Music Education

Willie Pickens and Welz Kauffman Play Open Jazz Master Class At UIC

Chicago jazz legend pianist Willie Pickens will serve as teacher and Ravinia President and CEO (and pianist) Welz Kauffman will be one of his students—joining an ensemble of the best high-school jazz players from Chicago Public Schools—in a jazz master class open to the public at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 19, in Room L060 of the Chicago Performing Arts Building on the UIC campus at 1040 W. Harrison St. The ensemble will also include alumni of Ravinia’s Jazz Scholars program, including one who is now a CPS band director. The entertaining Pickens will publicly critique the ensemble and hone their performance as they work their way through a song. Every year Ravinia selects the best high school players to form the Jazz Scholars, an ensemble that studies and plays real gigs with jazz professionals as part of Ravinia’s REACH*TEACH*PLAY education programs.

RSMI Alumni Take Top Prize In Banff International String Quartet Competition

Congratulations to Ravinia Steans Music Institute alumni Bryan Lee (violin, 2009 and 2010 - photo far-right) and Joel Link (violin, 2009 - photo far-left), members of the Dover Quartet, which recently took first prize at the Banff International String Quartet Competition (BISQC).

"In a competition that was remarkable for the very high standard of performances, the Dover Quartet consistently demonstrated an exceptional level of maturity, poise and artistry," said Barry Shiffman, Executive Director of BISQC. "This young group is ready for a major performing career, and we look forward to working together to help make that happen."   

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Ravinia Goes Back To School With It's Reach*Teach*Play Programs

Ravinia’s latest initiative, Sistema Ravinia, which puts musical instruments in the hands of young students, will begin its second year of daily afterschool instrumental instruction with 40 Circle Rockets orchestra students. 

The Jazz Scholars program matches talented high school students with Chicago’s finest jazz musicians, providing training and mentorship. These students meet with and rehearse over 50 times per year with our Jazz Mentors.


The Music Discovery program enhances the musical skills of thousands of K-3rd grade Chicago Public School students in over 140 classrooms by providing resident teaching artists and interactive music learning activities. 

The Ravinia Lawndale Family Music School begins its free music classes in general music, voice, violin, guitar and piano for children and adults who reside in this underserved community. 

Many artists from the 
$10 BGH Classics series and other renowned ensembles and musicians will perform in schools through Ravinia’s Guest Artists in the Classroom.

RSMI Alumna Sings In Tanglewood Finale Before Returning For Ravinia Closer

Mezzo-soprano Tamara Mumford, an alumna of Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute, just earned great notices for helping to close the 2013 Tanglewood season with its traditional finale, Beethoven’s Ninth.

She returns to Ravinia Saturday, Sept. 7 to help close Ravinia's season with the Midwest premiere of the acclaimed John Adams Passion, The Gospel According to the Other Mary. Mumford will reprise the role she originated along with fellow original cast members mezzo Kelley O’Connor, tenor Russell Thomas and countertenors Daniel Bubeck, Brian Cummings and Nathan Medley. Grant Gershon conducts the Chicago Philharmonic and Los Angeles Master Chorale.

RSMI Alumni Claudia Huckle Wins Birgit Nilsson Prize

At Steans, the faculty and fellows both strive for excellence. When the fellows leave the institute at the end of the summer, we know they are going on the great things. We follow their careers and support them through every one of their milestones. We were happy to hear that 2005 RSMI alumna Claudia Huckle, a mezzo-soprano from England, recently won the Birgit Nilsson Prize at Plácido Domingo's Operalia competition. Congratulations, Claudia!

 

RSMI Singers Get Nine Songs To Call Their Own In A Concert of Premiers

All summer Ravinia has been celebrating the 25th anniversary of its summer conservatory, Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute. Perhaps the biggest celebration yet comes tonight, Aug. 12, with a concert that boasts nine world-premiere songs, commissioned for the milestone year. Tickets are just $10, and all ticket-holders are invited to a post-concert party. The songs are Jake Heggie’s By the Spring, at SunsetAaron Jay Kernis’s setting of Walt Whitman’s Clear MidnightRamsey Lewis’s Quiet MomentsDavid Ludwig’s Still LifeStephen Paulus’s Was It All a Dream?, Augusta Read Thomas’s Twilight Butterfly, and a three-song cycle by Roberto Sierra called Décimas.

