Centenary Youth Orchestra kicks off third season with ambitious concert
November 2, 2016
SHREVEPORT, LA — The third season of the Centenary Youth Orchestra begins with a concert on Sunday, November 13 at 7:00 p.m. in Anderson Auditorium at Centenary’s Hurley School of Music. Featuring pieces by J.S. Bach, Gabriel Fauré, Aaron Copland, and Johann Strauss, Jr., the concert is free and open to the public.
The 52-piece ensemble of middle school, high school, and college students is under the direction of Dr. Todd Gabriel. Each work prepared by the young musicians requires a clear distinction in style.
“The CYO will undertake the mature French Romantic ballet suite, Pélleas and Mélisande by Fauré,” says Gabriel. “Aaron Copland demands a sweet, nostalgic American flavor for his Saturday Night Waltz from the ballet Rodeo, while Roses from the South is a famous Viennese waltz by the Waltz King, Johann Strauss, Jr.”
The program will also feature two of the CYO’s violinists, Hannah Jordan and Johnum Palado, performing all three monumental movements of the Concerto for Two Violins in d minor by J.S. Bach.
Orchestra director Gabriel is a graduate of the Juilliard School in New York City and a veteran orchestral violist with stints at the Alabama, Phoenix, and Queensland Symphony Orchestras in addition to the Shreveport Symphony Orchestra. He has worked with youth orchestras in Alabama and Arizona and is the Hurley School of Music Orchestra Director at Centenary.