Youth Symphony

A great way to get youngsters to like different foods is to give them a good variety when they're young -- and it's a good way to introduce anything new.That's the impetus behind the Kinderconcert at Our Lady of Sorrows Hall in Owensville next Sunday.Sponsored by South County Cultural Arts, the concert features the 65-piece Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra performing "Annapolis 300: A Musical Journey through our State Capital," featuring excerpts from works of the great masters who composed during the 300 years of Annapolis history.

The Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra performs holiday music 3 p.m. Saturday at the Annapolis Area Christian School, 109 Burns Crossing Road in Severn. Admission is free. Call 443-758-3157 for more information.

Scott Speck, associate conductor of the Honolulu Symphony, has been named musical director of the Chesapeake Youth Symphony for the 1994-1995 season.Mr. Speck, 33, attended Yale and the University of Southern California and has conducted the Oregon, Florida and Santa Cruz symphonies, the Rochester Philharmonic and the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra.A Fulbright scholar, he traveled to Germany, where he founded and conducted Concerto Grosso Berlin, an ensemble dedicated to the performance of music from the Baroque and Classical periods in a historically informed style.

Businesswomen to meet Sept. 13 The Maryland Capital Chapter of American Business Women's Association will hold its monthly meeting at 6 p.m. Sept. 13 at the Sheraton Annapolis Hotel, 173 Jennifer Road. Dinner will be served. The cost is $28 for members, $35 for guests. Registration is required by Thursday. Information: 443-790-1358 or 410-757-7057. Tech council celebrates growth The Anne Arundel Tech Council will hold a 200th member celebration at 5:30 p.m. Sept. 13 at Kyma restaurant, 69 West St., Annapolis, to mark the council's 100 percent membership increase from one year ago. The event is free.

With Dvorak's Eighth Symphony and Tchaikovsky's Fifth on its programs for the 1998-1999 concert season, the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra won't be blazing new repertory trails, as both works have been performed in recent years by the orchestra's talented young musicians.But the orchestra will have a new leader this season: David Ik-Sung Choo, a 35-year-old native of Seoul, Korea, with an impressive resume of guest-conducting appearances throughout Europe, Asia and North America.Choo will serve as music director and conduct the Youth Symphony Orchestra, the senior of three performing ensembles in the organization.

Karen Deal, founding conductor of the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra and former associate conductor of the Annapolis Symphony, has been named the assistant conductor of the Nashville Symphony Orchestra.Deal has agreed to a three-year contract that will place her on the Nashville podium for more than 100 concerts per season and could lead to the associate directorship of the orchestra.Well known to area audiences through her six-year association with the ASO and her work with the youth orchestra the past two seasons, Deal, 35, will leave Maryland to assume her duties in Tennessee Aug. 1."

Mark McCoy, the new conductor of the Chesapeake Youth Symphony pressed into service after Scott Speck's resignation in November, was impressive at his debut at Maryland Hall.McCoy got my attention immediately in the brooding tempo that opens Beethoven's "Leonore" Overture. Rather than give his players an artificial boost through those lengthy phrases and searching harmonies, McCoy stuck to his (and Beethoven's) guns, demanding and getting sustained playing that covered over virtually every potentially empty space.

It's been an auspicious inaugural year for the Chesapeake Youth Symphony and its conductor, Karen Deal. The ensemble is clearly off and running.Their concerts have been well-attended and well-received. The orchestra serves an area ranging from Anne Arundel County to Queen Anne's County to as far south as St. Mary's County. Nearly 50 youngmusicians already fill its roster.Next season will bring a regional piano competition, with winnersperforming concertos at the CYSO's winter concert.The 1992 spring concert will feature a salute to the Chesapeake Bay and will include new works commissioned especially for the orchestra, as well as poetry and prose written about the bay by Maryland school children.

Forces seemed depleted Saturday at the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra, which was pared down practically to chamber size for its Valentine's Day concert.Along with the requisite winds, just 11 fiddles, six violas and a pair of cellos took the stage under Mark Allen McCoy's direction for a program of Brahms, Debussy and Smetana.Whatever the reason for such thin ranks in the strings, there were certainly things to enjoy from the 42 youngsters who make up the 1997-1998 incarnation of the orchestra.

By day, it's a junior high school cafeteria ringing with every cacophonous dissonance known to man, and then some.But for one eveninga week, the sonorities of Haydn and Beethoven resound in the cafeteria of Bates Junior High School as the Chesapeake Youth Symphony rehearses under the direction of its conductor, Karen Deal.The 38-member orchestra, which consists of talented young playersfrom Anne Arundel and surrounding counties, will make its debut at 7:30 Saturday evening at Maryland Hall in a program consisting of Beethoven's emotionally charged "Coriolan Overture," Haydn's rollicking Symphony No. 89 and the Larsson Trombone Concerto.