Ravinia C.Y.I. Grant Is Anyone's Game

Every night the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performs at Ravinia, high school students from all over the Chicagoland area come to enjoy free lawn entry and, by doing so, earn points towards a $5,000 grant for their schools music program. Over 100 high schools are currently in the running and with just three CSO concerts remaining, it could still be anyone's game.
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One Score Resources On Verdi's Masterpiece Aida Available Online

Were you aware that Aida premiered in the same year that much of the Windy City was destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire? Learn about this and more as Verdi’s Aida is this year’s selection for Ravinia’s One Score, One Chicago initiative, the first time an opera has been selected for that treatment, and companion resources are available now. James Conlon will conduct the Chicago Symphony Orchestra with an all-star cast headed byLatonia MooreRoberto Alagna and Michelle DeYoung in the Pavilion onAug. 3One Score each year seeks to unite the music community in consideration of one masterpiece, including in-school programs. Explore it all, and you too can “Ritorna vincitor!”

Calling All High Schoolers!

Calling all high schoolers! Join us on August 4, 2013 at 3 p.m. for the 3rd annual Cannon Ball celebration prior to the 5 p.m. “Tchaikovsky Spectacular” concert. Cannon Ball is a free party with food, refreshment and prizes hosted by Ravinia's Classical Youth Initiative every summer before the Chicago Symphony's All-Tchaikovsky Evening. The concert features live cannons as musical instruments for the “1812” Overture. As with all CSO concerts at Ravinia, high-school students who check in at the box office will get onto the lawn for free as well as receive points for their school towards a cash prize for their music programs from the Ravinia Associates board. High-school students attending the Cannon Ball will receive double  the amount of usual points. You can find the current standings of this years Classical Youth Initiative grand prize here!

The Classical Youth Initiative is Ravinia's program aimed at giving high school students in the Chicago area the opportunity to experience the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and a chance to win money for their school's music program. To help create and develop ideas that teenagers would be receptive to, Ravinia reached out to students from Highland Park High School who met weekly with Ravinia staff members to develop a way to promote classical music to their peers. The result of all their hard work is the Classical Youth Initiative.

Master Classes Not Just For Musicians

VIDEO: James Conlon on his philosophy of conducting master classes.

When I was a junior in high school, I attended my first master class. It was at a four-day conference, and as I was too scared to attend as a performer, I went as an auditor instead. That means that I got to attend all the sessions but didn't play at any of them. I think I spent half my savings to do this.

At Ravinia, you don’t need to spend your savings to attend a master class. They’re free! In fact, not only are they free for the audience members, they’re also free for the incredibly talented young professionals who have been accepted into Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute (RSMI) each summer for the last 25 summers.

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A Great Introduction For Kids

I’ve often marveled at the relatively low-brow (does anyone use that term anymore?) way I was introduced to classical orchestral music as a child. It wasn’t piano lessons or music appreciation courses or anything quite so formal. Rather it was my typical kid’s addiction to cartoons on television. 

I’m not talking about latter-day Saturday morning fare like the Powerpuff Girls or SpongeBob SquarePants, but classic Hollywood theatrical cartoons that were a fixture of TV back in the day. I still remember seeing Andy Panda conduct a cartoon orchestra in a performance of Suppe’s Morning, Noon and Night in Vienna overture, or Mickey Mouse leading a band performance of the overture to Rossini’s William Tell. I was totally hooked, and those cartoon selections, among others, were my main incentive for acquiring my first classical LPs. 

It wasn’t just the animation, of course. The music seemed so right to me, and I have come to realize in retrospect just how ideal an introduction to classical music overtures can be. They are brief enough not to tax a child’s attention span, and most of them are jam-packed with wonderful tunes that today’s children—at least those with an open mind—can still find entrancing. 

This is why the Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert on Sunday, July 21, is a wonderful opportunity to introduce the children you care most about to the endlessly rewarding world of classical music. The program includes the overture to Bernstein’s Candide, the overture—and Wedding March—from Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (virtually any child will recognize that march) and two of the most perennially popular of Rossini’s infectious overtures, those to The Barber of Seville and The Thieving Magpie, both of which have made an appearance in numerous cartoons—the former was a specialty of Bugs Bunny, and a 1964 adaptation of the latter earned an Oscar nomination. Here’s your chance to give some lucky children something they can cherish for the rest of their lives—and have a lot of fun yourself along the way.

 

Miriam Fried Recieves Honor For Her 20-Year Commitment to RSMI

One of the most respected violin pedagogues in the world, herself an acclaimed soloist, Miriam Fried was surprised by Ravinia leaders, family and friends at a ceremony Monday when they presented her with the first Edward Gordon Award in recognition of her 20 years of leadership at Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute. Fried, who has led RSMI’s piano and strings program for most of the summer conservatory’s 25-year history, will give a concert in Ravinia’s Martin Theatre on July 5,with violinist Mihaela Martin, violists Atar Arad and Paul Biss, cellist Frans Helmerson and pianist Jeremy Denk.

The Circle Rockets Brass Take Off!

