How to participate:

1. New Media Music Critics must be a current fan or follower of Utah Symphony | Utah Opera. facebook.com/utahmusic or twitter.com/usuo
   
2. Potential New Media Music Critics just need to send an email to cyoung@usuo.org to sign-up. ONLY THE FIRST 50 WHO SIGN-UP WILL RECEIVE ONE FREE TICKET TO THE JULY 18 PERFORMANCE, although all who sign-up can sit in the reserved section and participate in the competition.
3. New Media Music Critics are required to post at least 5 updates during the performances. Use hash #dvmf for tracking purposes.
4. No video or photography is allowed during the performance due to federal copyright laws. Those who post video or photography from the performance will be disqualified from the competition.
5. New Media Music Critics must check-in at the marketing table prior to the performance in order to receive their ticket.

Click here for info on the performance. ABBA the Music: The Symphonic Hits features two of the original members of ABBA.

On Saturday, February 28, Maestro Keith Lockhart, CEO & President Melia Tourangeau, VP of Marketing & Development Deer Valley® Music Festival Carey Cusimano, Director of Special Events Amanda Deuel, VP of Marketing & Public Relations Kevin Bentz, and Deer Valley Resort President and General Manager Bob Wheaton hosted Deer Valley® Music Festival donors and VIPs for a Ski with Keith day.

Bob was a great host and took us up Bald Mountain for a few great turns and views of the Jordanelle Valley early in the morning while lunch was hosted by Mr. & Mrs. Gordon at the Mariposa. We all had a great time and USUO wishes to thank Bob and the Gordon’s for helping to make this such a wonderful day on the slopes. If you are interested in receiving information on our Deer Valley® Music Festival donor events, please contact Amada Deuel at adeuel@usuo.org for details. Until next time…

More photos are available on our Facebook fan page.

Broadway Rocks!

• Mac & Cheese Dialogues: “The best way to enjoy the Utah Symphony is outside with food!”
• O’ Happy Day: “We went to Deer Valley and heard the Utah Symphony play a selection of Broadway songs in the outdoor amphitheater. We brought along a fancy picnic and snuggled into blankets and just felt grateful to be together.”

Highlights of Gilbert & Sullivan

• Joseph and Stephanie’s Family: “It was a lovely evening with beautiful scenery, especially as the moon came up and over the mountains.”

Mormon Tabernacle Choir with the Utah Symphony

• Lunch Lady Chronicles: “It was fabulous!!! The setting is so beautiful, right up on the mountainside under the stars of the Deer Valley Ski Resort. We had a picnic dinner on our blanket and then enjoyed the concert.”
• Inside Heather’s Head: “The Utah Symphony was fantastic as well, playing some of the most beautiful songs. It got a bit chilly but I enjoyed every second of it. The highlight of the night was after the choir had performed Betelehemu and my dad had overheard a lady behind us that complimented on how the choir moved saying, ‘I didn’t know Mormons could move like that!’ I almost peed my pants of laughter!”
• Melglo Adventures: “The choir went up on stage and the orchestra was preparing. This was so worth hearing!!! It was a wonderful eve out under the stars.”

Gladys Knight & the Utah Symphony

• The Bastians: “It was a great night, under the stars!”
• Tommy, Kolbi, & Avonli: “We took some blankets and picnic and spread them out on the grass hill and had a nice dinner and watched the performance. It was just wonderful.”

Utah Symphony at Scera Shell

• Keep up the good work: “The Symphony was amazing. I love classical music and it was wonderful to hear such beautiful, stirring music. If you ever get the chance to hear the Utah Symphony, don’t pass it up. It raises your spirit to a higher level.”

Thanks everyone for the kind comments! This year’s festival was a lot of fun. I’m already looking forward to next year. For now, everyone is recovering from the Festival while at the same time working hard to get ready for our regular season concerts. These start in September and I’m sure there will be lots more blogging about the Utah Symphony and Utah Opera going on when they do.

What could be better for the grand finale week of the Deer Valley® Music Festival?

I feel very fortunate to have had firsthand experience with both of these groups. Soon after returning to Salt Lake City from graduate school, I accepted an invitation to join the Tabernacle Choir. What a thrilling experience it was to be a part of this unique organization – essentially all amateurs, but in fact, as we know, one of the greatest and most beloved choirs in all the world. Its sheer numbers generate the kind of excitement and fervor you’ll feel listening to its stirring signature piece, The Battle Hymn of the Republic, but it can move you equally deep in your heart with tender renderings from Brahms Requiem to the lovely songs Shenandoah, and Waters Ripple and Flow.

As a singing member, in additional to performing weekly “from the crossroads of the West,” I traveled with the choir on tours to Nashville, Louisville, Washington D.C., Mexico City, Munich, Paris, and London. After relinquishing my spot in the choir (having in the meantime joined the Utah Symphony), I nevertheless have very fond additional memories of traveling with the choir on its tour to Eastern Europe in 1991, when in such cultural capitals as Budapest, Warsaw, and Moscow I can attest to the joy that the choir’s singing brought to those listeners who found themselves lucky enough to get tickets.

