Classical music education: Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras (WYSO) needs YOUR HELP as it presents its annual Art of Note gala on May 4 in Madison in order to help hundreds of music students from all around south-central Wisconsin. Plus, the UW-Madison’s national Stamps Scholars give their debut concert on Sunday afternoon.

ALERT: You might want to catch the FREE debut performance by UW-Madison’s first class of Stamps Scholars (below in a photo) this Sunday, April 28, at 5 p.m. in Morphy Hall. Stamps Scholarships are competitive, four-year merit scholarships given by the Stamps Family Foundation of Atlanta. At the UW School of Music, Stamp Scholars include Renee Brechtel, violin; Alex Charland, clarinet; Kyle Pompei, horn; Cobrun Sells, piano & percussion, and Anna Whitaway, soprano. The program includes Igor Stravinsky‘s “L’Histoire du Soldat (The Soldier’s Tale); Franz  Schubert‘s “Der Hirt auf dem Felsen (The Shepherd on the Rock); Jarmo Sermila’s “Das Geblase”; and a piece written by Stamps Scholar Alex Charland, titled “Caricatures for Stamps Quintet.” For more information about the Stamps scholarships, check out these links: http://www.stampsfoundation.org/ http://www.supportuw.org/cfr/stamps-foundation-gives/ 

By Jacob Stockinger

Nobody quite knows what the cause is — maybe competing events, maybe the late cold, wet and overcast spring, maybe less public exposure.

But one fact is not in question: So far this year fewer than half the places that were sold last year have been sold to the annual Art of Note fundraiser for the Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestras on a week from today, at 6 p.m. on next Saturday, May 4, at the headquarters of CUNA Mutual on Mineral Point Road.

And WYSO simply needs to do better if it is to carry on the important and inspiring work it has been doing so successfully since it was founded in 1965, when it began educating more than 5,000 students from more than 100 communities throughout south-central Wisconsin.

Bluntly put: WYSI needs your help.

As The Ear has often said, there is no better cause or organization in the area to support if you care about the future of classical music, both the music-makers and the audiences, and about the role that music education plays in the lives of young people.

The gala will feature an evening of live music, gourmet cuisine, wine, locally brewed beer, and live and silent auctions, including a wine auction and bidding on violins that have been transformed into works of art (Below is the front and back of a violin by artist Michael Velliquette.).

The Art of Note gala will be held on Saturday, May 4, 2013, starting at 6 p.m. at the CUNA Mutual Conference Center, 5810 Mineral Point Rd., on the far west side of Madison.

Tickets are $100 per person in advance, $110 at the door. $70 of each ticket is tax-deductible. Guests can also purchase a table for 8 for $750.

Those who attend will enjoy hors d’oeuvres and dessert, served buffet-style, while they bid on fine dining, event tickets (including Badger football tickets), travel packages and many other items at the live or silent auctions.

You can preview many of these auction items at WYSO’s newly redesigned website: http://wyso.music.wisc.edu/art-of-note-gala-auction-2013/

The gala will include performances by the young musicians of WYSO’s Percussion Ensemble (below), Brass Choirs and Chamber Music Ensembles.

Proceeds of the gala will help support all aspects of the WYSO program for young people, including high-quality orchestral training, performance opportunities, student scholarships, orchestra tours -– major international tours every two years are on the works (below is a photo of WYSO performing in Vienna last year) — and master classes with professional musicians.

The outstanding results of WYSO training -– which has helped professional musicians and people in many other fields all over the world –- can be experienced first-hand when WYSO’s groups perform at several concerts during the year. Just listen to the performance of the last movement of Shostakovich‘s Symphony No. 5 in the YouTube video at the bottom.

The next upcoming examples of WYSO’s impressive achievement will be the Bolz Spring Concerts on Saturday and Sunday, May 18 and May 19, in Mills Hall on the UW-Madison campus. (Below is a photo by Cheng-Wei Wu of the WYSO Philharmonia Orchestra performing under retiring conductor and WYSO associate music director Thomas Buchhauser.)

Here is a link about the concerts and, at the home page, more about WYSO’s history and mission. Read them and see if you don’t agree that WYSO deserves support – YOUR support:

http://wyso.music.wisc.edu/events/

And speaking of support, let us acknowledge and praise the business and institutional help donated by the Art of Note sponsors: Boardman Clark Law Firm, The Century House, C.K. Chang, CUNA Mutual Group, Custer Financial Services/Lincoln Financial Group, EnRich Financial Partners, Goodman’s Jewelers, Tetrad, Inc., Susan Hoeft Vandewalle (WYSO Charter Concertmaster), and Wallman Investment Counsel.

Call (608) 263-3320 x 11 for more information or to RSVP.

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Posted in Classical music
Tags: Bucky Badger, CUNA Mutual Group, Histoire du Soldat, Igor Stravinsky, Jacob Stockinger, Madison, Michael Velliquette, Orchestra, Stamp Scholars, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Vienna, Wisconsin, WYSO, YouTube