Oak Ridge Today

Enjoy Danny Brian playing famous Tchaikovsky ‘Piano Concerto,’ with ‘Nutcracker’ bonus

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Danny Brian

Danny Brian

 

By Dale Gedcke

The Friday and Saturday concerts by the Oak Ridge Philharmonia will feature two of the most enjoyable compositions by Tchaikovsky. Danny Brian will play the exhilarating “Piano Concerto No. 1,” and the orchestra will perform selections from the enchanting “Nutcracker Suite.” For more information, continue to read below.

Danny Brian may be best known locally for serving as organist/pianist for 30 years at Cokesbury United Methodist Church. He has also been the accompanist for the Knoxville Choral Society and Knoxville Chamber Chorale for many years. Brian is an active local artist playing solo recitals and chamber music in the Knoxville area. He has been on the faculty at Knoxville College, and was staff accompanist at the University of Tennessee for several years. Brian won first place in the Mid-South Piano Competition, and has played with many orchestras throughout the Southeast. He began his musical studies at Blair School of music in Nashville, and he received his undergraduate degree in piano performance from Middle Tennessee State University, where he studied with Jerry Perkins. He also studied with David Northington at the University of Tennessee while he worked on his master’s degree. [Read more…]

Community Orchestra to become Oak Ridge Philharmonia, has concert Saturday

Posted at
By Leave a Comment

Oak Ridge Philharmonia aka ORCO at Cokesbury

The Oak Ridge Philharmonia, formerly known as the Oak Ridge Community Orchestra. (Submitted photo)

 

By Dale Gedcke

Pop singers do it, movie stars do it, even sophisticated string quartets do it. So, Oak Ridge Community Orchestra said: “Let’s do it. Let’s change our name.”

For the August 20 concert, the Oak Ridge Community Orchestra will be elevating its brand name to the Oak Ridge Philharmonia.

Under that new banner, it will be performing, “An American in Paris Suite” by George Gershwin (arranged by John Whitney), “Danse Macabre” by Camille Saint-Saëns, the “Overture on Russian Themes” by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and the first movement of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s “Symphony No. 40.” More details are offered below. There is also a special surprise for the common man by a famous American composer. See if you can guess what all the fanfare is about from the clues provided.

George Gershwin (1898-1937) captured the sounds and atmosphere of Paris in the 1920s with “An American in Paris,” an almost jazz-like composition originally commissioned for the New York Philharmonic Orchestra in 1928. It is more familiar as the accompaniment to Gene Kelly’s dancing in the 1951 movie of the same name. The version performed in this concert is the condensed arrangement by John Whitney. Near the beginning of the piece, one can hear the taxi horns, and feel the rush of activity in the streets of Paris. A lyrical section of American blues emerges to remind us of the visitor’s nostalgia for home.  Abruptly, a fast jazz idiom jerks the listener back into the Paris bustle, and accelerates the music into a hectic, then grandiose ending, that mixes all of the themes. This is one of Gershwin’s most memorable masterpieces. [Read more…]