WRTI continues its series of concert broadcasts of the Philadelphia Youth Orchestra with Music Director Louis Scaglione on the podium. This Sunday, it's music of Alexander Glazunov and Carl Orff, plus the premier of a new work by Alan Mackwell, winner of the PYO's Young Composer's Competition.
The concert, recorded in June of this year, was the 77th annual festival concert by the orchestra, and was highlighted by the selection of the 4th annual Ovation Award for Outstanding Leadership in Music Education, in addition to celebrating the 20th year of Maestro Louis Scaglione's tenure as Music Director of PYO.
Alan Mackwell's work, Secretly Ramses the Second, is the third movement of a larger work by the young composer, the Tintin Suite. Mackwell's piece is inspired by the Belgian cartoon character Tintin, and the title of the movement is taken from a quote in the Tintin comic book Cigars of the Pharoah. The German-born Mackwell explains the inspiration for writing the piece was his desire to step away from the concept of writing linear musical stories and instead to focus and develop the characteristics of Tintin that make his stories so fascinating.
Violinist Michael Ludwig joins the orchestra for a performance of the Violin Concerto in a minor, by Alexander Glazunov. The concerto is a real virtuoso tour-de-force, and is one of Glazunov's most frequently performed works.
The orchestra is then joined by soprano Alexandra Nowakowski, tenor Eric Rieger, and baritone John Viscardi plus the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia, and the Philadelphia Boys Choir and Chorale, for a performance of Carl Orff's best known work, the scenic cantata Carmina Burana.
Hear the Philadelphia Youth Orchestra in this remarkable concert, this Sunday from 3 to 5 pm on WRTI.