Pacific Symphony

Musicians from the Pacific Symphony and friends will be serenading donors at the second annual Musical Blood & Marrow Drive in Corona del Mar from noon to 6 p.m. April 29. The event at the Newport Center United Methodist Church, 1601 Marguerite Ave., benefits both the Red Cross and Be the Match, a national bone narrow and umbilical cord blood registry helping patients affected with diseases like leukemia and lymphoma. Blood donors for the Red Cross need to sign up in advance with a link available at PacificSymphonyMusicians.com . Walk-ins will be accepted for Be the Match after a series of health questions, cheek swab and signing a consent form.

COSTA MESA — Renowned American composer Philip Glass is the subject of the Pacific Symphony's annual American Composers Festival (ACF), which begins Thursday night in the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall in Costa Mesa. The festival ends Monday at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts' Samueli Theater, with Glass playing his own works on piano. ACF, a symphony event since 2000, focuses on how Glass was influenced by India's music and philosophy. It is part of the first-ever Southern California Philip Glass Festival, which began Feb. 27 and runs through March 27 and is in partnership with the Long Beach Opera and the Costa Mesa-based Pacific Symphony.

Editor's note: This corrects the previous photo caption and adds all the photos that appeared with this column in print. "Wine is one of the most civilized things in the world and one of the most natural things of the world that has been brought to the greatest perfection, and it offers a greater range for enjoyment and appreciation than, possibly, any other purely sensory thing. " — Ernest Hemingway in "Death in the Afternoon" Celebrating the wisdom and the hedonistic pleasure expressed by the late American author Ernest Hemingway, the Pacific Symphony will once again present the Pacific Coast Wine Festival at The Island Hotel in Newport Beach on March 5. In past years the festival has raised significant dollars in support of symphony's music and education programs.

The Pacific Symphony fundraised $125,000 during its Oct. 30 fall gala, which celebrated the opening of the pops season. The funds will go toward the Costa Mesa-based orchestra's artistic and education programs. More than 200 guests attended the gala dinner and soirée at the Westin South Coast Plaza hotel. The themed party included a procession, cocktails, music, stilt walkers and jugglers. The evening also celebrated the 20-year tenure of principal pops conductor Richard Kaufman.

COSTA MESA — The Pacific Symphony welcomed two new members to its ranks and netted about $200,000 in an event last week. The Costa Mesa-based orchestra, now in its 33rd season, will use the funds toward its artistic and educational programs, symphony officials said in a news release. The "Masters of the Music" event on Sept. 22, which included a pre-concert dinner and post-concert reception, was part of the 2011-12 season opener series that featured violinist Sarah Chang.

Call him Davis. Carl Davis. The American conductor-composer this week will be leading the Pacific Symphony in its last pops concert series of the season, "The Music of Bond. James Bond. " Dubbed "a license to thrill," the 8 p.m. concerts Thursday through Saturday by the Costa Mesa-based orchestra are in the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall. Images from the famed "Bond" film series will be projected during the concert, the hall decorated "Casino Royale"-style, vintage Aston Martins parked outside and martinis served shaken - not stirred.

The Pacific Symphony will be among the performers lined up for the 2012-13 season at Soka University's Performing Arts Center, according to a news release issued Monday. The Costa Mesa-based orchestra will play at the Aliso Viejo venue in a new afternoon series dubbed "Sundays at Soka," featuring the music of Mozart. "These informal, yet up close and personal, musical soirees will reflect the mastery of Mozart's talents," Pacific Symphony conductor Carl St.Clair said in a release.

If you made a New Year’s resolution to listen to more classical music, you’ll have a perfect opportunity tonight, when the Pacific Symphony debuts an Eastern European-themed program at Segerstrom Hall. Guests artists include conductor Carlos Kalmar and pianist Freddy Kempf. Born to two Austrians in Uruguay, Kalmar has performed around the world. He is the music director of the Oregon Symphony Orchestra and the principal conductor of the Grant Park Music Festival in Chicago.

Anybody who doesn't know who Aaron Copland is should have been at Harbor View Elementary School on Friday. Students from kindergarten to sixth grade at the Newport Beach campus paid tribute to the influential American composer through a performance that included song, dance, the spoken word and an instrumental selection, including kazoos. "Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-a, Aaron Copland is our man today," the first-grade students sang. Harbor View hosted its BRAVO! assembly to show its appreciation of Copland's music after spending the year learning about his work with Rob Slack, principal percussionist with the Pacific Symphony, through the Class Act program.

Sitting criss-cross on the floor, four kindergartners each placed a hand on the double bass towering over them to feel the vibrations as it was played. "Wow! How does that feel?" asked Pacific Symphony bassist Doug Basye. "Does it tickle?" Basye gave a lesson Thursday morning to a class of kindergartners at Victoria Elementary School on how the double bass works, the different sections of the orchestra and the works of American composer Aaron Copland. It was all part of Class Act, a partnership between the Costa Mesa-based Pacific Symphony and schools, to connect students with musicians and introduce them to a composer.

