News

LOUISVILLE ORCHESTRA ANNOUNCES SUMMER AND SPRING BREAK PROGRAMS FOR YOUTH IN PARTNERSHIP WITH HIP-HOP N2 LEARNING

Media Contact:
Contact Randy Blevins
502-897-0649 | randy@thinktanklou.com

For Immediate Release:
March 2, 2023

LOUISVILLE ORCHESTRA ANNOUNCES SUMMER
AND SPRING BREAK PROGRAMS FOR YOUTH IN
PARTNERSHIP WITH HIP-HOP N2 LEARNING

Hip-Hop N2 Learning / The LO Rap School Summer Camp
June 5 – June 9, 2023 | Registration open now!

Louisville, KY – Graham Parker, Today, Hip-Hop N2 Learning (HHN2L) along with
the Louisville Orchestra and Music Director Teddy Abrams, announced the
expansion of the organization’s partnership thanks to the $500,000 Accelerator
Award HHN2L received in December from The Lewis Prize for Music. This expansion
will include summer and spring break programs for 30 to 40 youth in 5th-12th grade
through the LO’s Rap School happening June 5 – June 9, 2023 from 9am to 3pm.
There is no charge to participate in these programs. Registration for the HHN2L and
The LO Rap School is open now at the following link:
https://forms.gle/VHn3MdYFns8VtfB98.

The LO Rap School was envisioned by Teddy Abrams and Jecorey (1200) Arthur and
premiered in 2019 to partner youth with the Louisville Orchestra in the fight for racial
equity through performance and advocacy. The program allows youth to reimagine
artistic performance and offers students the opportunity to rap with the Louisville
Orchestra at the annual MakingMUSIC education concerts.

In 2021 The Louisville Orchestra began its partnership with hip-hop based education
organization HHN2L to grow The LO Rap School by offering lessons to students
through a series of workshops. These workshops connect students with local social
justice educators, hip-hop artists, and musicians to supply students with resources as
they create rap lyrics that are then performed live on stage with the full orchestra.
Through the LO Rap School, local students from all levels are introduced to a variety
of additional programs led by HHN2L founders Nyree Clayton-Taylor and Antonio
“T” Taylor — all which focus on creating, producing, and performing music that
promotes social justice and community activism.

“This new and expanded relationship between the Louisville Orchestra and Hip-Hop
N2 Learning is undoubtedly one of the most meaningful partnerships we have
created,” says Graham Parker, Chief Executive for The Louisville Orchestra. “Working
with young students to unleash their full potential, expressing powerful messages of
change through writing and performing with the LO, is what is needed in society.
These Young Prodigies are our future.”

In December, HHN2L received a $500,000 Accelerator Award from the Lewis Prize for
Music supporting continued and new efforts to make sustained progress toward
community change. Because of this award, HHN2L has the necessary support to
elevate and expand existing programs. This includes the collaboration with The
Louisville Orchestra and The LO Rap school to uplift their creative impact in the
music industry. The new summer camp will provide opportunities to learn about
music fundamentals, music production, and real life operations in the music
industry.

# # #

About Hip Hop Into Learning:
Hip Hop Based Education (HHBE) provides new avenues for learning, predicated on
self-awareness, expression, and critical thought. While nested in the constructs of critical
theory, culturally relevant pedagogy, and self-awareness. HHBE is a relevant theory that seeks
to bridge culturally relevant teaching to the classroom. Programs of HHN2L include The Real
Young Prodigys, the LO Rap School in partnership with The Louisville Orchestra, TRAP Camp
(Teaching Respect About our Planet), and Pens Up, Bars Down (PUBD) using music to stop
violence in our community and heal student who suffer.

About The Louisville Orchestra:
Established in 1937 through the combined efforts of Louisville mayor Charles Farnsley and
conductor Robert Whitney, the Louisville Orchestra is a cornerstone of the Louisville arts
community. With the launch of First Edition Recordings in 1947, it became the first American
orchestra to own a recording label. Six years later it received a Rockefeller grant of $500,000
to commission, record, and premiere music by living composers, thereby earning a place on
the international circuit. In 2001, the Louisville Orchestra received the Leonard Bernstein
Award for Excellence in Educational Programming, presented annually to a North American
orchestra. Continuing its commitment to new music, the Louisville Orchestra has earned 19
ASCAP awards for Adventurous Programming of Contemporary Music, and was also awarded
large grants from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music and the National Endowment for the
Arts, both for the purpose of producing, manufacturing and marketing its historic First
Edition Recordings collections. Over the years, the orchestra has performed for prestigious
events at the White House, Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, and on tour in Mexico City, and
their last two albums for the Decca Gold label, All In (2017) and The Order of Nature (2019) –
the latter launched with an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon – both
topped the Billboard Classical and Crossover charts. The feature-length, Gramophone Awardwinning
documentary Music Makes a City (2010) chronicles the Louisville Orchestra’s
founding years, and, in spring 2018, Teddy Abrams and

Louisville Orchestra Kentucky Tour and Mammoth Cave Press Releases

NEWS RELEASE
For Immediate Release

 Louisville Orchestra Hits the Road, Connects Kentuckians Through Music

“In Harmony – The Commonwealth Tour of the Louisville Orchestra” to include performances across state with Kentucky natives, including Tessa Lark and Chris Thile;
LO also announces spring residency with famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma

LOUISVILLE, KY. (Jan. 18, 2023) – The Louisville Orchestra announced today that it will embark upon a two-year musical journey across Kentucky beginning in May, playing for audiences throughout the Commonwealth as part of “In Harmony – The Commonwealth Tour of the Louisville Orchestra.” These concerts will include full orchestra performances as well as bring orchestra musicians for intimate, collaborative engagements in schools, community centers, and libraries in dozens of communities.

