Carrie Underwood Hosts CMA Awards

Carrie Underwood is already the queen of country music, but she’s quickly becoming a darling of TV. Her live broadcast of The Sound of Music made international headlines, she has proven an awards-show favorite on such specials as The Grammys, and she’s the big reason to tune in to such TV specials as this week’s CMA Music Festival, billed as “country’s night to rock.” It’s just been announced that Underwood and Brad Paisley will team up for the seventh time to host the 48th Annual Country Music Awards this fall. Because of their TV chemistry, word is out that Underwood will join Paisley on his forthcoming album as well. In the meantime the superstar returns to Ravinia on Sept. 6 and Sept. 7.

Last Chance to Win Cash for Your School by Attending Ravinia's CSO Concerts for Free

The 2014 Chicago Symphony Orchestra residency is winding down. That means there are only a handful of opportunities left to give your high school a chance to win cash for its music program. All high-school students are admitted free to the lawn for CSO concerts, but those students should sign in at the box office before entering the park to earn a point for their school. The school with the most points at the end of the season will win $5,000, awarded by the Ravinia Associates Board. For the first time in years, Highland Park High School is pressing its hometown advantage—here are the standings—but students can turn the tides by attending Don Giovanni on Aug. 14 and Aug. 16 or The Marriage of Figaro on Aug. 15 and Aug. 17.

Chicago Tribune Explores Latest Teaming of Dame Kiri Te Kanawa and Jake Heggie

One of the great living singers of all time, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, and one of the hottest classical composers working today, Jake Heggie, have been friends since the latter’s college years. The Chicago Tribune takes a look at some of the great art born of that relationship in a just-published interview. In the latest collaboration Heggie celebrates Kiri’s 70th birthday with a new song cycle commissioned by Ravinia and based on the poetry of Emily Dickinson. That world premiere, with Heggie accompanying the soprano, is part of a program featuring music by Richard Strauss and Mozart on Aug. 12 in the Martin Theatre.

Scientific Chef Bowman Transforms Ravinia With A Middle-Earth Menu

Celebrated Chicago chef Thomas Bowman, of iNG, Baume and Brix and the recent WhiskeyTangoFoxtrot (WTF) event, returns to Ravinia as guest chef. Known for his attention to detail and scientific balancing of sweet and savory, Bowman will transform Ravinia into a Middle-earth feast fit for any hobbit or wizard when Ravinia presents the final installment of the Lord of the Rings series with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performing the live score along with the film Return of the King on Aug. 7 and Aug. 8. For dining reservations, call 847-432-7550.

Voices Carry From Canada to Ukraine

This week Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute (RSMI) welcomed 14 of the world’s most talented professional musicians to its summer conservatory program for singers. They’ve come from Australia, Canada, Germany, Norway, Poland, South Africa, South Korea, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and, of course, the United States. They will participate in a free, public master class with James Conlon at 2 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 1, in Bennett Gordon Hall. View a full list of concerts and master classes to be given by the RSMI class of 2014.

Real Million-Dollar Quartet: CSO, Conlon, Bell and Women's Board

Ravinia congratulates its Women’s Board on a terrifically successful gala benefit, held Saturday, July 26. More than 700 guests attended the formal cocktail party, dinner and concert, grossing more than $1 million for the not-for-profit festival and its REACH*TEACH*PLAY education programs. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra was conducted by Residency Music Director James Conlon and joined by violinist Joshua Bell, both of whom attended the post-concert dinner. REACH*TEACH*PLAY serves about 75,000 people throughout Chicagoland each year, bringing music to underserved schools and communities.

Naked Singer? Cue The Television Crews!

Before working at Ravinia, I spent slightly more than 13 years in the public relations department at San Francisco Opera. During all that time, the various general directors under which I worked unceasingly complained about the lack of TV coverage the company’s productions received. For every opera that was produced there, a media alert would be sent to all of the local television stations, desperately trying to interest them in coming to the dress rehearsal to publicize the opening. But it was mostly to no avail; even in an arts-crazed town like San Francisco, opera was deemed too esoteric an activity to be of interest to the general public.

But during the summer of 1993, SFO mounted a production of Richard Strauss’s Salome with opera star Maria Ewing in the title role, one of her most celebrated portrayals. Part of the attention she attracted stemmed from the fact that not only did she do her own dancing for the famous “Dance of the Seven Veils” (many opera divas leave that duty to a dancing double), but she also followed Oscar Wilde’s original stage directions that Salome should conclude the dance stark naked. Even singers who did their own dancing in other productions wore at least a body stocking for modesty.

