Nittany Valley Symphony will offer a fun, indoor event for families with an upcoming concert featuring a musical program suited for young audiences.
The concert, “Carnival of the Animals,” will take place at 3 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 22, at the State College Area High School Performing Arts Center. Tickets are free to the public thanks to support from The Happy Valley Adventure Bureau and Centre Foundation, and can be reserved online at nvs.org/upcoming-events/carnivaloftheanimals.
Designed especially for children and youth, “Carnival of the Animals” is a lively, one-hour presentation celebrating collaboration, education and musical imagination. The performance offers an engaging and accessible introduction to orchestral music for listeners of all ages while showcasing exceptional young talent.
The program features a side-by-side collaboration with the State College Area High School Advanced Strings, violin soloist Evan Zhang and piano soloists Amy Gustafson and Erin Chen. The concert will last roughly an hour, with no intermission.
Zhang, a State College Area High School junior and a violin student of Penn State professor James Lyon. was the winner of the NVS annual Ann Keller Young Soloist Competition held on Nov. 23. The competition, named for NVS founder and concertmaster Ann Keller, provides young soloists an opportunity to compete for a chance to perform live with the Nittany Valley Symphony.
As part of his first-place award, Zhang will appear as a soloist with the orchestra performing the dramatic, restless, and virtuosic first movement from Camille Saint-Saëns Violin Concerto No. 3. Zhang has participated in many orchestral groups including the Philadelphia Youth Orchestra, Temple Music Prep’s Youth Chamber Orchestra, the PMEA All-State Orchestra and the Honors Performance Series, as well as the Nittany Valley Symphony.
To start the concert, nearly 40 high school musicians will join the Nittany Valley Symphony on stage, sitting alongside orchestra members and performing as part of a full symphony orchestra. For this collaboration, students and symphony members will perform two pieces by Aaron Copland: An Outdoor Overture” and Down a Country Lane.
Copland wrote both works to highlight the talents of young musicians in America. An Outdoor Overture was commissioned in 1938 by Alexander Richter for the High School of Music and Art in New York City. Copland was asked to write a piece that would challenge advanced student players while remaining direct, energetic and accessible. Down a Country Lane was originally written as a piano piece and later orchestrated by the composer. Life magazine commissioned this work in 1962 and wrote that it was “among the few modern pieces specially written for young piano students by a major composer.”
Both works reflect Copland’s clear, open sound world and his deep connection to the American landscape. The pieces also serve as a preview of Nittany Valley Symphony’s larger celebration of American music later this season, with a program dedicated to American composers on March 19 at Eisenhower Auditorium as part of the United States’ 250th anniversary year.
The concert concludes with one of the most beloved works in the orchestral repertoire: Camille Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals. Featuring piano soloists Gustafson and Chen, the witty and imaginative piece takes listeners on a musical trip to the zoo, with each movement portraying a different animal. Full of humor, character and memorable tunes, Carnival of the Animals is a favorite for audiences of all ages.
