The new 2024 summer season of the Sicilian Symphony Orchestra kicks off, taking place from 21 June to 4 October with a series of concerts ranging from classical to pop music, including cinematographic homages and unreleased productions.
The summer programming aims to bring classical music to the smaller towns of Sicily, carrying out an important educational function and enhancing the territory.
The concert that inaugurates the season is staged Friday 21 Juneat 9.00 pm, in Piazza Ruggero Settimo, coincides with the Summer Solstice and the European Night of Music and is directed by the maestro Riccardo Scilipoti.
The concert featuring the Children’s Choir together with the Sicilian Symphony Orchestra is divided into two parts.
One focused on the first performance in Palermo of the version for three string orchestra Beatles-Concerti Grossi by Peter Breiner (nos. 1-2, 3).
The other is dedicated to the first ever performance of a Peace Pop Songbookin which the Children’s Choir of the Sicilian Symphony Orchestra Foundation performs, accompanied by the Orchestra, five songs from the pop repertoire, namely What A Wonderful World by George Douglas and Davis Weiss (made famous by Louis Armstrong), Over The Rainbow by Harold Arlen e
EY Harburg (from the soundtrack of the film The Wizard of Oz), Halleluja by Leonard Cohen, Heal The World by Michael Jackson and, of course, Imagine by John Lennon.
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The symphonic interludes between the various songs were composed by Alberto Maniaci, who also created the arrangements of the various songs.
Winner of prizes in important international piano competitions, maestro Riccardp Scilipoti has held solo recitals at the Italian Cultural Institutes of Prague, Cologne and Copenhagen and, in collaboration with the Soni Ventorum Ensemble, chamber music concerts at the Italian Institutes of Culture in Wolfsburg and Cologne and at the headquarters of the “Dante Alighieri” Society in Lübeck and Kiel (Germany).
He conducted the Sicilian Symphony Orchestra as part of the 53rd week of sacred music in Monreale. He is an orchestra pianist and master of the children’s choir of the Sicilian Symphony Orchestra Foundation.
THE PROGRAM
Peter Breiner
Humenné 1957
Beatles-Concerto Grosso n. 1 “In the style of Handel”
Duration: 13′
Beatles-Concerto Grosso n. 2 “In the style of Vivaldi”
Duration: 14′
Beatles-Concerto Grosso n. 4
Duration: 10′
Various authors
A Peace Pop Songbook for children’s choir, reciting voices and orchestra – Original music and arrangements by Alberto Maniaci – World premiere performance
Piece of peace n.1 (Alberto Maniaci)
What a wonderful world in homage to Antonio Vivaldi (George Douglas and David Weiss)
Piece of peace n.2 (Alberto Maniaci)
Over the rainbow (Harold Arlen and Edgard Yipset Harburg)
Piece of peace n.3 (Alberto Maniaci)
Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen)
Peace of peace n.4 (Alberto Maniaci)
Heal the world (Michael Jackson)
Peace of peace n.5 (Alberto Maniaci)
Imagine (John Lennon)
