ESYO opens season with P.D.Q. Bach performance
TROY, N.Y. » The Empire State Youth Orchestra will open its season this weekend with a local performance featuring music of the legendary P.D.Q. Bach.
Special guest pianist Jeffrey Biegel, who has been performing worldwide and recording traditional repertoire and new works for the Naxos and Steinway & Sons label, will join with the orchestra on P.D.Q. Bach’s Concerto for Simply Grand Piano and Orchestra at its New York State premiere.
The concert, to be held at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday at the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall, will also include other classical pieces designed to entertain and engage audience members such as Toccata and Fugue in D Minor by J.S. Bach/Stokowski and Symphony No. 5 by Prokofiev.
Biegel enjoys a fascinating career as a performing and recording artist, composer and teacher at the Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College. He could neither hear nor speak until the age of three when he had corrective surgery. He regularly performs with professional symphony orchestras, but appreciates working with younger musicians, as well. “I love working with young musicians because they bring an energy of youth and wonder to their performances. The music is new to them, and in the case of P.D.Q. Bach, they will experience what many have enjoyed for more than fifty years,” Biegel said in a press release.
The pianist created the PDQ Bach concerto commissioning project comprised of many orchestras in the USA and one professional orchestra in Finland. “Even though there are many funny aspects about the piece, there is also a serious quality which makes the humor more humorous. The original material is fabulous, as if it had been written during the Classical era,” he said in the release. P.D.Q. Bach is a fictitious composer invented by musical satirist “Professor” Peter Schickele. Professor Schickele has numerous commissions that have been performed by orchestras and chamber ensembles for five decades.
Music director Helen Cha-Pyo came up with the idea to perform the concerto and bring Biegel to the Capital Region. “I’ve known Jeffrey Biegel as a performer since the mid90s when I was the assistant conductor at Britt Music Festival in Oregon and he was a frequent guest pianist at the festival. I saw his invitation to this consortium commissioning project two years ago and was intrigued by the fact that the composer was P.D.Q. Bach! Professor Peter Schickele is truly a oneof-a-kind artist whose ingenuity in creating compositions that are beyond any particular style, genre and/ or time period has provided a new and delightful way of enjoying ‘old’ music to generations of musicians and concert-goers here in America and all over the world. In my opinion, he is the best musical satirist of the 20th century. He turned 80 years young last year, and he apparently announced that this particular piano concerto was the last commissioning request he would accept. I didn’t want to miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and thought our Youth Orchestra musicians would really enjoy performing his composition,” ChaPyo said in the release.
Many adults are familiar with P.D.Q. Bach as they attended concerts in the 1970s. “I am most excited about the fact that P.D.Q. Bach is a unifying element, bringing older generations and newer generations together. P.D.Q. was so popular back in the 1970s, and now, to have a new work to present to the new generation -- it is thrilling,“said Rebecca Calos, the executive director of the Empire State Youth Orchestra, in the release.
The organization works hard to provide the young musicians in their ensembles unique musical experiences that will enrich their lives. Bringing in Biegel is an opportunity for the students to learn from someone who has been in their shoes and ultimately decided to keep moving forward to make music a career. “Playing with professional musicians offers our students the chance to experience, first hand, a world that many are aspiring to be a part of as adults. To have the opportunity to ask questions, to gain insight and to be inspired by amazingly talented musicians who are ‘making it’ in the professional arena is incredible. After such interactions, we often hear from our students how the experience made them want to work even harder and play with greater passion and ambition,” Calos continued.
The Empire State Youth Orchestra concerts are family-friendly. P.D.Q. Bach is especially designed to delight a variety of ages. “It is always enjoyable for families to experience the magic of ‘live’ performances,” Biegel said in the release. “There is nothing like it, and families will enjoy having the opportunity to listen and watch the concert and experience the allure of P.D.Q. Bach.”
More information about Empire State Youth Orchestra’s program and concerts can be found online at esyo.org. Ticket’s to Saturday’s performance in Troy range from $10 to $2 and can be purchased online, at the venue box office, or at the doors.