Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra Invites Public To Free Tour Send-Off Concert

The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and Music Director Manfred Honeck invite the public to a free concert at Heinz Hall on August 19 at 8 p.m. The program will include highlights from the tour repertoire. The Pittsburgh Symphony's newest disc from Reference Recordings, Shostakovich 5, will be available for the first time at this concert.

The concert will celebrate the orchestra's departure for its 2017 European Festivals Tour on August 25. The tour will take the orchestra to Germany, Austria, the United Kingdom, Switzerland and Romania. Highlights include the orchestra and Maestro Honeck performing at the Salzburg Festival together for the first time (the only American orchestra performing there this year) and a return trip to the BBC Proms (where the symphony's performance is already sold out).

The program includes selections from works the orchestra will perform on the European Festivals Tour -Beethoven's Symphony No. 7, Dvorak's Violin Concerto and Mahler's Symphony No. 1.

Tickets to the send-off concert are free, but reservations are required. Call 412-392-4900 to reserve tickets.

The Pittsburgh Symphony would like to thank and recognize BNY Mellon for its supporting partnership of the Rheingau Music Festival concert in Wiesbaden, Germany. The engagements at the Rheingau Music Festival, Salzburg Festival, BBC proms and Lucerne Festival are supported by Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation through USArtists International in partnership with National Endowment for the Arts and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. This tour is made possible, in part, by a gift from Pat and Michele Atkins. International Touring is made possible, in part, by the Hillman Endowment for International Performances.

About the Artists

Renowned for his distinctive interpretations, MANFRED HONECK has served as music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra since the 2008-2009 season. He and the orchestra are consistently recognized for their performances and are celebrated both in Pittsburgh and abroad. To great acclaim, they regularly perform in major music capitals and festivals, among them the BBC Proms, Musikfest Berlin, Lucerne Festival, Rheingau Musik Festival, Beethovenfest Bonn, Grafenegg Festival, Carnegie Hall and the Musikverein in Vienna. This successful collaboration has also been extensively documented on recordings. The SACDs released by Reference Recordings, most recently the Shostakovich Symphony No. 5 in D minor and the Barber Adagio for Strings, have received numerous rave reviews, as well as two Grammy Award nominations.

Born in Austria, Honeck received his musical training at the Academy of Music in Vienna. Many years of experience as a member of the Vienna Philharmonic and the Vienna State Opera Orchestra have given his conducting a distinctive stamp. He began his career as assistant to Claudio Abbado and was subsequently engaged by the Zurich Opera House, where earned the prestigious European Conductor's Award in 1993. Other early posts include Leipzig, where he was one of three main conductors of the MDR Symphony Orchestra, and Oslo, where he was appointed principal guest conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra. He went on to become music director of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Stockholm and principal guest conductor of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. From 2007 to 2011, Honeck was music director of the Staatsoper Stuttgart, where he conducted premieres of operas by Berlioz, Mozart, Verdi, Strauss, Poulenc and Wagner. Other operatic guest appearances include Semperoper Dresden, Royal Opera of Copenhagen and the Salzburg Festival.

As a guest conductor Honeck has worked with the world's leading orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Staatskapelle Dresden, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Accademia di Santa Cecilia Rome and the Vienna Philharmonic. Orchestras he conducted in the United States include New York Philharmonic, The Cleveland Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra and Boston Symphony Orchestra. He has been artistic director of the International Concerts Wolfegg in Germany for more than 20 years.

Honeck has received honorary doctorates from St. Vincent College, Carnegie Mellon University and the Catholic University of America. Most recently, he was awarded the title of honorary professor by the Austrian federal president.

Violinist Jeremy Black was applauded for his "musical fire" and "effortless technique" by the Chicago Tribune for his debut performance with the Chicago Symphony at age 12, winning first prize in the nationally broadcast 1991 Illinois Bell/WTTW Young Performers Competition. More recently, his "fabulous tone" and "polished, reliable virtuosity" were noted by the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review in his "sensational" solo debut with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. Black has been a member of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra's first violin section since 2002 and concertmaster of the Grant Park Orchestra in Chicago since 2005. He has also performed as a guest concertmaster with the Minnesota Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra, the Buffalo Philharmonic and the Blossom Festival Orchestra, and in the violin sections of the Chicago Symphony and Cleveland Orchestra.

An avid fan of chamber music, Black performed and recorded the world premiere of Eugene O'Brien's Algebra of Night with the 21st Century Chamber Consort in Washington, D.C. (CD release expected in 2016), and has performed numerous recitals throughout the Pittsburgh region, including Carnegie Mellon, Chatham and Duquesne universities, West Liberty State College and the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.

Black also has made solo appearances with the Grant Park Orchestra, Pittsburgh Live Chamber Ensemble and in subscription concerts with the Chicago String Ensemble and Evanston Symphony. His other awards include first prizes in the University of Michigan and Case Western Reserve University concerto competitions, the Society of American Musicians Competition, the Nordic Musical Arts Competition and the Fischoff International Chamber Music Competition.

A native of Evanston, Illinois, Black studied with Mark Zinger, currently professor emeritus at DePaul University and a former student and colleague of David Oistrakh. Black's secondary education began in 1996 at Case Western Reserve University where he studied with Linda Cerone at the Cleveland Institute of Music. After graduating, he moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, to pursue his master's degree with Paul Kantor at the University of Michigan.

Black resides in Pittsburgh's Highland Park neighborhood with his wife, Kate, and their two sons. He plays a violin made by Lorenzo and Tommaso Carcassi, dated 1783.

The PITTSBURGH SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, known for its artistic excellence for more than 120 years, is credited with a rich history of the world's finest conductors and musicians, and a strong commitment to the Pittsburgh region and its citizens. Past music directors have included Fritz Reiner (1938-1948), William Steinberg (1952-1976), André Previn (1976-1984), Lorin Maazel (1984-1996) and Mariss Jansons (1995-2004). This tradition of outstanding international music directors was furthered in fall 2008, when Austrian conductor Manfred Honeck became music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony. The orchestra has been at the forefront of championing new American works, and gave the first performance of Leonard Bernstein's Symphony No. 1 "Jeremiah" in 1944 and John Adams' Short Ride in a Fast Machine in 1986. The Pittsburgh Symphony has a long and illustrious history in the areas of recordings and radio concerts. Its "Pittsburgh Live!" series with Reference Recordings has resulted in back-to-back Grammy Award nominations in 2015 and 2016. As early as 1936, the Pittsburgh Symphony broadcast on the airwaves coast-to-coast and in the late 1970s it made the ground breaking PBS series "Previn and the Pittsburgh." The orchestra has received increased national attention since 1982 through network radio broadcasts on Public Radio International, produced by Classical WQED-FM 89.3, made possible by the musicians of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. With a long and distinguished history of touring both domestically and overseas since 1900 - including international tours to Europe, the Far East and South America-the Pittsburgh Symphony continues to be critically acclaimed as one of the world's greatest orchestras.

HEINZ HALL FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS is owned and operated by Pittsburgh Symphony, Inc., a non-profit organization, and is the year-round home of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. The cornerstone of Pittsburgh's Cultural District, Heinz Hall hosts many events that do not feature its world-renowned Orchestra including Broadway shows, popular touring artists, comedians, speakers and much more. For a full calendar of upcoming non-symphony events at the hall, visit heinzhall.org.

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