 

The Circle Rockets Brass continue to exceed our expectations, both in terms of their skills and their enthusiasm! We are very excited to see some of our older students begin taking on leadership roles as peer-teachers and mentors for our younger students. Recently the students have been learning about playing in harmony (both in the musical and social senses!). Their rapidly growing skill levels are combining with a greater sense of musical identity to foster the joy of collaboration that was so obvious last week when one of our youngest trumpet students exclaimed, “We sound awesome!”

Theresa C.

Photo above: Tristan Dismukes, a fourth grader, teaches an exercise from our Essential Elements book using practice techniques discussed in class. 

 

Associates Host Music Matters Party for REACH*TEACH*PLAY Education Programs

Ravinia Associates, the festival’s forward-looking board of young business leaders, will host its annual Music Matters party to benefit Ravinia’s REACH*TEACH*PLAY education programs at 6:30 p.m. Saturday, May 4, at the Radisson Blu Aqua Hotel in Chicago. The black-tie event features a live auction (with electronic bidding paddles) for sporting events, vacation packages and premium Ravinia tickets. The event will also honor Ravinia Life Trustees Harrison and Lois Steans for 40 years of dedicated service. Ravinia reaches about 75,000 people each year through its education programs, which include student orchestras built on the “El Sistema” model. Those unable to attend can still make a donation to our REACH*TEACH*PLAY programs, and have it matched as part of the Music Matters Challenge, sponsored by Evergreen Real Estate Services.

Update: Sistema Ravinia Circle Rockets Orchestra


“I love orchestra!!!!” says Chloe, a 4th grade student and violinist at Catalyst Circle Rock Charter School in Chicago. She and 45 of her classmates in grades 4-6 have been learning, practicing and performing music for two hours daily since late October in the Circle Rockets orchestra. While all of the students are novices to orchestral music (in fact, they had never had instrumental music lessons before), they are advancing rapidly thanks to the intense training and innovative instruction of the new Sistema Ravinia initiative. “It’s a terrific experience to put a musical instrument in a kid’s hand, but even better when you see the music all over her face,” said Ravinia Festival President and CEO Welz Kauffman.

Ravinia CYI Alumni Jonas Tarm Receives Outstanding Honors

Jonas Tarm, founding member of Highland Park high school's student advisory board (now Ravinia Classical Youth Initiative) continues his success post graduation. In only his freshman year at New England Conservatory of Boston, Jonas is a National YouthArts Foundation Finalist in music competition. Chosen from approximately 10,000 applications from students in nine disciplines in the visual, literacy and performing arts, the former student at Highland Park High School and Music Institute of Chicago will participate in a life-changing experience provided by the National YoungArts Foundation. Congratulations Jonas! We are enjoying watching your professional career take off!

Ravinia Launches Student Orchestra At Circle Rock Elementary School

Ravinia Festival has announced the creation of a new student orchestra at Catalyst Circle Rock Charter School in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago. The orchestra, for children 8 to 12 years old, is modeled on the “El Sistema” training system that forgoes theory lessons to have the students making music with their instruments on the very first day they receive them. 60 children who volunteered to be part of “The Circle Rockets,” will receive their instruments today, learn their first note and perform in their first concert. Under the banner “Sistema Ravinia”™ Ravinia’s student orchestras are part of the festival’s REACH*TEACH*PLAY® education programs.

Classical Youth Initiative 2012 Grant Winner

Ravinia Festival, along with the Ravinia Student Advisory Board and the Ravinia Associates, has announced that Central High School in Burlington, IL, has been declared the winner of the festival’s second annual high school attendance contest for Chicago Symphony Orchestra concerts. The attendance contest spanned the duration of the CSO summer residency at Ravinia, and any high school student who attended a concert simply showed a valid student I.D. at the Ravinia Box Office for free lawn admission and to receive a point for the high school they attend. Over 100 high schools participated in the teen attendance contest. The first runner-up was Evanston Township, followed by Highland Park, New Trier and Adlai E. Stevenson high schools.
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Back to School with Ravinia’s REACH*TEACH*PLAY Education Programs

School is just starting, and that means the festival’s free REACH*TEACH*PLAY education programs are in full gear! We have expanded our Music Discovery program to reach 150 classrooms this year and over 4,300 K-3 kids who will develop their musical skills with resident teaching artists and interactive activities. Talented high school students will be auditioning soon for our Jazz Mentor program in which students are coached by Chicago’s finest jazz musicians. The Ravinia Lawndale Family Music School begins its free music classes in general music, voice, violin, guitar and piano for children and adults alike who reside in this underserved community. Ravinia’s latest program, Sistema Ravinia, which provides intensive after-school orchestral training at the grade-school level, is in full swing at William G. Hibbard Elementary, and Ravinia’s second installment at Circle Rock Elementary has just begun. Many artists in the BGH $10 CLASSICS series will also perform in schools through Ravinia’s Guest Artists in the Classroom program. Remember, your support of Ravinia makes these programs happen!