A beautiful quaint theater in Thousand Oaks has a very talented cast in their production of West Side Story. Greg (LA Winds Trumpet) and Sue (LA Winds Flute) can be heard in the small pit orchestra.
8:00 PM – Thursday, Friday, & Saturday: August 2 – 18, 2018
2:00 PM – Sunday: August 5, 12 & 19
Kian presents his 2nd USC DMA Trumpet Recital featuring Jahyeoung “Jackie” Koo on piano in Northridge.
Post recital reception with snacks and refreshments. Possible dinner following at a Korean BBQ nearby.
5:30 PM – Friday, August 10, 2018
Northridge Methodist Church
9650 Reseda Avenue
Northridge, CA 91324
Junior recital at Cal State Northridge, featuring works by Debussy, Mozart, and Godard. Free admission.
2:30 PM – Sunday, April 1, 2018
Cypress Recital Hall
18111 Nordhoff Street, Northridge 91330
Sunday, March 25, 2018 at 2:30 pm
Agoura Hills HS Performing Arts Education Centre
28545 W Driver Ave, Agoura Hills, CA 91303
Dear Friends and Members of the LA Winds Family,
Thank you so much for sharing your Valentine’s weekend with us last month! I’m sure you’ll agree that our February 11th concert was among the finest LA Winds concerts in our group’s history. Not only did our instrumentalists give us exciting and heartfelt renditions of “Romeo and Juliet” and “Samson and Delilah”, but our vocal soloists, Courtney and Christina, turned the afternoon program into an unforgettable event. It goes to show you how much star soloists can make a concert a truly memorable experience. With that in mind, I want to remind you that our March 25 concert, “Stars of the LA Winds” will feature equally memorable soloists drawn from the ranks of your very own LA Winds.
Beginning with a stirring antiphonal rendition of “Fanfare Canzonique” featuring our brass section, our “Stars” program continues with performances by our trumpet and flugelhorn soloist Gabriel Velasco, piccolo soloist Debbie MacMurray, and alto saxophonist Caryn Rasmussen. The first half closes with the world premiere of Andrea Vancura’s fascinating journey to the fringes of sleep and wakefulness—“Hypnogogia” followed by LA Winds staff arranger, Charles Fernandez and his rendition of Shostakovich’s “Galop”. The second half of our program consists of 2 works sure to please our long-time subscribers as well as those of you who are new to the LA Winds family. We’ll perform the blues and rock movement of Frank Bencriscutto’s “Symphonic Jazz Suite” featuring Greg Anderson and Mark Marcus. And our “stars” concert closes with Michael Daugherty ’s powerful and fun-filled tribute to Superman—“Red Cape Tango”—part of his “Metropolis Symphony”. Many of you will recall Daugherty’s exciting and cutting edge “Raise the Roof” which LA Opera’s timpanist Therese Dimond performed with us last season.
Following the concert, join us at Agoura’s own Boar Dough Wine Bar at 5015 Cornell Rd Unit G, Agoura Hills, CA 91301. Come and meet the “Stars” at this no-host reception. Those of you who joined us for our “Oktoberfest” or “Maestro’s Circle” receptions know how much fun it is to celebrate with your LA Winds. I’d love to meet and talk with you at this fun-filled wine tasting reception following the concert. Without your continued support, the LA winds would not have become one of the valley’s true cultural icons—and I’d like to personally thank you for your support.
If you need additional tickets, they are available through our LA Winds ticket manager Melinda Benane at melinda.lawinds@gmail.com. Advance sales tickets are available for $20. Tickets at the door are $25.
See you under the ”stars” at our 2:30 concert on Sunday, March 25th in Agoura!
Sincerely,
Stephen Piazza, Director, Los Angeles Symphonic Winds
This March, join us at Hawkmore Lyric Opera for our debut production, Vincenzo Bellini’s hypnotic masterwork, “I Capuleti e i Montecchi.” A stunningly talented ensemble brings new life to this bel canto classic–a stark adaptation of the Romeo and Juliet saga–in an all-new, stripped down-staging, presented with orchestral accompaniment at an intimate, blackbox-style venue. Don’t miss this enterprise in art: catch any of our six performances, at the Hudson Backstage Theater, in Hollywood. Sung in Italian, with projected English translation.
6 Dates: March 16 – 25
Venue: The Hudson Theatres, 6539 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles 90038
Tickets: www.plays411.com
This spring concert with the award-winning COC Studio Jazz Ensemble and Lab Bands will feature songs celebrating spring and a varied collection of jazz styles, tempos, and arrangers. Renowned jazz saxophonist Ann Patterson will be our special guest artist for this concert. She is also the founder and leader of the Maiden Voyage Big Band.