At age 15, children are smack-dab in the middle of their teen-age years. What better moment for a parent to step back, appraise them and utter those time-honored words, "My, how you've grown." The same goes for orchestras, as we'll see this weekend when Anne Arundel County's very own Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra takes center stage at Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts for a concert commemorating the 15th birthday of the ensemble that's become one of Maryland's foremost musical organizations for the young.

A program of opera favorites being performed on the Maryland Hall stage is hardly news. What is out of the ordinary is that the accompanying ensemble will be the talented young musicians of the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra. For the first time, the CYSO will be an opera orchestra, says Julien Benichou, the French-born, Baltimore-based conductor in his first year as music director of one of Maryland's premiere youth orchestras. "I think it's very nice for kids to accompany singers," Benichou says.

A program of opera favorites being performed on the Maryland Hall stage is hardly news. What is out of the ordinary is that the accompanying ensemble will be the talented young musicians of the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra. For the first time, the CYSO will be an opera orchestra, says Julien Benichou, the French-born, Baltimore-based conductor in his first year as music director of one of Maryland's premiere youth orchestras. "I think it's very nice for kids to accompany singers," Benichou says.

When David Choo decided to end his five-year tenure as conductor of the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra last season, the music world took notice. Fifty-two conductors from 21 states and three foreign countries (Britain, Italy and Austria) submitted applications to the orchestra's search committee for the job of conducting one of Maryland's premier young people's orchestras, said Robert Posten, a professional trombonist and CYSO parent who headed the group. The committee selected Julien Benichou, a French-born maestro who has trained under of Gustav Meier of Baltimore's Peabody Institute, one of the world's most renowned nurturers of young conducting talent.

Towson Dinner Theatre. "Once Upon a Mattress." All roles open, except Winifred. Prepare 16 bars of any song - take sheet music, accompanist is provided - and be ready to dance. 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. today and tomorrow at the theater, 100 E. Chesapeake Ave. Call 410-321-6595. 2nd Star Productions. "Brigadoon." All roles open. 7 p.m. Aug. 16 and Aug. 21 at Bowie Playhouse, Route 3 South in Bowie. Call 301-858-7245 or 410-757-5700. Young musicians. Auditions for musicians, ages 12 through college, interested in joining the Maryland Youth Symphony Orchestra, Maryland Youth Symphonette and Maryland Youth Symphony Flute Choir.

The Chesapeake Youth Symphony began with one orchestra, one gifted conductor and a master plan fashioned by community leaders intent on giving talented young musicians the opportunity to play demanding symphonic repertoire in the most supportive artistic environment possible. Ten years later, the CYSO, with no fewer than four ensembles under its organizational aegis, will celebrate the decade with a season-ending concert at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts in Annapolis.

The music world loves a birthday party as much as anyone else, so it is with special pleasure that the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra pays homage to George Gershwin, America's songwriter supreme, on the 100th anniversary of his birth.All three youth orchestra ensembles will gather at 7: 30 p.m. Saturday in Maryland Hall in Annapolis for a performance that will conclude the organization's eighth year of concerts.Joining the senior orchestra ensemble and conductor Mark Allen McCoy will be guest pianist Daniel Lau, who will play "Rhapsody In Blue."

Towson Dinner Theatre. "Once Upon a Mattress." All roles open, except Winifred. Prepare 16 bars of any song - take sheet music, accompanist is provided - and be ready to dance. 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. today and tomorrow at the theater, 100 E. Chesapeake Ave. Call 410-321-6595. 2nd Star Productions. "Brigadoon." All roles open. 7 p.m. Aug. 16 and Aug. 21 at Bowie Playhouse, Route 3 South in Bowie. Call 301-858-7245 or 410-757-5700. Young musicians. Auditions for musicians, ages 12 through college, interested in joining the Maryland Youth Symphony Orchestra, Maryland Youth Symphonette and Maryland Youth Symphony Flute Choir.

Violinist Dawn Kittrell played Antonin Dvorak's Symphony "From the New World" with the Chesapeake Youth Symphony for the first time back in 1994 from the middle of the second violin section, in awe of the majestic power of the great Czech composer's music."

With Dvorak's Eighth Symphony and Tchaikovsky's Fifth on its programs for the 1998-1999 concert season, the Chesapeake Youth Symphony Orchestra won't be blazing new repertory trails, as both works have been performed in recent years by the orchestra's talented young musicians.But the orchestra will have a new leader this season: David Ik-Sung Choo, a 35-year-old native of Seoul, Korea, with an impressive resume of guest-conducting appearances throughout Europe, Asia and North America.Choo will serve as music director and conduct the Youth Symphony Orchestra, the senior of three performing ensembles in the organization.