LA Opera: Il Trittico

Mr. Sweeney will be performing with the LA Opera in their production of Il Trittico. Performances September 6th through September 26th.  Click here for tickets or call (213) 972-8001.

From laopera.com:

Award-winning film directors William Friedkin and Woody Allen join forces to create a new cinematic production of Puccini's trio of one-act operas.

Bringing fresh insight to Puccini's trilogy of one-act operas will be two Academy Award-winning filmmakers. William Friedkin will direct Il Tabarro and Suor Angelica and Woody Allen will make his opera debut directing Gianni Schicchi. Tony Award-winning production designer Santo Loquasto (who has worked on more than 20 Woody Allen films) will design all three operas. On the podium will be Music Director James Conlon.

Il Tabarro ("The Cloak"), the story of a passionate love triangle that leads to a tragic end, features Mark Delavan, Salvatore Licitra and Anja Kampe. Suor Angelica ("Sister Angelica") tells the heart-rending tale of a cloistered nun with a worldly secret, and it features some of Puccini's most meltingly beautiful melodies, including the poignant "Senza Mamma." Sondra Radvanovsky returns to sing the title role, and mezzo Larissa Diadkova makes her Company debut. Gianni Schicchi, a romantic comedy that takes a page from Dante, features Thomas Allen in his debut in the title role along with soprano Laura Tatulescu and tenor Saimir Pirgu, who make their company debuts.(...read more)

Nothing but Beethoven

Mr. Sweeney will be performing with the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl on Tuesday, August 5th.  Click here to order tickets.

from: laphil.com

Classical pianist/conductor Christian Zacharias comes to the Hollywood Bowl to lead the Los Angeles Philharmonic in an all-Beethoven concert that includes the Coriolan Overture, Piano Concerto No. 1, in which he plays, and Symphony No. 6, “Pastoral,” Tuesday, August 5, at 8 p.m. Zacharias returns Thursday, August 7, at 8 p.m., to lead the LA Phil in a program featuring LA Phil Principal Cellist Peter Stumpf as the soloist in Boccherini’s Concerto in D major, G. 479. Also on the Thursday program are two works by Ravel – Valses nobles et sentimentales and Pavane pour une infante défunte – and Bizet’s Symphony in C major. (....more)

PYSO Vienna Tour

Mr. Sweeney will be joing the Pasadena Youth Symphony Orchestra on their European tour from July 7th - 18th.  Congratulations to my students Aileen Ro & Ashley Bae who are members of this fine orchestra and will be participating in the tour.

From the Pasadena Star News:

For the first time in nearly 20 years, the Pasadena Youth Symphony Orchestra will travel to Vienna, Austria, to perform at the International Youth Music Festival and Competition.

The young musicians will leave for classical music's legendary capital on Monday.

After months of preparing for what may be the highlight of their budding musical careers, the 80 middle school students, led by Director Jack Taylor, will attend the festival from July 12 to15. (read more...)

From www.pasadenapyso.org:

The young musicians of The Pasadena Youth Symphony Orchestra – lead by Music Director Jack Taylor, Ria Kubota and Anna Lim, co-conductors of the PYSO Chamber Orchestra, and Dr. Victor Aguilar, conductor of the PYSO Wind Ensemble – are rehearsed and ready for the prestigious, invitation-only International Youth Music Festival and Competition in Vienna. (read more...)

National Cello Institute: Opening Concert

Mr. Sweeney will be performing at the opening concert of the National Cello Institute with acclaimed pianist, Ines Irawati. They will be performing a full recital program together including the works of Beehtoven, Piatigorsky, and Prokofiev.

Date: Sunday June 22nd, 2008

Location: Pomona College -- 550 North College Ave, Claremont, CA 91711 (google maps)

About Ms. Irawati:

Known for her expressivity and virtuosity, Ines Irawati is in demand both as a solo recitalist and a collaborative pianist. Born in Jakarta, Indonesia, she began piano and composition instruction at age six at the Yamaha Music School in Indonesia. At age 12, she made her official debut playing the third Beethoven Piano Concerto and Chopin's first concerto with the Indonesian Youth Symphony. Her early musical studies began with Muneaki Watanabe, Yazeed Djamin and Iravati Soediarso.

As a performer and a composer, Irawati has performed her own compositions all over Indonesia, Singapore and Sri Lanka. At the age of 15, she was invited to the International UNICEF Benefit in Japan, where she performed her first concerto with the Tokyo Symphony. Her work for solo flute, “Flirting Belugas”, was published by the Manduca Music Publication. Her composition teachers include the renowned Indonesian composer, Slamet Abdul Sjukur, and Donald Erb.

