郭 Features
Finding what’s resonating: The Reno Chamber Orchestra works to build community via ‘The Stories We Tell’
Orchestral music isn’t the most popular form of music in 2023. As a result, music organizations worldwide are doing what they can to help the genre grow and reach new ears.
For the Reno Chamber Orchestra, collaboration is extremely important—and the orchestra is working with a variety of individuals and organizations for an upcoming concert event, The Stories We Tell. Narration, music, storytelling and more will unite when the Reno Chamber Orchestra takes a journey through three works, on Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 18 and 19.
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This spring, Ballet Fantastique brings our original (Misadventures of) Casanova to the Hult Center stage. The project features decadent live music played by the Oregon Mozart Players with internationally renowned Baroque musicians from across the globe. Music Director Maestro Kelly Kuo conducts the Casanova soundtrack, including some of the most gorgeous music in history by Antonio Vivaldi, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Jean Baptiste de Lully, and Johann Sebastian Bach. Oregon Mozart Players was founded in over 40 years ago presenting works written for small orchestras and intimate venues, making them the perfect fit for Ballet Fantatsique’s signature chamber ballet dance theater storytelling.
We caught up with Maestro Kuo, to hear his inside perspective on performing alongside BFan’s artists, our guest celebrity stars, and to discover more about the musical fabric for bringing Casanova to life.
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Kelly’s hometown newspaper, The East Oregonian, asked to know what he’s been up to since graduating from Hermiston High School.
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On March 20, 2022, Music Director Finalist Kelly Kuo led the Olympia Symphony Orchestra in an emotional performance of the Ukrainian National Anthem.
“Olympia is full of caring musicians who, more than anything, want to help live acoustic music be an essential part of the area’s culture and education,” he said. That’s a goal he shares. “I would love the symphony to be a must-see event, where people are clamoring for tickets,” he said. “I want it to be the center of musical arts in the community.”
A feature article about Kelly appears in the October 2021 edition of OPERA NEWS:
Excerpt:
“Kuo is conscious of his status as one of the few Asian-American conductors in opera. "I find that the ability to represent has become more and more important to me, especially for those who are aspiring into the field. I'm really glad to see that there are indications that the field is becoming more diverse. I think everyone wins when there’s more diversity onstage and in the pit. The more we reflect the society we live in, the more we can expect an audience that does represent our world.”
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The Reno Chamber Orchestra on July 9 announced the selection of a new music director: Maestro Kelly Kuo.
He will be only the third individual to hold this esteemed position since the Reno Chamber Orchestra’s founding in 1974, according to a press release.
For only the third time in its 47-year history, the Reno Chamber Orchestra has selected a new music director. He is maestro Kelly Kuo, and he follows Vahe Khochayan (1974-2003) and Theodore Kuchar (2003-2018).
Wolf Trap Opera in Virginia has revived her “Cendrillon” just this weekend. Viardot wrote both the music and words for this chamber operetta about Cinderella, a fanciful interpretation of the fairy tale by Charles Perrault.
“Her music is both challenging and wonderfully singable,” Kelly Kuo, the production’s conductor, said in an interview. “You just know that it was written by someone who really understood what she was doing.”
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Today, American Lyric Theater announced an important development in the company's artistic leadership: Kelly Kuo's appointment to the newly created position of Associate Artistic Director. In this role, Kelly will share artistic and curatorial responsibilities with ALT's founder, Lawrence Edelson. He joins ALT's leadership team as they launch a slate of programs under the umbrella of the Opera Writers Diversity and Representation Initiative (OWDARI).
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I was in Reno rehearsing for a concert when state regulations related to covid-19 forced the cancellation of the performances and sent me back home. I remember in the airport feeling extremely fortunate that the conducting engagement immediately preceding that one had been able to complete its run of performances the previous week, just a few days before that state restricted large gatherings.
Oregon native conductor Kelly Kuo grew up on the other side of the Cascades in Hermiston, three hours due east from Portland along the Columbia River. There, in the small desert town of 10,000, the 13-year-old young man’s Taiwanese parents encouraged him to travel with the United States Collegiate Wind Band to play clarinet in Europe.
Conductor and pianist Kelly Kuo hails from Oregon and currently serves as Artistic Director of the Oregon Mozart Players, and now, he comes farther north to conduct Charlie Parker’s Yardbird for Seattle Opera.
This new opera, with music by Daniel Schnyder and libretto by Bridgette A. Wimberly, revisits composer Charlie Parker’s dream of bringing classical and jazz together – and Kuo finds this combination exciting. “Even more than working on a piece focused on real people,” Kuo said, “I love working on a piece written by a living composer!”