STUDENT BOOK COVER
EDUCATION PATRONS ($10,000+)
William C. Etheridge Foundation, Mariam and Robert Hayes Charitable Trust, The McLean Foundation, Wake County
EDUCATION SUSTAINERS ($100,000+)
EDUCATION BENEFACTORS ($50,000+)
EDUCATION PARTNERS ($1,000+)Alamance County, Big Rock Foundation, Cumberland Community Foundation, Dr. Albert Joseph Diab Foundation, The Dickson Foundation,
Edward D. Jones & Co., Encompass Insurance, Enterprise Holdings Foundation, Gipson Family Foundation, Hanover Insurance Group, Kinston Community Council for the Arts, The Kyser Foundation, McGladrey LLP, Mr. and Mrs. W.G. Champion Mitchell, Montgomery Insurance,
Orange County Arts Commission, James J. and Mamie Perkinson Trust, George Smedes Poyner Foundation, Prescott Family Foundation, The Florence Rogers Charitable Trust, The Rolander Family Foundation, Safeco Insurance, Silverback Foundation, The Travelers Companies, Inc.,
WCPE Radio, The Mildred Sheffield Wells Charitable Trust, West Memorial Fund, Youths’ Friends Association
MUSIC EDUCATION ENDOWMENT FUNDSThe Ruby and Raymond A. Bryan Foundation Fund, The Mary Whiting Ewing Charitable Foundation Fund,
The Hulka Ensemble and Chamber Music Programs Fund, The Janirve Foundation Fund, The Ina Mae and Rex G. Powell Wake County Music Education Fund, The Elaine Tayloe Kirkland Fund
Sponsors are current as of June 2012
seating chart
Sections
firstviolins
cellos
violas
basses
oboesflutes
clarinets
Percussion
bassoons
horns
trumpets
trombonestuba
timpanipercussion
secondviolins
conductor
Brass
Woodwind
String
...and you sit here!
These concerts are made possible by a generous grant-in-aid from the State of North Carolina, Honorable Beverly Perdue, Governor; Honorable Linda A. Carlisle, Secretary for Cultural Resources
80th birthday!i t's your orchestra'sThe North Carolina Symphony has performed thousands of concerts for millions of
young people in our state. We even travel thousands of miles each year on a bus
to get to these students. So many people have sat in the same seats that you’re
about to use, and we bet you might know a few of them and not realize it. They
may even be your parents, grandparents, teachers or friends!
This season your North Carolina Symphony turns 80 years old, and we want to celebrate with you. As you read this book, look for the birthday cakes to uncover more fun facts
about the North Carolina Symphony and how your education concert tells
your orchestra’s story.
CARL
Born: June 9, 1865, Sortelung, DenmarkDied: October 3, 1931, Copenhagen, Denmark
INTRODUCTION to the North Carolina Symphony!
...to The
Carl Nielsen was the seventh of twelve children in a fam-
ily so poor, he had to work as a child to help everyone
survive. One day, when he was six years old and stuck
at home, sick with the measles, his mother gave him his
first violin. By the end of the day he had taught himself a few
short melodies, and soon enough, an assistant teacher at his school was encour-
aging him to learn to read and write music. Nielsen was sold. By the time he was
a teenager, he had learned to play trumpet and earned a position in the Sixteenth
Battalion, a military band. That was just the beginning. Nielsen eventually became
Denmark’s greatest composer, as well as a famous violinist, teacher and writer
and the conductor of the country’s Royal Theatre. • You will hear the orchestra
perform the Oriental Festival March from Nielsen’s music for the play Aladdin. This
is “incidental music,” meaning it would be played in the background of the play
to create a particular atmosphere or feeling, just like the music to your favorite
movie today!
Oriental Festival March from Aladdin Suite, Op. 34
For many years, Nielsen’s picture was on the Danish Krone, which is the paper money
used in Denmark.
. . .At age eight, Carl had a job looking after geese.
. . .Carl Nielsen liked to knit.
...the softnessor loudness
of sound
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was an ex-
traordinarily gifted musician from the
very beginning. He was writing his own
music by the time he was five, and in just a
few years, was performing in front of kings,
queens, princesses, famous composers and some of the most im-
portant people in Europe. By the time he was eight, he had written
three full Symphonies! Word traveled fast about this new, amazing
prodigy, a name for a child who is better than almost everyone at a
particular task, like writing music or playing the violin. Mozart held
onto this fame for the rest of his life, and he made the most of it,
wearing expensive clothes and spending long nights at parties. Yet
all the while, he wrote some of the most beautiful music the world
has ever known. • Mozart wrote in all of the musical styles popu-
lar in his day, from massive operas for many singers to concertos
that call out a single instrument to symphonies for a full orchestra,
like the music you’ll hear in your concert. Unlike almost any other
composer you can name, Mozart was successful in whatever style
he attempted. He is still remembered and loved as one of music’s
great geniuses.
