Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra Performs
Carnival of the Animals – A Family Concert

MINNEAPOLIS, January 8, 2011 – The Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra and Music Director William Schrickel present Carnival of the Animals – A Family Concert on Sunday, January 30 and Sunday, February 6, 2011. The free concert will features the orchestra playing dance music from Roumania (by Bartók), the Czech Republic (by Dvorak), France (by Offenbach) and the USA (Copland’s Hoe Down). The program also includes Saint-Saëns’ charming Carnival of the Animals, with a brand new narration written especially for these concerts by Pamela Hill Nettleton and read by Kim Hines, a wonderful and gifted actress.

Past versions of verses that accompany Carnival of the Animals mock and make fun of the animals. In this new version, writer Pamela Hill Nettleton turns that tradition on its ear, using each animal to sympathetically explore issues of diversity and difference in entertaining ways with which children can easily identify. "It's a mistake to think that children aren't conscious of the body image, bullying, and diversity issues that exist in our culture," says Nettleton, a communication studies and journalism professor at Marquette University in Milwaukee. "Children are, in fact, informed by the media about our cultural attitudes on a daily basis. And, they deal with in-the-trenches peer pressure and friction over difference."

“The Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra has enjoyed partnering with Neighborhood House for three years now, and there is nothing we do as an orchestra that is more rewarding than the warm relationships the musicians form with the children at Neighborhood House in the course of the players’ repeated Give-and-Take visits to perform for, learn from, and collaborate with the students,” William Schrickel explains. “Dou Vu, a teacher at Hope Academy in Saint Paul, has worked with students to create a Hmong bird dance that will be a part of the January 30 concert at St. Matthew’s Catholic Church, adding yet another international dance to the mix.”

Program:

William Schrickel, conductor
Kim Hines, narrator
Pamela Hill Nettleton, author
Students from the Neighborhood House (January 30 concert only)

Antonin Dvorak—Slavonic Dance, op. 72, #7 in C major
Béla Bartók—Romanian Folk Dances
Jacques Offenbach—Overture to Orpheus in the Underworld
Camille Saint-Saëns—Carnival of the Animals
Aaron Copland—Hoe Down from Rodeo

William Schrickel and MSO

The Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra celebrates William Schrickel's 11th season as its Music Director. He was an Assistant Conductor of the Minnesota Orchestra for the 2005-06 season and was the Music Director of the St. Cloud Symphony Orchestra from 2002-2008. The Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra is in its 29th season. Founded in 1982 by Saint Olaf College graduates, the orchestra has grown from a small chamber ensemble to a full symphony orchestra, a magnet for some of the area's finest professional and amateur instrumentalists. The primary goal of the orchestra is to reach all corners of the metropolitan area with a full spectrum of orchestral music and to encourage audiences to experience the excitement of live symphonic performances. Visit the MSO website Program page for the full 2010–11 season program, information about the artists, and directions to the performing venues.