If you are traveling around Troy, NY next weekend be sure to stop by the Experimental Media & Performing Arts Center as well as various venues and hot spots for the American Music Festival.
Whether your attending all 5-days or dropping in for one or two performances, the American Music Festival has a lot to offer the casual listener.
Don't just take our word for it! Here are a few concerts that you do not want to miss.
A lifelong love of music begins at a young age and the benefits of an early music education have been well documented. As adults we often reminisce on the magic years of our childhood and almost always have a song or a melody that ties our childhood memories together. For children, music stimulates the imagination and brings them on thrilling adventures to magical worlds.
Today is St. Patrick's Day, a day to celebrate the historic and cultural contributions of Irish Americans. While Irish composers are relatively marginalized in the classical concert hall, the influence of Irish folk music in American concert music is undeniable. A deeper look into lesser known works by some of history's most famous composers will also uncover Ireland's hidden influence.
Argus believes in honoring the foundational chamber music traditions, while also pushing
forward into the world of inventive and contemporary music. Since 2013, the Argus String Quartet has performed all over the United States and abroad--from the Hear Now Music Festival in Los Angeles to Carnegie Hall in New York
Travel with ease on AMTRAK® and Enjoy The American Music Festival- a Unique Festival of New and Innovative Music by America’s Cutting Edge Composers.
American Music Festival is a national destination festival of new and innovative music by American composers in Troy, NY.
Albany, NY: The Albany Symphony and New York By Rail, the official travel guide of AMTRAK®, recently announced the creation of all-inclusive travel packages from NYC to the American Music Festival- a unique destination for music enthusiasts and the culturally curious. For more than a decade, the American Music Festival, under the baton of Music Director David Alan Miller has grown into a multifaceted event showcasing the Albany Symphony and Troy, NY as a national destination and incubator for emerging music and art. For five days, the Experimental Media & Performing Arts Center at RPI and Downtown Troy becomes a magnet for acclaimed composers and world class musicians, while giving voice to new works that are reshaping the nation’s musical landscape.
In announcing the partnership with New York By Rail Justin Cook commented: The American Music Festival is the Albany Symphony’s flagship event and the Capital Region is the perfect destination. From state-of-the-art facilities like EMPAC to legendary concert halls like the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall, Troy is the perfect home for a festival of this size and scope. Not to mention, Troy is an intersection for trains traveling from Boston, New York, and Montreal. This partnership is going to make it easier for patrons to experience the best of what the Albany Symphony has to offer and bring a more regional and international audience to Troy, starting with NYC. The American Music Festival New York By Rail Travel Package provides a convenient, stress-free way for music lovers to visit the Capital Region via Amtrak and experience emerging music and art in a unique setting” said Thomas Martinelli, Publisher, New York By Rail
This year’s Festival, “Water Music,” includes more than 15 concerts, recitals, special events and artistic happenings including performances by the renowned Albany Symphony, the unique new music ensemble Dogs of Desire. In addition to the Albany Symphony’s signature performances, highlights of this summer festival include performances by the Argus String Quartet, Andrew McKenna Lee, Sandbox Percussion and more. Many of the works celebrate the Festival’s theme which explores humankind’s intimate connections to the water and the Bicentennial of the Eric Canal. The Albany Symphony will conclude the festival with preview of seven world premieres by young American composers and the official launch of WaterMusicNY, a one-of-a-kind musical celebration of the historic waterway and canal communities throughout New York State.
By rail travel packages include round trip transportation by Amtrak® from NYC, hotel accommodations in Albany as well as a 2017 American Music Festival All Access Pass.
For more information about travel packages email Lori Solomon at TravelPackages@NewYorkByRail.com, or call Akiba Travel at 518-322-2067.
After an exciting holiday season featuring performances by some of the Capital Region's most talented young musicians, Yo-Yo Ma and John Corigliano's evocative Symphony No. 1, the Albany Symphony returns to the stage for Brahms Fourth Symphony and an epic undersea adventure with vocalists from Bard College Conservatory.
The Stonewall uprising in 1969 marked a new chapter in the Gay Rights Movement.
And so did AIDS, in the early 1980s.
One of the responses to AIDS in the gay community is represented by John Corigliano’s Symphony No. 1 (whose first movement is aptly titled “Apologue: Of Rage and Remembrance,” expressing two chief emotions within the community, to the slow reaction of the culture at large to the plague and to the ongoing loss of friends and family), and you might prepare for the January concert simply by listening to the work and reading Corigliano’s program note at johncorigliano.com.
But you might also want to put this symphony in context by, say, viewing a short video on the unveiling of the AIDS Quilt in 1987 and then another, made 25 years later.
And a personal note: the late writer, Paul Monette (1945-1995) was a classmate of mine at Yale and our Class Poet. He chronicled his coming out in two powerful memoirs, Borrowed Time and Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story.
The first was about his relationship with his partner, Roger, who died of AIDS in 1986; the second--winner of a National Book Award--was his coming-out story and frank commentary of his own illness, to which he succumbed just shy of 50. For a vivid, stirring, and funny look at Monette’s life, visit On the Brink of Summer’s End (). Just as Corigliano uses his art to call attention and mourn, so, too, did Monette.
Paul Lamar, Albany Symphony Patron
Albany Symphony Music Director, David Alan Miller and Grammy-Award winning composer John Corigliano have once again earned international acclaim after being nominated for a 2017 International Classical Music Award (ICMA).
Released in July of 2016 by Naxos USA, Symphony No. 1 is the third recording completed by Miller and Corigliano and the second recording to receive international acclaim. In 2014, John Corigliano and David Alan Miller received a Grammy® award for Best Instrumental Solo for their recording of Conjurer with percussionist Evelyn Glennie and the Albany Symphony.
Corigliano’s Symphony No. 1 is an evocative musical portrait inspired by loved ones lost to the AIDS epidemic of the 80’s and 90’s as well as the “cumulative effect” of those losses. Miller's deeply emotional recording of Symphony No. 1 is the third recording of this work, but the first ever Naxos recording for the National Orchestral Institute Philharmonic, which is composed of elite conservatory students from across the United States and David Alan Miller’s 5th recording released on the Naxos Label.
On Saturday, January 7th at 7:30PM David Alan Miller will present John Corigliano’s Symphony No. 1 with the Albany Symphony at the Palace Theatre. Recognized as a leading voice in new American orchestral music, David Alan Miller is a driving force behind the Albany Symphony’s commitment to giving voice to new works by living American composers.
Tickets are available for purchase online. To charge tickets by phone call the box office at 518.694.3300.
At the heart of the Albany Symphony's mission is a deep seated commitment to performing and recording new music by living American composers. Under the leadership of David Alan Miller, this unwavering commitment to new orchestral music has earned the Albany Symphony national recognition from ASCAP, NPR Music, the American Record Guide, and the National Recording Academy.
