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Public Relations and Social Media Coordinator Katey Padden, (585) 274-1052, kpadden@esm.rochester.edu
More Information:
Margaret-Mary Owens, 813-502-7272, mowens9@u.rochester.edu
Third Thursdays at the Memorial Art Gallery opens its season with a dramatic musical tale of two aristocratic ladies whose lives unfold through a series of French songs and dances from the eighteenth century. Come and experience the intimate relationship between keyboard and dancer as each balances the other to create a dramatic realization that might have been presented in a French court. This special performance is created by guest historian, dancer, and choreographer Catherine Turocy, who is joined by fellow period dancer Alexis Silver from the New York Baroque Dance Company. Accompanying them will be Eastman faculty members Lisa Crawford on harpsichord and Stephen Kennedy on the Italian Baroque organ. The program will include works by Louis and François Couperin, Jean Philippe Rameau, and Jean-Henri D’Anglebert, among others. The concert will take place Thursday, October 17th, at 7:30pm in the Memorial Art Gallery Fountain Court.
Unique to this concert will be an additional lecture/demonstration presented by Catherine Turocy on Friday, October 18th, at 3:00pm in the auditorium of the Memorial Art Gallery. Ms. Turocy speaks about “Secrets of Performance,” and with harpsichordist Lisa Crawford shares insights into performance practice that go beyond notation – into the Worlds of the Mind and the Stage. This event is free with paid museum admission.
Catherine Turocy, recognized as one of today’s leading choreographer/reconstructors and stage directors in 17th and 18th-century period performance, with over 70 Baroque opera-ballets to her credit, has been decorated by the French Republic as a Chevalier in the Order of Arts and Letters. A founding member of the Society for Dance History Scholars (now Dance Studies Association, of which she is also a founding member), Ms. Turocy has lectured on period performance practices around the world, including the Royal Academies of Dance in London, Stockholm and Copenhagen; the Festival Estival in Paris and The Society for Early Music in Tokyo. She has served as consultant to Clark Tippett of American Ballet Theater and Edward Villella of the Miami City Ballet.
Alexis Silver is a New York City based dancer and choreographer. She joined The New York Baroque Dance Company in 2010, and has toured the US and abroad, performing in Handel’s Teseo at the International Handel Festival in Göttingen, Germany, Festival de Música Antigua Esteban Salas in Havana, Cuba, in Rameau’s Le Temple de la Gloire with Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, among many others. As a member of the Boston Early Music Festival Dance Company, she performed in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Charpentier’s La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers and La Couronne de Fleur,Handel’s Almira, and Campra’s Le Carnaval de Venise. Alexis choreographed the modern day premiere of Lully’s La Chûte de Phaëton at the Aquilon Music Festival and has presented her solo choreography at the Washington National Cathedral. Additionally, she performs with Balam Dance Theatre, Sarah Skaggs, and Becky Radway.
Lisa Goode Crawford is Professor of Harpsichord at the Eastman School of Music, and Emerita Professor of Harpsichord at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where she was a central figure in that institution’s early music program from 1973 to 2005. She holds the A.B. and M.A. degrees in music from Harvard University. In 1968 she was one of the first winners of the Erwin Bodky Award for performers of early music. Ms. Crawford has given solo and ensemble performances throughout the United States and in Europe and Japan. She was a member of the renowned Oberlin Baroque Ensemble, and continues as a faculty member at the summer Baroque Performance Institute at Oberlin, where she has taught since 1974. She has performed with Apollo’s Fire, Les Délices, the Smithsonian Chamber Players, and numerous other ensembles and artists. She has edited the keyboard music of Pancrace Royer for the series “Le Pupitre” published by Heugel (Paris). After producing and directing Royer’s ballet héroique, Le Pouvoir de l’Amour (1743), at Oberlin (February 2002), supported by a grant from the Florence Gould Foundation, she prepared a critical edition of this opera, published in 2006 by the Centre de Musique Baroque de Versailles.
Stephen Kennedy is Director of Music and Organist of Christ Church, Rochester, Instructor of Sacred Music at the Eastman School of Music, and Instructor of Organ for Eastman’s Community Music School. Stephen is the founder and director of the Christ Church Schola Cantorum that specializes in the weekly performance of Compline at Christ Church. The group has been featured in various national radio broadcasts and has recorded for ARSIS and LOFT records. Stephen has appeared in many venues as organ soloist in programs of standard repertoire as well as recitals consisting solely of improvisations. He has been a performer and lecturer for local and regional events of the American Guild of Organists, and has given workshops on choral music and chant and improvisation in the U.S. and abroad. He is also a composer of choral, instrumental, and chamber music as well as a collaborative musician. His composition Luma Voce, a dance score of computer-generated sounds with an overlay of vocal improvisation was commissioned by Jamey Leverett and the Rochester City Ballet and served as the finale to RCB’s New York City debut. He has also performed organ improvisations in collaboration with choreographers James Hansen and Vanessa Van Wormer.
About the Series
The Third Thursday concert series provides musicians and music-lovers the opportunity to experience authentic Baroque music on a regular basis. Its concerts highlight Eastman’s Italian Baroque Organ, which was built around 1770 in central Italy. Restored and installed in 2005 at the Memorial Art Gallery, the instrument is the only one of its kind in North America. The organ’s beautiful, authentic sounds have been heard by thousands of visitors who attend weekly Sunday mini-recitals and special “Third Thursday” concerts by internationally celebrated guest artists and Eastman musicians.
Admission to the concert is included with Gallery admission, which is half-price on Thursday evenings after 5pm and free to University of Rochester student ID holders. This concert is made possible by the Rippey Endowed Trust.
The next Third Thursday concert will take place on November 21, 2019. It will feature the music of Johann Sebastian Bach as a young composer, in a program organized and developed by Jacob Fuhrman. This concert will be performed by student musicians from the Eastman School of Music.
Thursday, October 17th
7:30pm
Third Thursdays with Eastman’s Italian Baroque Organ at the Memorial Art Gallery
“Keyboard and Key Moves: Baroque Explorations in Synesthesia”
Catherine Turocy, choreographer; Alexis Silver, dancer; Lisa Crawford, harpsichord; Stephen Kennedy, organ
Friday, October 18th
3:00pm
“Secrets of Performance”
Catherine Turocy, speaker; Lisa Crawford, harpsichordist
Memorial Art Gallery
500 University Ave
Rochester, NY 14607
Free with Gallery admission
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About Eastman School of Music:
The Eastman School of Music was founded in 1921 by industrialist and philanthropist George Eastman (1854-1932), founder of Eastman Kodak Company. It was the first professional school of the University of Rochester. Mr. Eastman’s dream was that his school would provide a broad education in the liberal arts as well as superb musical training. The current dean is Jamal Rossi, appointed in 2014.
More than 900 students are enrolled in the Collegiate Division of the Eastman School of Music—about 500 undergraduates and 400 graduate students. They come from almost every state, and approximately 23 percent are from other countries. They are taught by a faculty comprised of more than 130 highly regarded performers, composers, conductors, scholars, and educators. They are Pulitzer Prize winners, Grammy winners, Emmy Winners, Guggenheim Fellows, ASCAP Award recipients, published authors, recording artists, and acclaimed musicians who have performed in the world’s greatest concert halls. Each year, Eastman’s students, faculty members, and guest artists present more than 900 concerts to the Rochester community.