For Immediate Release
November 30, 2004
MidAmerica Productions Presents the National Festival Orchestra
New York, NY - MidAmerica Productions presents the Ninth Annual National Festival Orchestra in Isaac Stern
Auditorium at Carnegie Hall, Sunday, January 16th, 2005 at 8:30 PM. The concert will also feature the Crane
Symphony Orchestra in an Ensemble Spotlight.
Crane Symphony Orchestra
Christopher Lanz, Conductor
Tchaikovsky, Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64
National Festival Orchestra
Lukas Foss, Conductor
Mahler Symphony No. 1 in D major "Titan"
Eugene Minor, Conductor
Krista Stewart, Violin
Ravel Tzigane
Tickets, at $85, 50, 35, may be obtained by calling CarnegieCharge at (212) 247-7800, going online at
www.carnegiehall.org, or by visiting the Carnegie Hall Box Office at West 57th Street and Seventh Avenue
in NYC. For more information, call our Box Office at (212) 239-4699.
MidAmerica Productions is devoted to spotlighting the best emerging musical talent through its many
performance programs. On January 16th, groups from two of these programs share the stage in what
will be a remarkable evening of music.
The Ensemble Spotlight Series offers outstanding performing ensembles the opportunity to perform at
Carnegie Hall. Groups are selected from auditions. Since 1983, more then 200 groups from nearly
every state in the US, Canada, and Japan have performed as part of this series.
The National Festival Orchestra, under the baton of renowned conductor/composer Lukas Foss,
celebrates its ninth anniversary in 2005. The NFO was founded with the mission of identifying
talented music students from across the country who have already demonstrated their musical
ability and commitment to the art and to provide them with an intensive orchestral training
residency in New York. These young artists work with legendary performers culminating in a
performance on the world's most famous concert stage, Carnegie Hall. The NFO is created anew
each season with participants selected though taped auditions and represent the finest music
programs in the country. National Festival Orchestra Performers have come from every state
in America and have gone on to attend prestigious music schools and to perform as professionals.
In 2003, the National Festival Orchestra instituted the Lukas Foss Young Artist Competition
to recognize an outstanding instrumentalist.
Christopher C. Lanz, D.M.A., is the orchestra director at the Crane School. He leads the
Crane Symphony, String, Chamber and Opera Orchestras and the Early Music Ensemble, maintains
the harpsichords and continuo organ, and teaches conducting and string music education classes.
The Crane Symphony Orchestra, the resident orchestra of the Crane School of Music at the
State University of Music, Potsdam, NY, was formed in 1839 and is the second earliest
college orchestra in the country after Harvard.
Conductor Lukas Foss is a unique figure in American music, representing an extraordinary
legacy as conductor, composer, pianist, and pedagogue. He has conducted all of the most
celebrated orchestras in the world, including the Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony,
Cleveland Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra,
San Francisco Symphony, Berlin Philharmonic, Leningrad Symphony, London Symphony Orchestra,
Santa Cecilia Orchestra of Rome, and Tokyo Philharmonic. As Music Director of the Brooklyn
Philharmonic, Milwaukee Symphony, Buffalo Philharmonic and the Jerusalem Symphony, Foss has
been an effective champion of living composers. He has held the position of composer-in-residence
at Harvard University, Carnegie Mellon University, Yale University, Manhattan School of
Music, UCLA, Boston University, the Tanglewood Institute, and in 1986, delivered the Mellon
Lectures at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C. He is the recipient of 15 honorary
doctorates, a Guggenheim Fellowship, Fulbright Fellowship, the Prix de Rome, three New
York Critics Circle Awards, and is a member of The American Academy and Institute of
Arts and Letters.
Eugene Minor, conductor, is a native of Los Angeles, California. In addition to
conducting activities, he has composed symphonies, a piano concerto, and a several
vocal works. His opera Thespis, a reconstruction from the lost opera by Gilbert and
Sullivan, was given its premiere in Los Angeles, and the Bergen Youth Orchestra premiered
his Requiem: In Memoriam Dimitri Shostakovitch. He has appeared as guest conductor
of the New Haven Symphony and the Orchestral Society of Philadelphia. In 1998 Mr.
Minor was appointed conductor of the Concert Orchestra with the Inter-School Orchestras
of New York. An avid proponent of the music of Louis Spohr, Mr. Minor conducted the
world premiere of the composer's Tenth Symphony at Carnegie Hall. Recently, he served
as assistant conductor to Lukas Foss for MidAmerica Productions's National Festival
Orchestra.
Violinist Krista Stewart, age 14, is a freshman at Middleton High School in Middleton,
WI, and studies violin with Eugene Purdue and David Perry. As the winner of the 2004
Rising Stars Tri-State Concerto Competition (La Crosse Symphony), Concord Chamber
Orchestra Concerto Competition, and Madison Symphony Orchestra High School Concerto
Competition, Ms. Stewart performed as soloist with those orchestras in March 2004.
In May 2004, she performed as soloist with the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra as winner
of their Young Artist Auditions. She has also been a featured soloist with the Midwest
Young Artists Orchestra (as Overall Open Division winner of the 2004 Walgreens Competition),
the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra (as winner of their 2003 Young Artist Competition), and
the Madison Symphony Orchestra (as winner of their 2001 Fall Youth Competition.) In April
2004, she was invited to perform on a taping of the NPR program "From the Top" with
Christopher O'Riley in Minneapolis, MN.
Over the past 20 years, MidAmerica Productions has brought together conductors, choruses,
soloists, and orchestral musicians for performances at some of the world's greatest venues,
especially at New York's Isaac Stern Auditorium at Carnegie Hall.
Under the guidance of MidAmerica's founder, Peter Tiboris, the company has presented
over 720 concerts worldwide and some 600 in New York at Isaac Stern Auditorium at
Carnegie Hall, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall,
and Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall.
More than 2115 American ensembles, representing each of the 50 states, have appeared
with MidAmerica in New York, as have 75 symphonic and choral ensembles from Europe,
the Far East, South America, and Canada. There have more than 300 guest conductors,
620 solo artists, and 88,000 performers who have appeared on MidAmerica's series in
Carnegie Hall.
In addition to presenting classic choral and instrumental works, MidAmerica Productions
has championed the works of contemporary composers. On MidAmerica's series in Carnegie
Hall and at Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall, there have been approximately 31 World
Premieres, 16 United States Premieres, and 50 New York Premieres.
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