The Pacific Symphony will be among the performers lined up for the 2012-13 season at Soka University's Performing Arts Center, according to a news release issued Monday. The Costa Mesa-based orchestra will play at the Aliso Viejo venue in a new afternoon series dubbed "Sundays at Soka," featuring the music of Mozart. "These informal, yet up close and personal, musical soirees will reflect the mastery of Mozart's talents," Pacific Symphony conductor Carl St.Clair said in a release.

Editor's note: This column is the fourth and final in a series about Bradley Zint's participation in OC Can You Play With Us?, an initiative where he and other amateur musicians played alongside the Pacific Symphony professionals. * One of those little things you don't consider when first choosing an instrument is what it's like to lug it around. For the flutists and clarinetists, their small instruments can act as stowaways in standard-sized backpacks. Even the heavies - tubas, cellos, basses, harps and the like - well, those cases are blessed with wheels.

Anybody who doesn't know who Aaron Copland is should have been at Harbor View Elementary School on Friday. Students from kindergarten to sixth grade at the Newport Beach campus paid tribute to the influential American composer through a performance that included song, dance, the spoken word and an instrumental selection, including kazoos. "Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-a, Aaron Copland is our man today," the first-grade students sang. Harbor View hosted its BRAVO! assembly to show its appreciation of Copland's music after spending the year learning about his work with Rob Slack, principal percussionist with the Pacific Symphony, through the Class Act program.

Any nerves of being poked with a needle were likely calmed by some Beethoven during a blood drive Wednesday afternoon in Corona del Mar. With Pacific Symphony musicians in one corner and medical equipment in the other, some 60 people came, heard and donated during the third annual Musical Blood and Marrow Drive at Newport Center United Methodist Church. The music of Dvorak and Schubert was also among the selections that helped serenade the donors, who gave 49 pints of viable blood to the American Red Cross, said Pacific Symphony violinist Nancy Eldridge in an email.

Editor's note: This column is the third in a series about Bradley Zint's participation in OC Can You Play With Us?, an initiative where he and other Orange County amateur musicians will play alongside the Pacific Symphony professionals. The columns will run through May. * LAGUNA WOODS - For weeks I've been playing my French horn by myself. It has been hours in the practice chair, playing to the monotonous tunes of scales, arpeggios, lip slurs and other simple exercises.

By staging "La Bohème" at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts, the Pacific Symphony will launch its new "Symphonic Voices" opera-vocal initiative to bring opera back to Orange County. "La Bohème's" enduring tale of carefree Bohemians and star-struck lovers in 19th-century Paris was set to open at 8 p.m. Thursday at the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall in Costa Mesa, with repeat performers scheduled for the same time and place on Saturday and Tuesday nights. Conductor Carl St.Clair and Stage Director A. Scott Parry will lead a cast of first-rate soloists, the Pacific Chorale and the Southern California Children's Chorus in a rendition of Puccini's most beloved opera.

A grand early spring festival of the grape, co-chaired by DeDe and Alex McKinnon , attracted some 300 wine lovers and raised an impressive $160,000 for the Pacific Symphony. Organizers billed the event, which unfolded at the Island Hotel in Newport Beach, as the Pacific Coast Wine Festival. It showcased vintages from 30 wineries worldwide. Participants in the festival were selected by advanced sommelier Jim Houston from the renowned Charlie Palmer's dining rooms. The Saturday evening party began at sunset with a cocktail reception.

In the coming days, there is something for everyone in Costa Mesa's classical scene: a youth ensemble, an organist, a visiting orchestra and a classic film score. At 2 p.m. Sunday, the Pacific Symphony Youth Wind Ensemble, an educational group under the auspices of the Costa Mesa-based Pacific Symphony, will be having a concert titled "Music for Prague. " The afternoon event inside the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall features "Music for Prague 1968," by Czech-American composer Karel Husa.

Sitting criss-cross on the floor, four kindergartners each placed a hand on the double bass towering over them to feel the vibrations as it was played. "Wow! How does that feel?" asked Pacific Symphony bassist Doug Basye. "Does it tickle?" Basye gave a lesson Thursday morning to a class of kindergartners at Victoria Elementary School on how the double bass works, the different sections of the orchestra and the works of American composer Aaron Copland. It was all part of Class Act, a partnership between the Costa Mesa-based Pacific Symphony and schools, to connect students with musicians and introduce them to a composer.

The Pacific Symphony continues with its "Year of the Violin" programming next week with a series highlighted by virtuoso Vadim Gluzman. The Israeli violinist will be playing Tchaikovsky's venerable Violin Concerto in D major for the concerts on Feb. 23 to 25 in Costa Mesa's Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall. All the performances under Carl St.Clair's baton begin at 8 p.m. There will also be a 7 p.m. pre-concert lecture with Alan Chapman each evening. An added layer of complexity to this concert is that Gluzman will be playing on a Stradivarius violin made in 1690 that belonged to Leopold Auer, the influential Hungarian violinist whom Tchaikovsky dedicated his Violin Concerto to. A video interview with St.Clair posted on the Pacific Symphony website notes this.