Music That Moves: The Brass Experience

Hong Kong Sinfonietta and Swire Island East present a FREE Sunday Afternoon concert at
ArtisTree, 1/F Cornwall House, TaiKoo Place

Sharing a common vision that arts is accessible for everyone, Hong Kong Sinfonietta and Swire Island East, join forces for the very first time to bring live music out of the concert hall with “Music That Moves: The Brass Experience” at ArtisTree, 1/F Cornwall House,TaiKoo Place, Island East on 5 July (Sun), 3pm.

The concert showcases a programme of lively and entertaining brass music specially chosen for Sunday afternoon. Hong Kong Sinfonietta Brass Ensemble will be led by trumpet master James Thompson (Professor of Trumpet at the renowned Eastman School of Music, and former Principal Trumpet at the Atlanta and Montreal Symphony Orchestras), and together they will share their great brass experience with music including Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man, Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez (Adagio), The Fellowship of the Ring Suite, and other fun pieces that may get you moving along! To complete the total brass experience, the performers will also share their favourite aspects and anecdotes about their glitzy, mighty instruments.


Music that Moves！

As the theme of Hong Kong Sinfonietta’s 2009/2010 season is “Music that Moves”, the orchestra will be bringing different concert experiences, in different formats and at different venues to audiences this season, as part of its aim to bring music closer to the community.

Hong Kong Sinfonietta
Music That Moves: The Brass Experience

Trumpet /Conductor / Presenter: James Thompson
Hong Kong Sinfonietta Brass Ensemble


5 July 2009 (Sun) 3pm
 ArtisTree, 1/F Cornwall House, TaiKoo Place, Island East
(Quarry Bay MTR Station Exit A or car drop-off point at G/F Oxford House, TaiKoo Place)

Free Admission

Programme Enquiry: 3607 2331 / info@hksinfonietta.org
Venue Enquiry: 2844 5095 / www.islandeast.com.hk

                                  
Programme

James Thompson                      Trumpet

James Thompson is currently Professor of Trumpet at the renowned Eastman School of Music. He came to this position having played Principal Trumpet in the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra since September 1990. He has held corresponding positions with the Phoenix Symphony, the Orchestra of the State of Mexico, the National Symphony of Mexico, and for 14 years, the Montreal Symphony Orchestra.

Born in Frankfurt, Germany, he was raised in Phoenix, Arizona where he began trumpet studies at the age of ten. His principal teachers included Richard Longfield and Roger Voisin.

Thompson has been active both as a soloist and a teacher. He has taught trumpet and brass ensemble at Northern Arizona University, the National Conservatory of Music in Mexico City and McGill University in Montreal, Canada. He has also performed as a soloist with orchestras in North and South America as well as in Europe. In 1979 he was a prize winner of the First Maurice André International Trumpet Competition.

He has made recital tours to China, Japan, Canada, Spain, Germany, Sweden, Norway and Latin America. He has also been a guest artist with the Summit Brass and Chicago’s Music of the Baroque. At the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Opening Ceremonies he performed a jazz/gospel trumpet solo and was seen on television by more than three billion people. He has performed as guest Principal Trumpet with the New York Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, as well as the other orchestras in the United States, Canada and Europe. Currently he is solo trumpet of the Symphonica Toscanini under the baton of Lorin Maazel.

Thompson has actively encouraged new compositions for the trumpet. In 1987 he performed the world première of Malcolm Forsyth’s Concerto for Trumpet, which was written for him and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. He recorded this concerto with the Kitchener-Waterloo Orchestra for CBC Records in May 1992. In 1990 he performed the Quebec première of Jacques Hétu’s Trumpet Concerto and in March of 1992 he gave the world première of the Glenn Buhr Concerto for Trumpet, also written for him and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra.

Thompson can be heard on London Decca recordings with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra and Telarc’s Atlanta Symphony releases. He has also recorded on Chandos in performances which include Vivaldi’s Concerto for Two Trumpets and the critically acclaimed Shostakovich’s Concerto
No 1 for Piano, Trumpet and Strings. Thompson is a Yamaha Performing Artist.

 Hong Kong Sinfonietta        Music Director: Yip Wing-sie

One of Hong Kong’s flagship orchestras, Hong Kong Sinfonietta was founded in 1990 with a mission to bring music closer to the community.  In April 2002, eminent conductor Yip Wing-sie joined as the new Music Director, adding to the orchestra’s vision – “investing in a cultural tomorrow”.  Today, Hong Kong Sinfonietta performs over 80 times a year and has collaborated with an illustrious array of international musicians and groups including Vladimir Ashkenazy, Plácido Domingo, Augustin Dumay, Fou Ts’ong, Christopher Hogwood, Luciano Pavarotti, Pinchas Zukerman, The Royal Ballet, English National Ballet, Kirov Ballet, Bolshoi Ballet and Stuttgart Ballet.

Hong Kong Sinfonietta has been a regular guest at festivals at home and abroad, including La Folle Journée Festival in Tokyo, a concert at the prestigious National Philharmonic Hall in Warsaw and concerts at festivals in France and Lithuania (2005). This year, the orchestra was invited back to La Folle Journée and made its début at two music Festivals in Italy.

Apart from standard orchestral repertoire, the orchestra ventures into crossover productions, new commissions and innovative audience development concerts for different age groups. On the educational front, Hong Kong Sinfonietta has pioneered specially-designed “educational” concerts for different age groups. New concepts on the Hong Kong concert stage: HKS for Kids (for children), Short-cut to Classical Music, Know Your Classical Music (for adults) and HKS McDull Music Project have provided a new realm in “audience development”.

Swire Island East

Swire Island East is one of Hong Kong’s best planned and established business districts which comprise the retail and office centres of Cityplaza and TaiKoo Place, developed and managed by Swire Properties. Following the completion of One Island East, the Island East portfolio offers eight million square feet of commercial accommodation for local and multinational corporations. A comprehensive range of cosmopolitan business and leisure amenities are situated within the area, including the 1.1 million sq ft Cityplaza shopping centre, the Butterfield’s private members’ club, over 60 restaurants and cafes and some 4,000 public parking spaces.

Swire Island East has been a long-time patron of art and culture and a diversified range of visual and performing art events are held year-round in the past decade. To raise the bar and be able to bring world-class art events to Hong Kong, a 20,000 sq ft multi-purpose venue ArtisTree located at Cornwall House, TaiKoo Place was launched in November 2008. The inaugural event was the Vivienne Westwood A Life in Fashion exhibition, a collaboration with London’s Victoria & Albert Museum.

ArtisTree is a pun for the original word “Artistry” which means “artistic workmanship, effect or quality, artistic ability”. Like a tree, this new venue symbolizes a nurturing ground where art grows. It is intended to be a cultural resource for Hong Kong. From where, through the presentation of outstanding events from the visual and performing arts world, inspire the learning, appreciation, creation and growth of art in the wider Hong Kong community.

 
Hong Kong Sinfonietta is financially supported by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative region
Hong Kong Sinfonietta reserves the right to change the programme and artists

---End---