“With the ‘In Harmony’ tour, the Louisville Orchestra becomes the only orchestra in the United States committed to traveling to every corner of its state to partner in performance with artists across our communities,” Music Director Teddy Abrams said. “There is no so-called urban-rural divide in music. Art and music transcend geographic boundaries. We couldn’t be more excited to share our treasured work with our fellow Kentuckians in their hometowns and home counties.”

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, a fervent supporter of the arts, applauded the Louisville Orchestra’s drive to connect with its neighbors throughout the Commonwealth.

“I commend the Louisville Orchestra for bringing these experiences to communities across Kentucky, ensuring all of our people have access to these performances which can bring joy, comfort and inspiration,” said Beshear. “When we work together for the greater good, we can accomplish some pretty incredible things and the Louisville Orchestra is leading by example.”

“In Harmony” Tour to Reach Across Kentucky

The Louisville Orchestra will kick off the tour in eastern Kentucky on May 17, 18, and 19 with performances in Prestonsburg, Pikeville, and Harlan respectively. During that week, Kentucky-born and raised violinist Tessa Lark joins the orchestra to showcase cornerstones of the traditional repertoire, along with arrangements of famous Kentucky fiddle tunes.

The weeks of July 3 and July 10, the orchestra travels for performances in Glasgow, Covington, Bowling Green, Ashland, and Bardstown. On this program, Abrams will both conduct and be a piano soloist in Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue. The concert will highlight both the Commonwealth’s musical legacy and traditional American tunes.

In September, the orchestra welcomes the singular mandolin virtuoso Chris Thile, who was raised in Murray. These concerts will include performances in Henderson, Owensboro, and Madisonville. During these concerts, Thile will perform the Kentucky debut of his Mandolin Concerto, a showcase for his vocal and finger-picking talents.

The tour will conclude in late February and early March 2024 with stops in Danville, Frankfort, Georgetown, and Fort Knox.  The dates and venues for each stop on the tour will be announced soon.

“This tour is a mark of things to come from the Louisville Orchestra,” said Graham Parker, the Louisville Orchestra’s Chief Executive. “We are a community-centric orchestra, striving to foster artist-driven civic leadership and cultural well-being throughout the Commonwealth. Meeting people where they are is a key part of bringing people into the arts, and that is what we hope to accomplish through this statewide tour.”

The tour was made possible through a budget appropriation from the Kentucky state legislature, a huge win for the arts in the Commonwealth.

A Musical Resource to Bring Communities Together

From the very outset of discussions with Sen. Robert Stivers (R-25), President of the Kentucky Senate, and Rep. David Osborne (R-59) Speaker of the Kentucky House of Representatives, it was clear that by using the musical resources of the Louisville Orchestra, communities, regions, and partners could be brought together to experience a shared togetherness that only music can provide.

“My mother instilled an appreciation for many genres of music in me from a very young age. Mom saw the value of music as one that develops critical thinking skills and expands perceptions,” said Senate President Robert Stivers. “When presented with the opportunity to support this outreach for those who might not otherwise have access across this beautiful state, I had to say yes to the full experience.”

“This is an extraordinary opportunity for Kentuckians of all ages to come together and celebrate the music of the Louisville Orchestra. I am pleased that we were able to make the necessary funding possible and look forward to seeing this investment reach communities throughout the Commonwealth,” Osborne said. “Without a doubt, the Louisville Orchestra is engrained in our state’s cultural legacy. For more than eight decades it has made world-class performances accessible and served as a model for performing arts programs throughout the nation.”

In each community the Louisville Orchestra will serve, there will be proactive and meaningful outreach to work with schools, libraries, and community centers to introduce music and the musicians, and where possible to make music together with local musicians steeped in the traditions of the region. Free, full orchestra concerts in the evenings will showcase local talents, together with orchestra members and special guests, showing what bonds exist and what bridges are possible.

“We can’t thank our elected officials enough for their critical support of our organization and for the arts as a whole,” Parker said. “What started as a dream – to tour our beloved Commonwealth and share our music with its people – is now a reality, thanks to our legislature.”

Orchestra Season Includes Residency with Yo-Yo Ma, Performance in Mammoth Cave

Before the Louisville Orchestra sets out on its journey, famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma will enter a five-day immersive residency with the Louisville Orchestra, including a once-in-a-lifetime performance within the caverns of Mammoth Cave.

