FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 7, 2009
PRESS CONTACT: Rebecca Hawkins
781-274-8233 or publicity@lexingtonsymphony.org
http://www.lexingtonsymphony.org/press/
WINTER REVERIES: LEXINGTON SYMPHONY AND MEZZO-SOPRANO JANNA BATY
Lexington Symphony has packed its 750-seat hall for the first three performances of the season and performs again in Cary Hall, Lexington on Saturday, Feb. 7th at 8:00pm. The program showcases a Lexington native, mezzo-soprano Janna Baty, who visits from New York City to perform Barber’s poignant Knoxville: Summer of 1915. Also on the program are I Crisantemi by Puccini, Sleeping in Air by renowned local composer Rodney Lister, and Vaughan Williams’ Symphony No. 5, a work first premiered during World War II and noted as a serenely beautiful refuge in turbulent times. A conductor’s talk with Music Director Jonathan McPhee takes place at 7:00pm in the concert hall.
Mezzo-soprano Janna Baty, who grew up less than a mile from Cary Hall, enjoys a versatile musical career. Recent engagements include appearances with the Hamburgische Staatsoper, the Boston Lyric Opera, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Hartford Symphony, and at Carnegie Hall. She has sung under conductors Seiji Ozawa and Robert Spano, among others, and has appeared at Tanglewood and numerous national and international music festivals. Winner of several international competitions, Baty co-directs Music at St. George's, a Manhattan-based vocal chamber music series and Auros Group for New Music in Boston. She can be heard on critically-acclaimed Chandos and Naxos recordings.
Composer Rodney Lister, whose works have received notable performances at venues such as Tanglewood, the Library of Congress, and the Edinburgh Festival, has been a creative contributor to Boston’s contemporary music scene for many years. Sleeping in Air flows from a poem by Randall Jarrell about a baby bat’s night spent clinging upside-down to his mother, witnessing her hectic life from that precarious yet comforting vantage-point.
The Lexington Symphony is a professional group of dedicated musicians who share a passion for their music and for exacting standards of performance. With an emphasis on accessibility within the community, the Symphony offers programming to reach all ages. For more information and to buy tickets, go to lexingtonsymphony.org, call (781) 863-9581 or visit Wales Copy, 1810 Massachusetts Avenue. Tickets are $35 standard, $30 seniors and $15 students; reserved seating. Cary Hall is T-accessible and located at 1605 Mass. Ave., Lexington Center, next to Town Hall. Will-call tickets must be picked up at least 15 minutes prior to concert.
“[Conductor Jonathan] McPhee flowed from lark to lilting to liturgical in a way that made me wish I were at the Met listening to him conduct the entire opera.”– Jeffrey Gantz, Boston Phoenix, review of Lexington Symphony’s Nov. 2008 concert