Symphony earns nod from NYT
The New York Times gave the Spokane Symphony some excellent press last Sunday on the front page of its Arts & Leisure section.
The story was about the attempt by symphonies across the country to attract younger audiences. It was accompanied by an image of the Spokane Symphony’s successful “Symphony On the Edge” concert series at the Big Easy.
The piece also mentioned an upcoming Spokane Symphony promotion: “Under-30’s attending a Spokane Symphony Beethoven concert will receive free ‘Beethoven Bash’ T-shirts.”
Will these kinds of promotions help classical music audiences grow? According to the story, that’s still an open question.
That “Beethoven Bash” concert, by the way, will take place Oct. 14 at 8 p.m. at the Opera House, and will feature his Third and Fifth symphonies.
The Symphony on the Edge series will have two performances this season, Oct. 8 and May 19, 7:30 p.m., both at the Big Easy.
Tickets for these shows and all other Spokane Symphony performances are available by calling 624-1200.
An Eckart blog
By the way, the Spokane Symphony has jumped into the world of blogging by starting a new blog featuring postings from music director Eckart Preu and associate conductor Morihiko Nakahara, as well as other symphony musicians from time to time.
Check it out this week to see a photo of Preu riding an elephant. He’s on vacation in Thailand. Go to www.spokanesymphony.org and click on “blog.”
Symphony in the Park
Oh, yeah, don’t forget that you can see the Spokane Symphony for free on Sept. 3 at the Pavillion Park in Liberty Lake and on Sept. 5 (Labor Day) at Comstock Park in Spokane. Both concerts begin at 6 p.m.
Preu and Nakahara will conduct selections from the upcoming season, including some Beethoven, some Tchaikovsky and some “Carmen,” as well as marches and movie music.
‘York’ continues its journey
“York” is returning to the Spokane Civic Theatre for one night only, Sept. 10 at 8 p.m., after a successful tour of the Northwest.
This exhilarating one-man show is about York, the manservant of William Clark on the Lewis & Clark Expedition. The play features David Casteal as York and was written by the Civic’s playwright-in-residence, Bryan Harnetiaux.
It premiered in the Civic’s Firth Chew Studio Theatre in May and then went on the road in Montana and Oregon. For this return showing, it has been moved upstairs to the Main Stage.
Tickets are $15, available by calling 325-2507.
A hankerin’ for ‘Hank’
The Hank Williams tribute “Hank & My Honky Tonk Heroes” has been booked into The Met for a show on Nov. 2 at 7:30 p.m.
Jason Petty, who starred off-Broadway in the Williams revue “Lost Highway,” has put together a new show in which he pays tribute to Hank and other classic honky-tonkers, including Jimmie Rodgers, Roy Acuff, Ernest Tubb, Webb Pierce and George Jones.
Tickets are $22, through TicketsWest outlets (325-SEAT, 800-325-SEAT, www.ticketswest.com).
Spokane TV moves up-market
Spokane now is the nation’s No. 78 TV market, up from No. 80 last year, according to new rankings released by Nielsen Media Research.
The new numbers show Spokane with 389,630 TV households, which means it leapfrogged past Rochester, N.Y. (No. 79) and Paducah-Cape Girardeau-Harrisburg (Kentucky, Missouri and Illinois, respectively, No. 80).
Spokane’s radio market ranking, on the other hand, is No. 92. That doesn’t mean there are necessarily fewer people listening to the radio. It’s a function of market boundaries and how they are drawn.