Tickets are available through http://www.cocjazzband.com or the Santa Clarita Performing Arts Center.
Time / Date: 7:30PM – Friday, March 16, 2018
Location: Santa Clarita Performing Arts Center
26455 Rockwell Canyon Road
Valencia, CA 91355
The Angel City Big Band is performing at the Woodland Hills American Legion on Saturday Feb 10. Our featured singer this month will be Bonnie Bowden (former lead singer with Sergio Mendez and Brazil ’77). Come for the great food, drinks, dancing, or just the music!
Venue: American Legion Hall, 5320 Fallbrook Ave, Woodland Hills, CA 91367
Time & Date: 7:30 – 10:30 PM, Saturday February 10th,
Entry: $15/person or $25/couple
Our February 11, 2018 concert celebrates famous couples from the symphonic and operatic world—couples who have been synonymous with the beauty and tragedy of those most human of emotions—love and desire.
It promises to be among the most exciting, romantic and passionate concerts in the over thirty-year history of your LA Winds! I know that there are many demands on our time, and our social calendars are oftentimes overbooked. Family, friends, leisure and work responsibilities often necessitate choices on how we spend our valuable free time. Let me urge you, however, to clear your calendars so you don’t miss our February 11 concert.
We invite you and your loved ones to begin your Valentine’s week with an entertaining, inspiring and unique symphonic wind concert celebrating Romeo and Juliet, Porgy and Bess, Samson and Delilah and Tristan and Isolde. Christina Roszhart of Center Stage Opera – a remarkable young award-winning dramatic soprano — will be our featured soloist in Tristan and Isolde. Courtney Marsh – a gifted, supremely talented rising star mezzo– will sing selections from Porgy and Bess. Along with the virtuoso instrumentalists of the LA Winds, you’ll share in an unforgettable afternoon of high-powered music making.
The acoustically inviting and beautiful Performing Arts Education Center of Calabasas High School (22855 Mulholland Hwy, Calabasas CA 91302) will once again serve as our venue. As usual, we will begin at 2:30 pm. All who attend will receive a Valentine’s gift package from your LA Winds—a small gesture of thanks to you from your LA Winds. And members of the Maestro’s Circle are also invited to a post-concert dinner and reception at the Marmalade Café in Calabasas.
As many of you may know, each of these works occupies a truly special place among the masterworks of Western culture. Tristan and Isolde marked a giant leap forward in terms of its daring harmonic resources and cataclysmic climaxes. Written in the same year (1859) as Darwin’s Origin of Species and Marx’s Das Kapital, it marked a turning point in the history of Western art, just as the other works were equally transformative in the fields of science and economics. Gershwin’s controversial Porgy and Bess, written in 1936, was likewise a musical game changer in that it successfully combined elements of “classless” jazz and “classical” music into an artform long associated only with upper-class snobbery. And Tchaikovsky’s melodies in Romeo and Juliet (1860), once dismissed by the musical intelligentsia as insubstantial “musical cotton candy”, are now staples in the symphonic diet. Finally, the exoticism of the Saint Saens Bacchanale—certainly not as shocking as it may have been when it premiered in 1877—retains its seductive magnetism as Delilah celebrates here short-lived victory over her newly-shorn rival, her deceived and conflicted lover, Samson.
Although hundreds of you already have tickets to this spectacular event, additional tickets are available through our LA Winds ticket manager Melinda Benane at melinda.lawinds@gmail.com. Advance sales tickets are available at $20. Tickets at the door, $25.
See you on the 11th! Don’t miss it! Amor Vincit Omnia
Sincerely,
Stephen Piazza, Director, Los Angeles Symphonic Winds
Ingredients
Your favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe
24 caramels, unwrapped (from 14-oz bag)
2 tablespoons half-and-half
1/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips, melted
1 teaspoon coarse sea salt
Directions
When cookies come out of the oven make a small indentation in the middle and allow to cool. Once cooled, spoon melted caramel into center of cookie to fill indentation and sprinkle a small amount of coarse sea salt over the caramel. After caramel has cooled and set, drizzle melted semi-sweet chocolate over the top of the cookie. Cookies can be left out for the chocolate to set or if you would like to speed up the process they can be placed in the refrigerator. When chocolate has hardened cookies are ready to be enjoyed!
And an extra warm thank you to Arlene Sobel for organizing and manning the cookie tables! She reported that the concert attendees thoroughly enjoyed all of your creations and donations — thank you!
Susan will be performing with a harpist Peggy Skomai at a free holiday concert offered at the La Cañada Public Library at 2pm on Saturday, December 9th. Library link here.