WOLFGANG AMADEUS
Born: January 27, 1756, Salzburg, AustriaDied: December 5, 1791, Vienna, Austria
Mozart had perfect pitch and could hear a note and identify it without having to play it on the keyboard.
. . .As an adult, Mozart enjoyed billiards
and dancing. He also had several pets including a canary, starling,
dog and horse for riding.
. . .Like many men in the 1700s, Mozart
wore a powdered wig. A wig was considered very fashionable,
but it also kept people from having to wash their hair every day and
reduced the spread of lice.
Symphony No. 39 in E-flat Major, K.543, Mvt. I or III
Mozart’s Symphony No. 39 is one of the North Carolina Symphony’s most frequently performed pieces of music for students.
Too poor to care for him,
Claude Debussy’s parents sent
their young son to live with
an aunt, a decision that would
change not just his boyhood, but
his entire life. Debussy’s aunt introduced the young boy
to music through live concerts and piano lessons, and
immediately Debussy was hooked. He was just ten years
old when he entered the Paris Conservatoire, the best
music school in France. Debussy wanted to be a com-
poser, but he disliked his teach-
ers’ many rules for music writ-
ing. Instead, as he grew up, he
searched for a sound that, in his
words, would “please his own
ears.” Along the way, he became friends with painters
and poets like Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir.
They would all be grouped together as Impressionists, a
term for an artist who was part of a famous and popular
artistic movement, Impressionism, that broke all of the
rules that came before. • At your concert you will hear
“Golliwogg’s Cakewalk” from Debussy’s Children’s Cor-
ner, Suite for Orchestra. Written for Debussy’s daughter,
Claude-Emma, when she was three years old, the Suite
was inspired by the toys in the girl’s closet. When you
hear the Cakewalk, listen for the
dance-like pulse and how the or-
chestra stretches the speed of the
music, just like a dancer in motion.
CLAUDE
Born: August 22, 1862, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, FranceDied: March 25, 1918, Paris, France
a
tostoo
...the speedof the music
...how fast or how slow...
“Golliwogg’s Cakewalk” from Children's Corner, Suite for Orchestra
The first time Debussy’s Children’s Corner, Suite for Orchestra was performed by the North Carolina Symphony for students was in 1949, more than sixty-three years ago. If you had been at that education concert you’d be about 71 years old now.
Most of Debussy’s music was written for solo piano and later
arranged for a full orchestra, including this Suite.
. . .Debussy’s daughter’s nickname
was “Chou-Chou,” which is a term of endearment that means
“favorite” in French.
LR
6
R
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky didn’t
start out as a great musician.
Though he
had played
the piano since
he was four years old, he first stud-
ied law and got a job with the gov-
ernment. His love of music won out,
however, and he was soon back in
school, this time at the famous Saint
Petersburg Conservatory. His compo-
sitions shot him to stardom, especially
for the way they combined classical
music with Russian folk tunes. A rich
widow, Nadezhda von Meck, took
a liking to Tchaikovsky’s music and
offered to pay him a regular salary
so that he could focus on compos-
ing. The pair wrote more than 1,200 letters to each
other but never met, remarkable for a relationship
that produced some of the most
famous music of the past 200 years. •
Tchaikovsky is most often remem-
bered for his ballets, including one
you always hear around the holidays,
The Nutcracker. At your Symphony
concert, you’ll hear a piece from an-
other famous ballet, The Sleeping
Beauty. The music is a waltz, played
when Sleeping Beauty dances at her
birthday party. You may remember it
from Disney’s movie Sleeping Beau-
ty, as “Once Upon a Dream.” Listen
closely to the swaying waltz rhythm
and imagine how Sleeping Beauty
might have danced.
PIOTR ILYICH
Born: May 7, 1840, Votkinsk, RussiaDied: November 6, 1893, Saint Petersburg, Russia
whole note half note quarter note eighth note
… how the sectionsof the music are put together…
its structure...
…a pattern of notes
of varied lengths and accents…the beat or the pulse of the music...
of vaer no
atart
htt
RondoondnnnnnnnoRoA B A C A B AA CAAAAAA
A B A C A B AA
whole nole note half notehalf quarter nototeq eighth note
A BB A C A B AA
Waltz from The Sleeping Beauty
Tchaikovsky loved nature and one of his favorite
hobbies was searching for wild mushrooms
when out on long walks.
. . .His family was very wealthy. They lived in a large house
with many servants.
. . .He was very orderly and kept to a rigid schedule.
The North Carolina Symphony last performed Tchaikovsky’s Waltz from The Sleeping Beauty for elementary students in 1972. Dr. Benjamin Swalin
was our music director back then, and 1972 was his last year conducting the North Carolina Symphony after
thirty-three years of service. We call Dr. Swalin the father of the North Carolina Symphony because our orchestra grew so much with him as our leader.
