We have been taking our children to the Little Orchestra Society concerts since our daughter Victoria was three, two years ago, (see my posts of Dec. 6, 2015 and Feb. 9, 2016) and our son Gideon, now 18, and Susan and I get as much enjoyment out of them as Victoria does. Yesterday's concert was devoted to Vivaldi and LOS did their usual excellent job of providing visual experiences for the kids without compromising the quality of the music.
The concert was conducted by Joseph Young and, as usual, the soloists were young, just out of high school or college: Valerie Kim on violin, Martin Bernsldltein playing recorder, Elizabeth Egan on bassoon, Yifei Xu on harpsichord, Aberta Khoury and Tengyue on guitars, and Brandon Bergeron and Atse Theodros on trumpets. The use of young soloists helps the appeal of the music to children. There were effective fake newscasts announcing the change of seasons for "The Four Seasons" and the orchestra members donned hats and scarves to play "Winter." Vivaldi himself was played by
David Gautschy, demonstrating that the music was actually written by a real person. And there were "circus artists" John Leo and Sarah Petersiel moving to the music, conveying another visual element.
The performance was at the Danny Kaye Theatre (few children today recognize the name Danny Kaye, for better or worse) at Hunter College, a relatively small and intimate theatre just right for this combination of music and visual support, and the concert lasted just under an hour. I recommend LOS to all parents who want to introduce their children to the beauty of music; there are three more concerts this season, devoted to Beethoven. Mendelssohn and Bernstein.
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