Yo-Yo Ma will join Abrams and the full orchestra for a performance including Shostakovich’s Cello Concerto No. 1 at the Kentucky Center’s Whitney Hall on April 27. The performance will be preceded by a gala. The concerts at Mammoth Cave on April 29 will feature music composed by Abrams featuring members of the Louisville Orchestra, the Louisville Chamber Choir, a solo percussionist, and Yo-Yo Ma.

“Visitors have always been drawn to Mammoth Cave to experience its ancient stillness and expansiveness,” said Abrams. “It’s no surprise that this otherworldly treasure has inspired art of all forms, some of which can still be seen in the cave. Performing music in a cave where untold generations of people before us have created their own music connects us in a vital way to our past.”

“We are thrilled to offer this amazing opportunity to experience the sounds of Yo-Yo Ma and the Louisville Orchestra inside Mammoth Cave,” said Park Superintendent Barclay Trimble. “Music is universally loved and recognized as a way to connect and bring people together. Mammoth Cave has been a source of artistic inspiration for thousands of years and now through a composition created by Teddy Abrams and historic performance by Yo-Yo Ma, we can add another fantastic musical moment to the cave’s history.”

Yo-Yo Ma and the Louisville Orchestra will perform at Rafinesque Hall inside Mammoth Cave on Saturday, April 29, 2023 at 11 am and 3 pm CDT. Tickets for the event will be distributed by lottery through Recreation.gov and people may apply for a chance at tickets beginning Monday, January 30.  The lottery closes at 10 am on February 5.

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About the Louisville Orchestra 

The Louisville Orchestra was created in 1937 and sprung up in a time of need, just after the great flood and in the wake of the depression. Robert Whitney was invited to conduct the newly established orchestra, known then as the Louisville Philharmonic, and arrived from Chicago that same year. In its formation, the goal was to create a new model for the American symphony orchestra, as it was conceived through an ambitious effort that emphasized innovation through the commissioning, performance, and recording of new works by contemporary composers. The Louisville Orchestra garnered international critical acclaim, became the first orchestra to establish a record label, and cemented a place in history for its contribution to contemporary classical music. In its first two decades, the Louisville Orchestra commissioned/recorded up to 52 new works annually and ultimately created 150 vinyl recordings (LPs) of more than 450 works.

The Louisville Orchestra continues to be recognized as a cornerstone of the Louisville performing arts community. Music Director Teddy Abrams has helmed the Louisville Orchestra since 2014, and the Louisville Orchestra has returned to its origins of commissioning new music and recording, having released two albums under the prestigious Decca Gold label. A wide variety of immersive and innovative concert performances and educational programming continue to receive national attention. Recent press coverage includes articles and mentions in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, and CBS Sunday Morning. Accolades include three invitations to perform at Carnegie Hall; the Leonard Bernstein Award for Excellence in Educational Programming; the League of American Orchestras 2019 Ford Musician Awards for Excellence in Community Service; and 19 American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) awards for adventurous programming in use of contemporary music.

Media Contacts:                                               

Jenny Recktenwald                               Quin Welch
jrecktenwald@c2strategic.com            qwelch@c2strategic.com
(502) 994-9167                                      (859) 388-0510

Teddy Abrams and Members of the Louisville Orchestra to Perform in Mammoth Cave with Special Guest Yo-Yo Ma (April 29)

Rafinesque Hall at Mammoth Cave National Park – Courtesy of National Park Service

“A pioneering force in new music.”

— Billboard on the Louisville Orchestra

(January 18, 2023)—One of the world’s most awe-inspiring natural wonders will serve as the setting for a once-in-a-lifetime performance as Music Director and Musical America 2022 Conductor of the Year Teddy Abrams, members of the Louisville Orchestra (LO), bass-baritone Davóne Tines, the Louisville Chamber Choir, and solo percussionist join forces with cellist Yo-Yo Ma at Kentucky’s Mammoth Cave National Park, directed by Zack Winokur.

Two immersive concerts to be held inside the cave on April 29 will feature a site-specific composition by Abrams inspired by the environment in which it will be performed. Tickets for the performances, taking place at 11 am and 3 pm CDT, will be distributed by a lottery process through www.recreation.gov beginning Monday, January 30. More information about the events can be found here.

Over the past year, Abrams explored Mammoth Cave National Park—the longest-known cave system in the world—and immersed himself in the cave’s geology and history, specifically focusing on the origins of the cave, the people who have lived and worked in it, and the stories they have told. Abrams explains:

“These performances are an homage to and celebration of this remarkable place, its history, and its people. Visitors have always been drawn to Mammoth Cave to experience its ancient stillness and expansiveness. It’s no surprise that this otherworldly treasure has inspired art in all forms, some of which can still be seen in the cave. Performing music in a cave where untold generations of people before us have created their own music connects us in a vital way to our past.

The genesis of this project came about during a conversation between Abrams and Yo-Yo Ma in preparation for a podcast interview that Abrams conducted with Yo-Yo in 2020.  Yo-Yo mentioned his admiration of the documentary featuring a concert at Crater Lake National Park, which Abrams had conducted.  Yo-Yo then shared the idea behind his national parks project – