Twenty music students, ranging from fifth grade through high school, have been accepted to participate in the Columbia Festival Orchestra’s new education program “Take a Seat…in the Orchestra.” This program will take place in conjunction with CFO’s 3-day residency at PS21 (Performance Spaces for the 21st Century) in Chatham, NY, July 25-27, 2008.

Student interns will be seated with their mentors in the orchestra for rehearsals and two performances of a new work, written for the occasion by Chatham graduate, David Grunberg. Overture to a New Theatre, is scored for orchestra and incorporates sections that will be orchestrated specifically for the students participating in this program. They met for the first time to rehearse their parts with the composer on July 21st (see photo).

The following students will Take their Seats… violins: Cathleen Alarcon, Victor Feldman, Jeffrey Girton, Elizabeth Moran, Trevor DePew, Lydia Curran and Deidre Kelly; viola: Samantha Oakes; cello: Patrick Jones; string basses: Alexander Toth and Oliver Kress; flutes: Glynnis MacDonald and Annalise Krajeski; clarinet: Angela Matthews and Sterlene Negron; trumpet: Michael Krajeski; french horns: Anna Costello, Austin Klein, and Bethany Meyers; trombone: Raja Pillai. School districts represented include Hudson, Chatham, Ichabod Crane, Taconic Hills and Germantown, as well as Cairo-Durham, Hawthorne Valley, Gt. Barrington Rudolph Steiner, John Jay, Averill Park, Mineola Middle School, and one student is home-schooled.

The residency of the CFO and its associated education program “Take a Seat…in the Orchestra” have been made possible through the generous support of the the following corporations and foundations: Arcon Construction, Berkshire Taconic Foundation Fund for Columbia County, Melanie and Howard Brandston Fund, Francis Greenburger Charitable Fund, Ed Herrington, Inc., Hudson River Bank & Trust Foundation, JSL Computer Services, Lavelle & Finn, Marilyn and Bob Laurie Fund, Mario’s True Value Home Center, Metz Wood Harder Insurance, Old Chatham Sheepherding Company. Price Chopper’s Golub Foundation, Stewart’s, David G. Whitcomb Foundation and many individuals (list in preparation).

Performances take place on Saturday, July 26 at 6 pm and on Sunday, July 27 at 2 pm. The program will also include Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 1, the “Classical,” Barber’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 with CFO Young Artist Chanel Wood, soprano, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7.

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The Columbia Festival Orchestra, founded in 1988 by artistic director and conductor Gwen Gould, is a professional orchestra based in Columbia County, NY, whose mission is to present classical music and other concerts to the highest degree of excellence and to cultivate an appreciation of the art of music in young people and adults.

Click the links below for more information:
Columbia Festival Orchestra
Take a Seat…in the Orchestra