Stokowski Celebration Concerts

Stokowski wanted to control and perfect every aspect of how his orchestra sounded, live and over the airwaves. Stokowski had an experimental device created that allowed him to both conduct the orchestra and control the volume levels of the broadcast at the same time. This cartoon, which ran in the Philadelphia Public Ledger on December 28, 1930, depicts Stokowski’s multi-tasking talents as conductor and engineer.

A sketch of Leopold Stokowski from the early 1930s.

On January 27, 1933, Leopold Stokowski and The Philadelphia Orchestra teamed up with Bell Telephone Labs in New Jersey to experiment with new technology that allowed for a broadcast of a concert from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C. The Orchestra performed live in the Academy of Music while an audience in Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., listened to the Orchestra remotely, the audio-only broadcast accompanied by a colored light show. But where was Stokowski?

Whether you’re an opera buff, familiar with the movie Apocalypse Now, or can simply whistle the main theme to "The Ride of The Valkyries," I’m pretty certain you’ll want to know how we are going to get our Valkyries off the ground later this month!

In this video I’d like to tell how I envisage making the Wagnerian heroine Brünnhilde and her eight sisters—that’s right, eight—known as “the Valkyries” appear inside the auditorium of the Academy of Music. Join me as I show you how my simple napkin sketches get converted into cutting-edge technology.

Among the materials found at Penn was this curious object labeled as a “variable pitch box.” You’ll see the buttons are clearly labeled. But there was no documentation on what this piece of equipment did.

In this blog post, I’d like to tell how my team of creative lighting and special effects designers and I will try to compliment, not compete with, the artistic magnificence of the Disney movie Fantasia, excerpts from which Yannick Nézet-Séguin and The Philadelphia Orchestra will accompany live during the Stokowski Celebration Family Concert on June 23.

You have spoken! The final votes are in on the Audience Choice concert and you all put together a fantastic program for Saturday evening, June 23, at the Academy of Music. It was fascinating to watch the close race among the top choices. There were a few lead changes and some surprising results. In the end, here's what came out on top, and how Yannick has organized them into a compelling concert:Bach/orch. Stokowski Toccata and Fugue in D minor

The June Stokowski Celebration concerts are just one month away, and we hope you’re as excited as we are to see Yannick lead the Orchestra in its former historic home, the Academy of Music. Now is probably as good a time as ever to encourage you to revisit some of the other posts on this blog to continue familiarizing yourself with Leopold Stokowski, and also to get a better sense of just how spectacular these June concerts will be by watching James Alexander’s behind-the-scenes videos.

Whether it was pure fate or simple scheduling karma, this week I had a chance to meet up with Yannick Nézet-Séguin in Europe. We were able to update each other on the preparations for the Stokowski Celebration concerts in the Academy of Music June 21-23.

Hello! James Alexander, stage director for the June Stokowski Celebration concerts here! 

In this latest blog in our series I want to show you how I’m aiming to complement Yannick Nézet-Séguin and The Philadelphia Orchestra’s re-telling of Rimsky-Korsakov’s evocative Sheherazade. 

As for the eye-catching bespoke imagery being created for this concert, like the composer himself, I am eschewing a definitive narrative. Rather, I’m endeavoring to offer images which accompany this dazzling and colorful score and offer you a visual thematic fantasy.

In this latest blog post James Alexander, the stage director responsible for the physical presentation of the four Stokowski Celebration concerts in June, shares what he saw in his mind’s eye when he listened to Stokowski’s landmark orchestral arrangement of Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor, the composer’s most famous work in the organ repertoire. 

James then goes on to enlighten us as to what happens to his “napkin sketches” once he shares them with his creative special effects team at Symphony V.0.