At age 14, Irawati was recommended by Jahja Ling, the recently appointed director of the San Diego Symphony, to join the prestigious Young Artists Program at Cleveland Institute of Music. She was accepted under full scholarship, and continued her studies at the Institute where she then received her Bachelors of Music. Her teachers and coaches include Olga Radosavljevich, Vivian Weilerstein, Anne Epperson, and Donald Weilerstein.

Irawati holds a Masters of Music degree from Yale University, where she studied with Claude Frank, and was coached by Peter Frankl, and Kikuei Ikeda, the second violinist of the Tokyo String Quartet. As both a solo and collaborative pianist, she has participated in master classes with such noted musicians as Emmanuel Ax, Murray Perahia, Martin Katz, Barbara Bonney, and Dawn Upshaw (more....)

Mr. Sweeney will be performing with the Los Angeles Opera in their production of Puccini's Tosca. Shows Saturday, May 17th through Saturday, June 21, 2008.

from laopera.com:

"Political power and its abuse intensify the tragic love triangle between the fiery diva Floria Tosca, the handsome painter Mario Cavaradossi, and the sadistic police chief Baron Scarpia. Obsessed with the tempestuous singer, the villainous Baron plays a cruel cat-and-mouse game with her and her lover. Tosca strikes a bargain with the diabolical Scarpia only to experience horrifying consequences.

The Hollywood film composer Erich Korngold once referred to Tosca as the "greatest film score of all time" because the music reflects every hair-raising detail of this gripping melodrama in a way that keeps the excitement at fever pitch. Plácido Domingo and Sir Richard Armstrong share the podium."

Congratulations to Ashley Bae and Aileen Ro on their success as winners of the recent PYSO Solo Concert Auditions. Aileen and Ashley will be performing the Double Cello Concerto in g minor, RV 531 by Antonio Vivaldi. The concert will be held on Saturday, April 19th at the Shumei Spiritual Fellowship Center at 2430 East Colorado Blvd, Pasadena, California 91107.

Mr. Sweeney will be performing with the Los Angeles Opera for their 40th anniversary gala with Placido Domintgo on Friday, April 18th

from laopera.com:

Forty years ago, a young tenor on tour in Los Angeles took the stage of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. At that time, few in attendance had any idea what the name Plácido Domingo would come to mean to Los Angeles and to opera fans around the world.

Plácido Domingo would go on to change the face of opera as we know it, performing on the Dorothy Chandler Stage more than 120 times and raising LA Opera to its world-class status.

LA Opera Music Director James Conlon will conduct the LA Opera Orchestra in this Gala performance in which Plácido Domingo will touch on the vast breadth of repertory he has conquered in his unparalleled career. The program will feature some of the roles with which he is most closely associated, along with some newly minted gems and genuine surprises.

This historic Gala performance marks the first time that Plácido Domingo and James Conlon will perform together in Los Angeles. Joining Maestro Domingo on the program will be the internationally celebrated soprano Patricia Racette.

LA Opera: Recovered Voices

Mr. Sweeney will be performing with the Los Angeles Opera in their Recovered Voices series. Shows Sunday, February 17th through Saturday, March 8, 2008.

from laopera.com:
Los Angeles Opera continues its exploration of music by composers suppressed by the Nazis. This season, Music Director James Conlon's multi-year project Recovered Voices presents two exceptional one-act operas.

Alexander Zemlinsky based The Dwarf (Der Zwerg) on Oscar Wilde's one-act tragedy "The Birthday of the Infanta." Viktor Ullmann's The Broken Jug (Der zerbrochene Krug) is taken from a comedy by the Romantic German poet Heinrich von Kleist. Vivid imagery, supercharged emotions, and rich late-Romantic orchestral textures characterize these operas. You'll hear beguiling echoes of Mahler, Strauss and Wagner, but the overall effect is one of exciting musical discovery.

LA Opera: Otello

Mr. Sweeney will be performing with the Los Angeles Opera in their production of Giuseppe Verdi's Otello. Shows Saturday, February 16th through Sunday, March 9, 2008.

on laopera.com:
"From the opening tempest scene to the spine tingling finish, Verdi's transformation of the original Shakespeare play crackles with theatrical electricity and incandescent intensity. When the evil Iago cleverly exploits Otello's obsessive jealousy, the Moor's innocent wife Desdemona is blindsided in the explosive dramatic friction. This musical portrait of Otello's descent into a tortured heart of darkness is explicit in every chilling detail - you'll feel the Moor's temples throb with Vesuvian rage and hear the blood boiling in his veins as he destroys all in life that he holds dear. "

Lynn Harrell Lecture/Demonstration

Cellist, Lynn Harrell, will present a multi-media lecture/demonstration on cello technique and the relationship of vocal music to cello playing. The lecture is open to the public and admission is free.

Date:
February 3rd, 2008 at 3:00pm

Location:
Professional Musicians Local 47, Union Hall
817 Vine St, Los Angeles, CA 90038 (google maps)