L
1
4
L R
R
...the overall sound
...it’s howthe music feels
of the instrumentsthat are playing...
The son of an opera-singing fa-
ther and piano-playing mother,
Igor Stravinsky grew up sur-
rounded by music. Strangely, his
parents didn’t want him to pursue
a career in music. They encouraged him to become a
lawyer, and though Igor loved playing the piano, he
at first honored their wishes. Then his father died,
and Stravinsky changed his plans,
moved to Paris and became a com-
poser. When he was 28 years old,
Stravinsky wrote The Firebird, a
ballet for the famous Ballet Russes
that was so popular, Stravinsky be-
came a celebrity overnight. More
ballets were demanded, and one
of them, The Rite of Spring, was so
new and unusual, members of the first audience that
heard it couldn’t decide if they loved it or hated it. They
argued with each other, and the argument turned
into a riot. The debate about The Rite of Spring
made Stravinsky the world’s most famous living com-
poser. • When you hear the “Dance of the Young
Girls,” one of many dances from Stravinsky’s ballet
The Rite of Spring, think about how the music makes
you feel. Is it rough? Is it smooth?
Are many instruments playing, or
only a few? In The Rite of Spring,
you’ll hear a variety of rhythms and
dissonant sounds, or notes that do
not sound like they are meant to
go together. Think, have you ever
heard anything like it before?
IGOR
Born: June 17, 1882, Oranienbaum (Lomonosov), RussiaDied: April 6, 1971, New York City, New York
“Dance of theYoung Girls” from The Rite of Spring
Stravinsky’s ballet The Rite of Spring is twenty years older than the North Carolina Symphony.
The ballet, which premiered in 1913, celebrates its 100th
anniversary this year.
Walt Disney’s Fantasia uses The Rite of Spring as the music depicting animated scenes of
erupting volcanoes, prehistoric forests and dinosaurs.
. . .Stravinsky once wrote a
circus polka for fifty elephants wearing ballet tutus.
. . .In 1962, President John F. Kennedy
honored Igor Stravinsky at the White House on the composer’s 80th birthday.
RICHARD
Born: May 22, 1813, Leipzig, GermanyDied: February 13, 1883, Venice, Italy
Wagner composed the famous wedding song “Here Comes the
Bride” for his 1850 opera Lohengrin.
. . .Wagner designed some new
instruments such as the “Wagner Tuba” and an opera house
especially for his own music.
. . .Wagner’s Ring cycle is a gargantuan
collection of four operas that are all performed separate from
one another. You could almost think of the Ring cycle as being similar
to a movie series, such as Harry Potter or The Lord of the Rings,
but with opera instead!
...the last musicyou will hear at a concert......the most dramatic
and exciting...
Like many composers featured in your concert,
Richard Wagner showed an interest in music at
a very young age. He studied piano as a boy and
wrote variations on his favorite composers’ music.
Yet it was opera with which he fell in love, and Wagner,
now considered one of the best opera composers of all time, perfected
many of its most famous musical techniques. For example, he loved the
“leitmotif,” a melody that represents a specific character or idea in an op-
era and is played whenever that subject appears. His works often build to
a conclusion but rarely conclude until the very end, so that tension grows
throughout the entire work. And he also enjoyed length, as many of his op-
eras take several hours to perform! Altogether, these techniques showcase
Wagner’s central belief, that all of the arts – music, dance, visual arts and
theater – could be brought together in one “total artwork.” • In today’s
concert, you will hear the Overture, or the introduction, to one of Wagner’s
first successful operas, Rienzi. Notice how Wagner uses different dynamics,
tempos, rhythms, textures and melodies to make this music more interest-
ing. Every part of Wagner’s music means something. Let the melodies guide
you as you try to imagine the opera’s story just from its music.
Overture to Rienzi
We’re breaking the rules and ending our program with our beginning. Wagner’s Overture to Rienzi was performed at the North Carolina Symphony’s very first concert on May 14, 1932, held in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
We hope you enjoy this exciting conclusion to your concert!
...it’s the main idea of the music...the line that you walk away singing...
We have included a song for you to sing with us at your concert. “North Carolina is My Home”can also be played with instruments, like the recorder. We hope to hear an instrumental group from your school perform this song at your concert before you sing it with the orchestra. For those who will play, here are the instructions:
1 Learn to play “North Carolina is My Home” on an instrument, such as recorder, stringed instrument, bells, xylophone, guitar or other.
2 Memorize the music so you can watch your conductor.
3 Play the song through one time at your North Carolina Symphony concert.
Music by Loonis McGlohon • Words by Charles KuraltNorth Carolina Is My Home””
North Carolina Symphony, 3700 Glenwood Ave., Suite 130, Raleigh, NC 27612 • 919.733.2750 • www.ncsymphony.org/educationprogramsNorth Carolina Symphony Student Handbook © 2012 by North Carolina Symphony Society, Inc. Reproduction of this book in its entirety is strictly prohibited.