Of course, the Utah Symphony has taken marvelous tours as well, bringing our music to many areas of the United States over the years, as well as to South America (summer of ‘71), England (’75), and the European Continent in ‘66, ‘77, ‘81, ‘86, and ‘05. I have had the privilege of participating in all of these tours except the earliest two, as I joined the orchestra in the fall of 1971.

In Utah we are indeed blessed to have two such preeminent musical organizations which are so outstanding and revered throughout the world. To experience them together in the same concert just does not happen every day, so please do not miss this concert! I believe it will remain happily in your memory for a long time to come.

Sincerely,

Julianne Johnson
Violin, Utah Symphony

Mormon Tabernacle Choir with the Utah Symphony
Friday, August 15, 2008 at 7:30 PM
Deer Valley Snow Park Amphitheater

Utah Opera highlights soloists in a concert conducted by the inimitable and popular Gerald Steichen–NEWS FLASH! The orchestra really likes him, too!! Enjoy a return engagement by the Georgia Guitar Quartet, this time performing a cappella at the Deer Valley® Music Festival.

Additionally, this week includes one of my all time favorites—Camille Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals. This cleverly-conceived masterpiece is truly a multi-purpose work—equally appropriate to the formal concert stage or to the intimacy of a concert for children. The instruments and sections of the orchestra assume the roles of zoo animals and “speak” music that uncannily resembles the voices of the animals they portray. The work is accompanied by scrumptious poetry written by Ogden Nash. This presentation is enhanced by an off-stage instrument petting zoo. Bring your kids and get your “zoo-ducation!”

I hope to see you this week in Park City!

Sincerely,

Erich Graf
Principal Flute, Utah Symphony

Utah Symphony | Utah Opera has worked closely with UDOT to ensure this project does not conflict with our summer Festival in Park City, and UDOT has been very helpful in adjusting road closure times to ensure our patrons can make it to and from the Festival from Salt Lake City.

At 7 PM on August 16 (the day of the Gladys Knight concert), UDOT will be closing all eastbound lanes on I-80 to replace the Lambs Canyon / Mt. Dell bridges. This closure means our guests traveling from Salt Lake City to Park City will be able to drive to our performance on I-80 but must be past the Mt. Dell bridge by 7 PM. Westbound traffic will not be affected by the road closure so travel back to Salt Lake City will remain unchanged.

Due to road closure on I-80, we will be opening the gates at 4:30 PM in anticipation of early arrivals. UDOT recommends that everyone be through Parley’s Canyon before 6:30 PM. We invite you to come up to Park City early and either have dinner in the city or bring a picnic to the hill and eat before the concert. Visit www.deervalleymusicfestival.org to see discounts you can receive with your concert ticket.

We will also have FM100 on-site starting at 3 PM with live on-air broadcasts and free giveaways. Stop by their Live Remote and enter to win a chance at FREE Deer Valley® lift passes for the 2008- 2009 ski season!

Thanks for your understanding! We hope you’ll plan ahead and come up early to have a great time in Park City.

One of the great things about playing in an orchestra is the opportunity to play great repertoire, like the “New World” Symphony, which is full of beautiful melodies and tone colors. To sit in the middle of an orchestra, feel the sound washing over me, and enjoy how the many parts fit together is quite an experience. I highly recommend it.

Another great piece in the repertoire we’ll be performing this week is the Beethoven Concerto for Violin and Orchestra. It has been one of my favorite pieces for as long as I can remember, and it was one of the first recordings of classical music I owned when I received a cassette tape of Itzhak Perlman for Christmas. I liked it so much I traded my entire coin collection (very valuable to a nine-year-old boy!) with a friend to get his orchestral score so I could read along with the tape. Now, I have more than 20 recordings of this concerto, and I still never get tired of it. Actually, one of my favorite performances of the piece was when Joseph Silverstein played it with the Utah Symphony many years ago; his warm sound and poised phrasing was ideal to me.

Please join us for these and more wonderful pieces at the Deer Valley® Music Festival!

Joe Evans

Violin, Utah Symphony

This weekend’s forecast is all sun, but it’s great to see that people enjoy themselves at the Festival even when the weather isn’t optimal. Hope you can make it to either New World Symphony or Broadway Rocks! this weekend. If you’d rather stay indoors, we’ll also be presenting Double the Beethoven and Time for Three at St. Mary’s Church.

Today I was reading through some blog entries about last weekend’s concert and found an aspiring Utah Symphony Music Director showing off his conducting skills to Bernstein’s Overture to Candide.  Scroll to the bottom and watch the video to see if you think Cannon is the Utah Symphony’s future: Cannon Conducting Cannons.

There were some other great blog reviews out there this weekend also. The Labrun Family loved dancing to the Elvis tunes (for those who missed it, Keith got his wish of seeing 3,000 people dance on the Deer Valley lawn this weekend), Karisa & Cortland enjoyed the outdoor atmosphere of the Festival, and Ben plugged his ears while the cannons went off.

Thanks everyone for all your great blog posts about the Utah Symphony! Keep them coming.