Fall Young Artist Orchestra Events

The Young Artist Orchestra started off its 2009-2010 season with a bang, performing two concert events in October.

(Images courtesy of Young Artist Orchestra Public Relations Director Bill Kendig.)

The Young Artist Orchestra, the most advanced ensemble of the five Greenville County Youth Orchestras, is comprised of the most skilled, talented, and experienced student musicians in the Upstate. It is also the Orchestra-In-Residence at the Fine Arts Center. Though most members are high school aged, the YAO will also admit exceptional middle school musicians. Each year the orchestra performs three Young Artist Concerts at the Peace Center’s Dorothy Gunter Theatre.

The YAO staged its first event on October 15th at the Handlebar Café in Greenville. Better known for headlining rock and blues bands, the Handlebar was the perfect setting for GCYO Association President John Abdalla's brainchild, "Bach to Rock.," an orchestra fundraiser that featured chamber ensemble performances by members of the orchestra and a small orchestra version of Ney Rosauro's Concerto No. 1 for Marimba and Orchestra, with percussionist Wesley Strasser (Fine Arts Center, Wade Hampton High School, 11) heading the ensemble as soloist and conductor Dr. Gary Auguste Robinson directing from the drum set. Following the YAO's set, Abdalla's rocking cover band, The Substitutes, (does this ring any bells, Who fans?) performed two sets of war horses from largely the 1960s.

The YAO then performed its first formal concert of the season on Thursday, October 29, at the Peace Center's Dorothy Gunter Theater. Entitled "Youthful Aspirations," the concert showcased Richard Wagner's Arrival of the Guests from Wartburg from his opera Tannhauser, the Rosauro concerto, and Russian composer Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov's Symphony No. 3, Opus 32 in C major. Strasser was again the featured soloist on the Rosauro concerto with Robinson leading the orchestra from the podium.

The success of the concert was underscored in letters like the following, send to Dr. Robinson by an orchestra parent following the event: "I had mentioned to my sister who was visiting from Michigan that whenever one of these concerts is over, I wonder if these kids are really high school students.  She didn’t fully understand what I was talking about until the downbeat of the concert.  Before the end of the Wagner, she had tears in her eyes.  She was totally amazed at the artistic expression and technical ability of the students.  She had decided that she was going to order two cd’s of the performance (one for herself and one to share).  Once Wesley started playing she leaned over and said, “No, I’ve got to be able to see this again – I’m getting the DVD.”