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Articles tagged with: Grant Park Music Festival

Grant Park Fest’s all-summer concert party begins with a selfie of bad-news Belshazzar

Jun 17, 2018 – 12:36 pm
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Review: Summer’s obviously just over the horizon: The musicians, chorus, maestro and devotees of the Grant Park Music Festival are already partying like the equinox has happened. As the centerpiece of the festival’s 84th summer opener, June 13-16, William Walton’s grand and colorful oratorio “Belshazzar’s Feast” felt like a reflection of the block-party atmosphere at Millennium Park.

Under Kalmar’s command, Grand Park forces triumph in oratorio hailing end of World War II

Jul 31, 2017 – 6:48 pm
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Review: We’re well into another Grant Park Music Festival season that has demonstrated once again the value of conductor Carlos Kalmar’s artistic leadership through 18 summers. Where else but in Millennium Park, under Kalmar’s baton, might one hope to hear the likes of Swiss composer Frank Martin’s grand-scaled, inexplicably neglected oratorio “In terra pax,” a profound and moving reflection on the long-awaited end of the carnage that was World War II.

In rainy weather, Grant Park Festival shines when orchestra, chorus, soloists go seafaring

Jun 19, 2017 – 4:08 pm
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Review: Music director Carlos Kalmar’s always imaginative – and often quite bold – programming for the Grant Park Music Festival hit an early peak June 16 and 17 in his choice of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ prodigious “Sea Symphony.” This 70-minute masterpiece for orchestra, chorus, soprano and baritone uses texts from Walt Whitman’s poem “Leaves of Grass” to create an epic duality: a great paean to the sea and a metaphor for the grandeur and the possibilities of human life.

Legacy of African American music lights up Grant Park fare accented by jazz, spirituals

Jul 23, 2016 – 4:58 pm
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Review: From the pages of African American history, lines of musical heritage intertwined in a concert as appealing as it was fresh and diverse when the Grant Park Festival Orchestra was joined by jazz violinist Regina Carter and the vocal trio TreDiva at the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park.

Musical Stars and Stripes will fly all summer as Grant Park celebrates American composers

Jul 3, 2015 – 5:00 pm
July 4 at Grant Park Music Festival

Preview: The season programming of a major orchestra may offer a preponderance of German, Russian, and French music, but at this year’s Grant Park Music Festival, Americans make a greater showing. Now in its 81st season, the free Festival in downtown Millennium Park embodies the exploratory spirit of composers who have sought to create an intrinsically American music.

Grant Park Orchestra, led by ‘goalie’ Kalmar, heats up Beethoven to kick off festive summer

Jun 18, 2015 – 5:40 pm
Carlos Kalmar and Grant Park Orch, opening night June 17, 2015 (Norman Timonera)

Review: Chicago’s getting everything right at the beginning of this summer season. The day after the Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup, the weather was picnic perfect at Millennium Park, where the free Grant Park Music Festival got underway. Thousands laid down their blankets on the great lawn at Pritzker Pavilion. Even the curse of the overture “Drip” – rained out two seasons running – was finally broken. Check out our top festival picks.

World premieres in Grant Park’s 2014 plans; conductors renew ties for festival’s 80th year

Feb 12, 2014 – 3:29 pm
Composer William Bolcom's new concerto for orchestra is scheduled for Grant Park Music Festival Aug.  15-16, 2014 (Katryn Colin)

Report: World premieres by composers William Bolcom and Christopher Theofanidis and the return of former principal conductors Leonard Slatkin and Hugh Wolff will highlight the Grant Park Music Festival’s 80th anniversary season at Jay Pritzker Pavilion.

2013 Summer Season: Grant Park Fest spins Chinese and Incan threads, jazz and modern

Feb 14, 2013 – 5:40 pm
Grant Park Music Festival announces 2013 concerts credit Norman Timonera

Report: Under the stars at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago’s Millennium Park, the Grant Park Music Festival kicks off its 79th free-concert summer season on June 12. Here’s what looks new and promising week by week.

Cultural twins, tied to Chicago and Poland, set to make their mark in the orchestra world

Mar 29, 2012 – 8:49 am
Eska Laskus featured image

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