CCPA presents two free concerts with Mexican-American guest conductor Alondra de la Parra

Posted: 03/30/2012

Roosevelt University’s Symphony Orchestra will perform two concerts under the direction of highly acclaimed guest conductor Alondra de la Parra at 7:30 p.m. Monday, April 16 at Benito Juarez Community Academy in Chicago and at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 17 at Orchestra Hall at Symphony Center in Chicago.

The concerts, featuring Roosevelt’s Chicago College of Performing Arts (CCPA) Symphony Orchestra, are free and open to the public. One of America’s premier conductors, de la Parra is founder and artistic director of the New York-based Philharmonic Orchestra of the Americas and has appeared with the New World Symphony, the Houston and San Antonio Orchestras, the Singapore Sun Festival Orchestra, the Russian National Orchestra and Venezuela’s Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra.

The concerts will feature works by Hector Berlioz, Maurice Ravel and one of Mexico’s most renowned classical composers, Silvestre Revueltas, who graduated in 1919 from Chicago Musical College, the former name of CCPA.

Soprano Megan Williams, winner of Roosevelt’s 2011 Student Solo Competition, will perform Ravel’s Shéhèrezade with the orchestra. Closing the program is the dramatic and exciting Night of the Mayas.

The April 16 concert, which takes place at Benito Juarez Academy, 1450 W. Cermak Road, Chicago, will build on Roosevelt’s commitment to bringing its music programs into diverse Chicago communities. Earlier this spring, the CCPA Orchestra and Opera programs presented a fully-staged student production of Mozart’s The Magic Flute at Benito Juarez. The April 17 concert takes place in Orchestra Hall at Symphony Center, 220 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago.

“We are pleased to be working with Alondra de la Parra and would like to thank the Mexican Consulate for its interest in and support of this series in which the CCPA Symphony Orchestra shares these wonderful musical experiences with the Pilsen and wider communities and brings its musicianship to some of the top venues for music in the city,” said Henry Fogel, dean of CCPA.
For more information, contact CCPA’s Performance Activities Office at 312-341-2238 or email cbernstein@roosevelt.edu.

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