Park Avenue Chamber Symphony to Present Stravinsky's RITE OF SPRING, 2/22

The noted American conductor David Bernard will lead The Park Avenue Chamber Symphony in an ambitious program of Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring) and the Wagner/Maazel The Ring Without Words on Sunday afternoon, February 22nd, 2015, 3 p.m. at the Rose Theater, Jazz at Lincoln Center's Frederick P. Rose Hall, Time Warner Center, New York, NY.

The program follows:

Stravinsky: Le Sacre du Printemps

Wagner/Maazel: The Ring Without Words

For tickets starting at $15 online: ticketing.jazz.org, call CenterCharge: 212 721 6500, or visit the Rose Theater Jazz at Lincoln Center Frederick P. Rose Hall box office located on the ground floor at Broadway & 60th Street.

Music Director and founder of New York City's Park Avenue Chamber Symphony, David Bernard has gained recognition for his dramatic and incisive conducting in over 20 countries on four continents, including a nine-city tour of the People's Republic of China and a guest conducting assignment with the China Conservatory Orchestra.

Under Maestro Bernard's leadership the Park Avenue Chamber Symphony's membership has thrived, expanding in size and achieving critical acclaim. Active throughout the greater New York City area, Maestro Bernard has appeared as a guest conductor with the Long Island String Festival, the Massapequa Philharmonic, the New York Symphonic Arts Ensemble, the Putnam Symphony and the South Shore Symphony. Mr. Bernard has previously served as Music Director of the Stony Brook University Orchestra, the Gilbert and Sullivan Light Opera Company of Long Island, and Theater Three.

Previously he held the post of Assistant Conductor of both the Jacksonville and Stamford symphony orchestras.

A two-time First Prize Winner of the Orchestral Conducting Competition of The American Prize, David Bernard was described by the judges as "a first rate conductor. With no score, an animated and present Maestro Bernard led a phenomenal performance of incredibly difficult repertoire-masterly in shaping, phrasing, technique and expressivity". A reading of Richard Strauss's Tod und Verklärung brought high praise from Lucid Culture which found the performance to be "unsurpassed in its dynamic range and attention to detail."

Devoted to the music of our own time, Bernard has presented world premières of scores by Bruce Adolphe, Chris Caswell, John Mackey, and Ted Rosenthal, while distinguished concert collaborators include Carter Brey, David Chan, Catherine Cho, Pedro Díaz, Stanley Drucker, Bart Feller, Whoopi Goldberg, Sirena Huang, Judith Ingolfsson, Christina Jennings, Anna Lee, Jessica Lee, Kristin Lee, Jon Manasse, Spencer Myer, Todd Phillips, and James Archie Worley.

Maestro Bernard's discography includes 17 albums spanning music from Vivaldi to Copland, including a complete Beethoven symphony cycle praised for its "intensity, spontaneity, propulsive rhythm, textural clarity, dynamic control, and well-judged phrasing" (Fanfare). About his release of 20th century orchestral music by Copland, Stravinsky, Vaughan Williams, and Bartók Fanfare Magazine wrote:

"David Bernard is an exceptional conductor... His performances are marked by a strong sense of the music's structure, an outstanding feeling for orchestral texture and phrasing, and a dynamic rhythmic propulsion that makes itself felt even in quiet passages." (July 2014)

Maestro Bernard is passionately committed to elementary and secondary school music education, continuously developing new talent and providing solo performance experience to exciting young artists. His leadership in fundraising for music education programs has bolstered outreach, community music schools and conservatory preparatory programs-most notably the Harmony Program (a New York City initiative modeled after Venezuela's "El Sistema") and the Lucy Moses School. Mr. Bernard and the Park Avenue Chamber Symphony have also established the Parent's Association Endowed Scholarship Fund at The Juilliard School Pre-College Division.

David Bernard is an alumnus of The Juilliard School, Curtis Institute of Music, Stony Brook University, Tanglewood, and Saratoga Performing Arts Center.