Free family concert Sunday features ‘Peter and the Wolf,’ ‘Spring’

The Oak Ridge Symphony Orchestra will present “Peter and the Wolf” and Vivaldi’s “Spring” in a free family concert at 3 p.m. Sunday, January 25, at the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge.

Children are invited to come early for paper puppet making and instrument making beginning at 2 p.m. at the museum at 461 West Outer Drive. The museum is offering free admission from 1-5 p.m. Sunday to support the concert.

Puppets from the “Peter and the Wolf” story are in the Anna Cebrat Puppet Room at the museum, where children may act out the story in the puppet theater in the week leading up to the concert.

A small symphony orchestra will perform the musical story of “Peter and the Wolf” by Sergei Prokofiev. The composer considered the music as a child’s introduction to the orchestra, with each character represented by a different instrument or group of instruments. The strings represent Peter, and the horn section represents the wolf.

Dan Alcott will conduct the orchestra, and Matt Shafer Powell, of WUOT-FM, will be the narrator.

“The Oak Ridge Symphony presents an annual free family concert as a gift to the community,” said Oak Ridge Civic Music Association Executive Director Michelle Powell. “It’s a chance for children and the young-at-heart to come out and experience classical music.”

Special guest violinist Hannah Shipstad, 11-year-old winner of the Youth Aliyah competition in Oak Ridge, will perform with the orchestra in Vivaldi’s “Spring.”

Children may listen to the Vivaldi’s “Spring,” composed in the 1720s, to find signs of the season. The violin concerto is part of “The Four Seasons,” among Vivaldi’s best-known and most popular works.

Sponsors of the program are John and Lois McKeever, Pao-Min Loh Fund for Excellence in Education, Rotary Club of Oak Ridge, Capital Mark Bank and Trust, the Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge, and WUOT-FM. The concert is funded under an agreement with the Tennessee Arts Commission and National Endowment for the Arts.

For more information, see the symphony website at www.OakRidgeSymphony.org, and the Children’s Museum website at www.childrensmuseumofoakridge.org.