{"id":427,"date":"2012-02-23T00:30:17","date_gmt":"2012-02-23T05:30:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/?p=427"},"modified":"2012-02-23T00:30:17","modified_gmt":"2012-02-23T05:30:17","slug":"north-carolinas-state-wide-symphony","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/2012\/02\/north-carolinas-state-wide-symphony.html","title":{"rendered":"North Carolina’s State-Wide Symphony"},"content":{"rendered":"

Having just spent a week taking part in a \u201cDvorak and America\u201d festival presented by the North Carolina Symphony Orchestra, I think I\u2019ve learned a thing or two about how an orchestra can serve an entire state. The NCSO travels the length and breadth of North Carolina \u2013 more than 12,000 miles annually, offering more than 150 concerts. And it\u2019s done that for a long time. In all four cities that hosted festival concerts, audiences strikingly evinced pride in the orchestra and an intimate sense of ownership. No one in Chicago would speak of \u201cour very own Chicago Symphony.\u201d In North Carolina, the orchestra serves not as a city\u2019s international ambassador; rather, it invaluably buttresses a range of cultural communities.<\/p>\n

The audience for \u201cDvorak and America\u201d in Fayettville, on the campus of Fayettville State University, looked to be about fifty per cent African-American. I addressed a group of students earlier in the week, none of whom had previously heard the name \u201cDvorak.\u201d A pre-concert recital featured members of the FSU music faculty in the Violin Sonatina and G-flat Humoresque. The first half of the concert was (in every venue) a multi-media exploration<\/a> of Dvorak\u2019s \u201cAmerican accent\u201d in his New World<\/em> Symphony. Dvorak\u2019s espousal of \u201cNegro melodies\u201d was the central topic. The Fayettville audience hung on every word. The second half of the concert was the New World <\/em>Symphony itself. Afterward, many stayed to offer intense expressions of gratitude. <\/p>\n

In New Bern (population 30,000), near the coast, the orchestra\u2019s seasonal series is ever popular. I have rarely seen a more eager audience. I observed people listening to the New World<\/em> Symphony with eyes closed, their faces aglow with appreciation. The venue was a large conference room with vivid acoustics; it sat about 800.<\/p>\n

In Raleigh, the concert took place Friday at noon. The hall was full to capacity, including two groups of high school students both of which had travelled for several hours. Their teachers had been participants in a 2010 \u201cDvorak and America\u201d Teacher-Training Institute hosted by the Pittsburgh Symphony. Kevin Deas, the eminent African-American bass-baritone, frequently partners my \u201cDvorak and America\u201d presentations. At Raleigh, Kevin and I offered a \u201cHarry Burleigh Show\u201d for the visiting students at 10:45 in the morning.<\/p>\n

In Chapel Hill, on the campus of the University of North Carolina, there was both an orchestral concert and an ancillary event featuring chamber music, and Burleigh songs and spirituals.<\/p>\n

The orchestra itself, a spirited and disciplined group, undertook this typical week of travel and performance without apparent fatigue. The music director, Grant Llewellyn, happens to be Welsh and yet is a fit. It matters that the pleasure he takes in the orchestra\u2019s unusual mission is at all times palpable. He likes people. He gravitates to students. The message that he and the musicians convey is \u201cWe\u2019re happy to be here.\u201d The orchestra\u2019s unusual mandate, which could prove a burden, instead functions as a beacon: it focuses and inspires the institution.<\/p>\n

The NSSO \u201cDvorak and America\u201d events were part of a $300,000 National Endowment for the Humanities project called \u201cMusic Unwound.\u201d NEH funds paid for free student tickets, busses for school groups, and teaching materials \u2013 as well as the extra personnel (host David Hartmann, video artist Peter Bogadnoff, myself as producer\/writer) and technical requirements (screens, stand-lights) the concerts demanded. The project next travels to the Pacific Symphony Youth Orchestra (where it\u2019s partnered by an elementary school and four high schools) and the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra (where the partners include an art museum). Few Americans have any idea what the NEH does. (Mitt Romney favors its termination.) Would that more orchestras undertook a humanities mandate, linking to literature, film, visual art, and history; and to high schools, universities, and museums. The NEH is there to help \u2013 for now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Having just spent a week taking part in a \u201cDvorak and America\u201d festival presented by the North Carolina Symphony Orchestra, I think I\u2019ve learned a thing or two about how an orchestra can serve an entire state. The NCSO travels the length and breadth of North Carolina \u2013 more than 12,000 miles annually, offering more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-427","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2QLHN-6T","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}