Columbus Symphony's KLEZMER SHOWCASE to Offer Diverse Works That Share Roots

Led by CSO Music Director Rossen Milanov and featuring guest clarinetist David Krakauer, this intriguing, genre-bending program celebrates the origins and influences of klezmer music, the lively and soulful dance tunes played by Jewish folk musicians as they traveled throughout eastern Europe during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Program selections range from folk-flavored classical pieces by Liszt and Johann Strauss to recent works with similarly mixed roots.

The Columbus Symphony presents the Klezmer Showcase at the Southern Theatre (21 E. Main St.) on Friday and Saturday, January 13 and 14, at 8pm. Tickets start at $10 and can be purchased at the CAPA Ticket Center (39 E. State St.), all Ticketmaster outlets, and www.ticketmaster.com. To purchase tickets by phone, call (614) 228-8600 or (800) 745-3000. The CAPA Ticket Center will also be open two hours prior to each performance.

The 2016-17 Masterworks Series is made possible through the generous support of season sponsor Anne Melvin.

Prelude - Patrons are invited to join Christopher Purdy in the theatre at 7pm for a 30-minute, pre-concert discussion about the works to be performed.

Postlude - At the conclusion of the Friday program, patrons are encouraged to meet the musicians in the adjacent Thurber's Bar (The Westin Columbus, 310 S. High St.).

Respected and admired by audiences and musicians alike, Rossen Milanov is currently the Music Director of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra, and recently completed his second season with the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra to enthusiastic acclaim. He is also Music Director of the Princeton Symphony and Spain's Orquesta Sinfónica del Principado de Asturias (OSPA).

The 2016-17 CSO season builds upon many of the innovative ideas that were introduced in his first season-thematic festivals, enrichment programs, integrated experiences, and collaborations with other local cultural institutions. In Princeton, he is continuing the tradition of adventurous programming and collaborating with violinist Leila Josefowicz, clarinetist David Krakauer, and composers Saad Haddad and Zhou Tian. In Spain, he will conduct the Spanish premiere of Tchaikovsky's Mazeppa with the Oviedo Opera and the gala concert of the "Princess of Asturias" awards with OSPA.

Milanov has collaborated with some of the world's preeminent artists including Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman, Joshua Bell, Midori, Christian Tetzlaff, and André Watts. During his 11-year tenure with the Philadelphia Orchestra, he conducted more than 200 performances as Associate Conductor and as Artistic Director of the Orchestra's summer home at The Mann Center for the Performing Arts. In 2015, he completed a 15-year tenure as Music Director of the nationally recognized training orchestra Symphony in C in New Jersey. His passion for new music has resulted in numerous world premieres of works by composers such as Richard Danielpour, Nicolas Maw, and Gabriel Prokofiev among others.

Rossen Milanov studied conducting at the Curtis Institute of Music and the Juilliard School, where he received the Bruno Walter Memorial Scholarship.

Known for his mastery of myriad styles, David Krakauer occupies the unique position of being one of the world's leading exponents of eastern European Jewish klezmer music, and at the same time, a major voice in classical music. He has appeared with the Tokyo, Kronos, and Emerson quartets, plus as soloist with the Dresden, Seattle, and Detroit symphony orchestras among many others. symphony orchestras, among many others. With his band, Ancestral Groove, he has redefined the klezmer genre with major appearances at Carnegie Hall and internationally. Consistently defying categorization, Krakauer has enjoyed major ongoing artistic collaborations with a tremendously diverse group of performers and composers including Dawn Upshaw, Itzhak Perlman, John Zorn, Fred Wesley, Music from Marlboro, Abraham Inc, Osvaldo Golijov, The Klezmatics, John Cage, Danny Elfman, and Socalled. In his newest project, The Big Picture, he explores the universal search for identity through a re-imagination of familiar themes by renowned film music composers brought together in a cinematic concert accompanied by original visuals. An avid educator, Krakauer has enjoyed a long relationship with Mannes (New School University), the Manhattan School of Music, NYU, and the Bard Conservatory.

Klezmer is a musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of eastern Europe. Played by professional musicians called klezmorim, the genre originally consisted largely of dance tunes and instrumental display pieces for weddings and other celebrations. Originally, klezmer referred to musical instruments, and was later extended to refer, as a pejorative, to musicians themselves. It was not until the late 20th century that the word came to identify a musical genre. Klezmer is easily identifiable by its characteristic expressive melodies, reminiscent of the human voice, complete with laughing and weeping. The style is meant to imitate khazone and paraliturgical singing. Various musical styles influenced traditional klezmer music, but perhaps, the strongest and most enduring is Romanian music. Klezmer musicians heard and adapted traditional Romanian music, which is reflected in the dance forms found throughout surviving klezmer music repertoire.

Founded in 1951, the Columbus Symphony is the only full-time, professional symphony in central Ohio. Through an array of innovative artistic, educational, and community outreach programming, the Columbus Symphony is reaching an expanding, more diverse audience each year. This season, the Columbus Symphony will share classical music with more than 200,000 people in central Ohio through concerts, radio broadcasts, and special programming. For more information, visit www.columbussymphony.com.