In advance of the dress rehearsal, I struggled to find a way to imply without explicitly stating that Ms. Ewing would be baring her all—after all, we were a major international opera house and didn’t want to sound sensationalistic or exploitative. So I used phrases like, “SFO ‘Unveils’ New Salome Production.”

I must have succeeded: no fewer than five TV news crews showed up.

It should be noted that since Ravinia’s Salome on August 2 is a concert performance, Metropolitan Opera star Patricia Racette (who is undertaking the title role for the first time in her career) will remain fully clothed. As will the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Conlon Takes Podium with Eisler's and Korngold's Chamber Works

James Conlon, music director of the CSO residency at Ravinia, settles in for the season with a program focusing on works by Hanns Eisler and Erich Korngold, two composers who found success after fleeing Nazi persecution, on July 22. The Martin Theatre concert with soloists from the CSO features the Ravinia premieres of Eisler’s Fourteen Ways of Describing Rain, accompanied by the silent film Regen (Rain), and Korngold’s String Sextet in D Major. The program also includes Wagner’sSiegfried Idyll.

American Idol Phillip Phillips Joins Food Network in Concert at Ravinia

Phillip Phillips, the winner of American Idol season 11, has been added to the roster of music talent for Food Network in Concert at Ravinia on Sept. 20. Having recently released his sophomore album, Behind the Light,Phillips joins headliner John Mayer, DJ Alexandra Richards, Twin Forks(with Dashboard Confessional’s Chris Carrabba), jazz musician Raul Midón, indie rock band California Wives, and guitarist/singer Zane Carneyand others for the daylong festival of food and music, featuring some of the best music and culinary talent. Ticket prices for admission to the event include: Lawn Only ($99), Lawn plus Greatest Hits venue-wide tasting event ($199), Pavilion 2 plus Greatest Hits ($249), and Pavilion 1 (premium seating) plus Greatest Hits ($299). Attendees will also have the opportunity to experience exclusive lunch and dinner events hosted by Food Network stars Sunny Anderson, Anne Burrell, Jose Garces, Alex Guarnaschelli,Jeff Mauro, Marc Murphy and Geoffrey Zakarian. These special add-on experiences will feature some of the best BBQ, craft beers, cocktails, wines, sandwiches, desserts and more. Prices vary from $85 and $125 per culinary event, and can be purchased with new tickets or added to previously purchased ones.

Kiri Te Kanawa Program Released

When Kiri Te Kanawa celebrates her 70th birthday with a Martin Theatre recital on Aug. 12, she will sing the world premiere of Newer Every Day, a set of five songs based on the poetry of Emily Dickinson, composed by Jake Heggie, who will accompany her on piano. Heggie is best known as the composer of one of the most successful operas of recent times, Dead Man Walking. The rest of the program has now been released and includes nine pieces by R. Strauss and works by Mozart, the composers most associated with the singer. The singer, who recently appeared on Downton Abbey, will also sings works by Mozart, Granados, Obradors and Guastavino, accompanied by Kevin Murphy, director of the Program for Singers at Ravinia's Steans Music Institute (RSMI). Kiri herself will give a free master class for RSMI singers in Bennett Grodon Hall at 2:00 p.m. on Aug. 10 in preparation for their Aug. 11 "Richard Strauss and Friends" concert.

That Darned Tritone

Notions of which intervals in music are considered pleasing have certainly changed drastically ever since the first polyphony (more than one musical line at a time) emerged in Western music around 900 C.E. Medieval theorists had some very specific notions as to which combinations of sounds should be allowed and which should be avoided. And none was avoided more than the interval known as a tritone, so named because it comprises three whole steps—in the key of C Major (the white keys of the piano), it occurs between F and B. Theorists considered the interval to be unstable and dissonant, and for that reason it was avoided not only in harmony, but even in melodic lines for nearly a thousand years.

When music students first enter conservatory-type schools, they are traditionally required to take a course in “sight-singing,” a thorn in the side of many of music student, unless they possess “perfect pitch,” which is quite rare even among accomplished musicians. In order to identify and sing various intervals, many students learn them as part of a well-known melody. For instance, an ascending perfect fourth is the first two notes of “Here Comes the Bride”; an ascending major sixth is outlined by the first two notes of the iconic musical tag for “N-B-C.” And of course, different students might choose different melodies, depending on what they are most familiar with.

But the tritone? That’s a much harder one to find. And so virtually all music students learn an ascending tritone as being the first two notes of the song “Maria” from West Side Story. 

