CONCERTS BY THE AMERICAN SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA INCLUDE COPLAND'S LINCOLN PORTRAIT, NARRATED BY AWARD-WINNING FILMMAKER KEN BURNS AND CONDUCTED BY LEON BOTSTEIN THE FOCUS OF WEEKEND THREE OF THE BARD MUSIC FESTIVAL IS COPLAND'S WORK FOR STAGE AND SCREEN – FROM THE CONCERT STAGE TO HOLLYWOOD Music by Copland Contemporaries – Leonard Bernstein, Erich Korngold, and Hanns Eisler – to be Performed in Saturday Chamber Music Concert, October 22, at 8:00 P.M. “The [Bard Music] festival is sensibly premised on the notion that a composer's choices are best understood when placed against the backdrop of his times.” – The New York Times The 2005 Bard Music Festival dedicated to Aaron Copland and His World, an enormous critical and audience success this past August, will have a finale on Bard College's beautiful Annandale-on-Hudson campus the weekend of October 21-23. “From the Concert Stage to Hollywood” is the focus of the two concert programs and panel discussion being given between Friday, October 21, and Sunday, October 23. Copland's concert work, Music for Movies, will be performed on the opening program, Friday, October 21, at 8 p.m., (program repeated Sunday at 3 p.m.). One of the highlights of the two concerts will be Lincoln Portrait, narrated by the award-winning filmmaker Ken Burns. The popular four dance episodes from Rodeo, written the same year as Lincoln Portrait, will end the evening. An Outdoor Overture and Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson, sung by mezzo-soprano Janice Meyerson with the American Symphony Orchestra under its music director Leon Botstein, will complete the concert program. Music for Movies, written in 1942, was dedicated by Copland to his colleague Darius Milhaud, whereas each of Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson, was generously dedicated to a different composer friend. The panel discussion Aaron Copland and Music for Films, on Saturday afternoon, October 22, at 4 p.m., will be moderated by Bard scholar and BMF coartistic director Christopher H. Gibbs, with panelists Sally Bick, Michael Pisani, and John Pruitt, and will be followed by the evening's chamber music concert. Works by Copland contemporaries – some remembered now more for their film music than their concerts works – will be played by the Chiara String Quartet, Easley Blackwood, and other guest artists. The composers represented, in addition to Copland, are Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Hanns Eisler, and Leonard Bernstein. Films with scores by those and other composers will be shown throughout the day Saturday, October 22, and Sunday, October 23. For showtimes, see the festival website or call 845-758-7900. The New York Times review of Weekend Two of the Copland Festival stated: “As in past years, the festival mixed orchestral and chamber concerts with supplementary events like panels, pre-concert talks and even documentary films, placing the composer's achievement in a rich web of context. “Bard's formula seemed tailor-made for a figure like Copland, whose output remains little known by most listeners beyond the few works that made him famous. The festival dug deeper, not only by presenting the jazz-infused Copland, the early modernist Copland and the very unsimple 12-tone Copland, but also by trying to integrate these disparate faces into a single whole with that elusive ring of unity.” The same Times critic noted that the performance of Copland’s epic Symphony No. 3, which ended the Weekend Two festivities, “showed Mr. Botstein and the orchestra in top form.” Full details at press time are given below. For updates and full information about the Bard Music Festival, Weekend Three, please contact the Bard box office at 845-758-7900 or visit: www.bard.edu/bmf/2005 BARD MUSIC FESTIVAL – Weekend Three Programs FRIDAY, October 21, 2005 Concert: From the Concert Stage to Hollywood Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, Sosnoff Theater 7:00 p.m. Preconcert Talk: Christopher H. Gibbs 8:00 p.m.Performance: Ken Burns, narrator; Janice Meyerson, mezzo-soprano; American Symphony Orchestra, Leon Botstein, conductor Aaron Copland (1900–90) An Outdoor Overture (1938) Music for Movies (1942) Lincoln Portrait (1942) Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson (1958–70) Rodeo, four dance episodes (1942) Buckaroo Holiday, Corral Nocturne, Saturday Night Waltz, Hoe Down ______________________________________________________________________ SATURDAY, October 22, 2005 PANEL: Aaron Copland and Music for Films Olin Auditorium 4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. Christopher H. Gibbs, moderator; Sally Bick; Michael Pisani; John Pruitt PROGRAM TWO: From the Screen to the Concert Stage Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, Sosnoff Theater 7:30 p.m. Pre-concert Talk: Dorothy Lamb Crawford 8:00 p.m. Performance: Easley Blackwood, piano; Chiara String Quartet; and others Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897–1957) String Quartet No. 3 in D Major, Op. 34 (1945) Hanns Eisler (1898–1962) String Quartet (1938) Aaron Copland (1900–90) Piano Sonata (1939) Songs by Hanns Eisler (1898–1962) and Leonard Bernstein (1918–90) _______________________________________________________________________ SUNDAY, October 23, 2005 PROGRAM THREE: From the Concert Stage to Hollywood (repeat of Program One) Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, Sosnoff Theater 2:00 p.m. Preconcert Talk 3:00 p.m. Performance # # #