Cameron Carpenter Comes to Poway OnStage

Cameron Carpenter performs a mixed classical and modern program on the Marshall & Ogletree Digital Touring Organ at Poway OnStage Saturday, February 17, 2018 a 8:00pm. The New York Times says he is a player with extraordinarily glib fingers and Astaire-like footwork... a first-rate talent with a sense of how phrases move."

Carpenter's repertoire from the complete works of J. S. Bach to film scores, his original compositions and hundreds of transcriptions and arrangements is large and diverse. In 2012 he was awarded the Leonard Bernstein Award. He is the first solo organist ever nominated for a GRAMMY Award, and has appeared with international orchestras around the world.

"The virtuosity of Mr. Carpenter's performance is astonishing" Michael Rennie, President and CEO of Poway OnStage continues "and his knowledge of classical and modern forms in concert with the inner working of the Marshall and Ogletree Organ give our audience an unprecedented experience of this transformative music, the history behind it and the technology that allows it to go places it has never been before."

In 2014, Carpenter introduced his International Touring Organ, a monumental cross-genre digital organ built to Carpenter's own specifications. This innovative instrument has allowed Carpenter to do what few have ever done: make extensive tours of Europe and the USA bringing the pipe organ to communities where it had previously been unheard. His SONY Music debut album, If You Could Read My Mind, entered Billboard's Traditional Classical chart at No. 1.

Carpenter trained at the American Boychoir School and the North Carolina School of the Arts and holds two degrees from The Juilliard School. He has spoken and debated at think tanks and conferences including TED, IdeaCity, The Entertainment Gathering and many more.

Built by digital organ pioneers Marshall & Ogletree of Needham, MA, the touring organ accommodates both Cameron's repertoire and his touring schedule. The organ consists mainly of a modular five-keyboard console, a massively parallel computer processing system utilizing samples from several organs key to Cameron's artistic development and a revolutionary "geographic" concert audio system scalable to the largest concert halls medium alternative venues such as nightclubs, open-air use and television.

"My vision is to keep the best of the classical organ, its emotional magnitude, its sonic range, its coloristic drama but to liberate these from the pipe organ's immobility, its moving parts, its cost, its institutionality," says Mr. Carpenter. "I want the 'American Classic' cathedral organ to combine with its counterpart, the cinema organ, in a single instrument. It has to have the cathedral organ's expansiveness, and the Wurlitzer's clarity, rapidity and audacity. It is ethereal and rhythmless at times - and at other times more rhythmically intense than any pipe organ in the world."

"Organists almost never own their instruments, meaning they play at the pleasure of whomever does" says Carpenter. "The organ scene is rife with stories of organists who have lost instrument relationships of years at the behest of a change in management. Such a situation is too insecure for real artistic freedom, and the digital organ stands to give organists the chance for deeper relationships with their craft - of which this organ may be a bold first step." Cornelia Schmid, President of Konzertdirektion Schmid, who helped Cameron secure the financing to purchase his instrument, agrees. "Owning an instrument is a natural thing for most instrumentalists. For Cameron as an organist who appears at all major venues of the world, it should be natural, too. I admit that this idea might seem quite unusual, but so is Cameron. We are glad Konzertdirektion Schmid can support making his dream come true, and we're convinced that this will be not just is a new episode in Cameron's success story, but also a unique and very enriching contribution to modern musical life."

Tickets: 858-748-0505
Online: http://powayonstage.org/377/Cameron-Carpenter
Prices: $15-$50

Poway OnStage, (a dba of The Poway Center for the Performing Arts Foundation), is a 27-year-old non-profit organization that offers a professional performing arts series, including music, dance, theater, comedy and more by nationally and internationally-renowned performers. Poway OnStage also hosts an Arts in Education Initiative that serves more than 4,300 students in the Poway Unified School District. Its Arts in Education Initiative programs include a free, one-week musical theater camp; Introduction to Instruments assemblies; partners with the nonprofit Natural High hosting assemblies for teens encouraging them to find their natural alternative to drugs and alcohol; Master Classes with visiting artists; and reduced price youth theater tickets, made possible by GEICO. Visit our website at www.powayonstage.org

Poway OnStage has been selected by State Assemblymember Brian Maienschein as an exceptional nonprofit organization in California's 77th district.

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Cameron Carpenter

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