multimedia concert series developed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and creative director Gerard McBurney. Created not only for aficionados looking to delve deeper, but also for newcomers eager to explore the world of classical music, the first half of each Beyond the Score program offers a live multimedia documentary of the selected score-its context in history, how it fits into the composer's output of works, the details of a composer's life that influenced its creation-on the stage of Verizon Hall, sharing the illuminating stories found "inside" the music. Live musical examples by the Orchestra are called upon to illustrate the structure of each composition. After an intermission, concertgoers return to the hall with newly discovered knowledge to hear a performance of the score, played in its entirety by The Philadelphia Orchestra.

Other works explored in the series during the 2009-10 season included Bartok's The Miraculous Mandarin and Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring. The series continues in the 2010-11 season with programs featuring Shostakovich's politically controversial Symphony No. 4 (October 1), Strauss's musical self-portrait Ein Heldenleben (March 3), and Holst's mythically-inspired The Planets (May 13). Learn more about Beyond the Score at www.beyondthescore.org.

The Philadelphia Orchestra

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 unity in artistic leadership with only seven music directors throughout its history: Fritz Scheel (1900-07), Carl Pohlig (1907-12), Leopold Stokowski (1912-41), Eugene Ormandy (1936-80), Riccardo Muti (1980-92), Wolfgang Sawallisch (1993-2003), and Christoph Eschenbach (2003-08).

This rich tradition is carried on by Chief Conductor Charles Dutoit. Mr. Dutoit has a long-standing relationship with the Orchestra, having made his debut with the ensemble in 1980. Highlights of his second season include performances of Berlioz's Te Deum and Symphonie fantastique, part of Mr. Dutoit's four-year focus on the works of that composer, and a celebration of the 100th anniversary of Samuel Barber's birthday. During his tenure, Mr. Dutoit will also showcase the music of the Ballets Russes, continuing in the 2009-10 season with performances of Stravinsky's Petrushka and The Rite of Spring.

The Philadelphia Orchestra annually touches the lives of more than one million music lovers worldwide through its performances, publications, recordings, and broadcasts. Each year the Orchestra presents a subscription season in Philadelphia, education and community partnership programs, regular appearances at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center, and a three-week tour. Its summer schedule includes performances at Philadelphia's Mann Center for the Performing Arts, free Neighborhood Concerts, and residencies at the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival and the Saratoga Performing Arts Center.

For more information on The Philadelphia Orchestra, please visit www.philorch.org.

BEYOND THE SCORE: PICTURES OF WHAT?

June 3 at 7:00 PM - Thursday evening - Verizon Hall at The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts

Before the advent of iPods and museum audio tours, Modest Musorgsky crafted his Pictures from an Exhibition as a musical depiction of a memorial exhibition of works by his good friend Viktor Hartmann. Though few of Hartmann's original watercolors and drawings remain, Musorgsky's beautifully imaginative and colorful music provides glimpses of what it would have been like to experience Hartmann's masterly series of pictures. Our guides, Charles Dutoit and Gerard McBurney, will navigate through the historical records to bring the inspiration and execution of this beloved work into focus.

The Philadelphia Orchestra
Charles Dutoit Conductor
Gerard McBurney Host
David Howey Actor
Kiyoko Takeuti Piano
Musorgsky Pictures from an Exhibition

Beyond the Score is made possible by support from the Hirschberg-Goodfriend Fund in memory of Adolf Hirschberg as established by Juliet J. Goodfriend.

The Wachovia Wells Fargo Foundation is proud to be the Lead Underwriter of the "Raising the Invisible Curtain" initiative. Additional funding comes from the Annenberg Foundation and the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development.

Tickets: $15-$55, 215.893.1999 or www.philorch.org.

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