Was Bernstein, who composed that immortal score, purposely doing something that had once been “forbidden” to make some sort of a point? Dennis Polkow, who has written an article for Ravinia magazine on the musical, points out that it also occurs right at the beginning of the piece between the second and third notes of the little three-note signal that is played by the orchestra as well as whistled by the gang members. Perhaps it is meant to convey the “dissonance” between the warring factions of the Sharks and the Jets.

Or maybe it’s just Bernstein being his iconoclastic self, using whatever means he had at his disposal to achieve whatever effect he was aiming for. But one thing is certain: Most music students will never hear “Maria” the same way again.

Madonna Mia, Ci Sono Molte Donne!

There’s a frequently repeated joke about the novice opera-goer who comes out of a performance and comments, “Wow, that Don Giovanni was a regular Don Juan!” The joke being, of course, that Don Giovanni IS Don Juan, translated into Italian.

But Don Juan gave his name to more than an opera and a legend; it also became a psychological diagnosis, the so-called “Don Juan complex.” Quite some time ago, TV talk-show host Sally Jessye Raphael devoted one of her shows to “Don Juans,” which she defined as “men who think they are God’s gift to women.” To qualify for participation on her panel, the men had to have slept with—or claim to have slept with—at least 200 women. One of her four guest subjects actually boasted of having had sexual relations with over 1,500 women, a claim that brought a gasp of astonishment from the studio audience.

What they probably didn’t realize is that Mozart’s Don Giovanni would have sneered at that paltry figure. In the first act, Giovanni’s henchman Leporello is explaining the reality of the situation to the scorned and furious Donna Elvira in the so-called “Catalogue aria,” in which he enumerates his master’s conquests: “In Italy, 640; in Germany, 231; 100 in France; in Turkey, 91; but in Spain, 1,003 and counting.” Mind you, the large number of Spanish conquests is not a moral judgment against Spanish women, but merely reflects the fact that Giovanni lived in Spain and, of course, did better on his home turf.

This brings his total to a whopping 2,065. And had Donna Anna not screamed for help in the first scene, it would have been 2,066. All of which makes Sally Jessye’s guests look like rank amateurs. Fortunately for them, at the end of the taping, they were allowed to simply leave the studio rather than being dragged into Hell by a living stone statue, a far more dramatically effective ending. You can see and hear baritone Christopher Maltman pay the ultimate price for his lecherous ways—all to the accompaniment of the glorious Chicago Symphony Orchestra—on August 14 and 16 in Ravinia’s Martin Theatre.

Nelson Know Depps of Fandom

When you are a multigenerational icon like Willie Nelson, even your fans have fans—Johnny Depp, instance. The movie star is such a big fan of the country legend that he swashbuckled his way onto the stage at a Boston concert to play guitar with Willie. Come see if any stars come out to play when Willie Nelson and Alison Krauss team up at Ravinia on July 12.

Theme From 2001 Expands Across Galaxy of More Unexpected Film

Carl Sagan might say that Richard Strauss’s heavenly Also sprach Zarathustra shows up in billions and billions of movies. Though most earthlings associate the bombastic piece with Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, it has crash-landed in some unexpected titles such asZoolander, Land of the Lost, Wall-E, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,Jackass Number Two, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, Magnolia andCasino. On July 11 conductor Robert Moody and the CSO prove pop culture and the classics are more intertwined than we think with the program “Classics Go the Movies,” which features timeless favorites made familiar through their use on film soundtracks.

Win Cash For Your High School Music Program

Not only do children and students through college receive free lawn admission to every classical concert at Ravinia, but high-school students could actually win cash for their school’s music program. Each time a student attends a CSO performance at the festival, his or her school earns a point. At the end of the season the school with the most points will receive a check for its music programs from the Ravinia Associates Board. Double points will be awarded at the Tchaikovsky Spectacular on July 27, when Ravinia’s student marketing team will host a free preconcert hangout with food and refreshment for all high-school students. Remember to check in at the box office to get your points.

Hobbit Resource Guide Available Now

Ravinia’s One Score, One Chicago initiative features a piece of symphonic music each year to be the focal point of a public conversation about the art and as a project to bring into schools through its REACH*TEACH*PLAY education programs.

This year’s One Score selection is Howard Shore’s Oscar-winning score to The Lord of the Rings—The Return of the King, and an original resource guide is available online now. With his Oscar-winning scores for the Lord of the Ringstrilogy, Howard Shore contributed the heartbeat if not the soul of those phenomenally successful films.

Ravinia concludes the trilogy this summer with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performing the score to The Return of the King while the film is broadcast on video screens in the Pavilion and on the lawn on Aug. 7 and Aug. 8. Pavilion or lawn tickets are $25 each. Children and students will be admitted free to the lawn, but tickets must be reserved in advance.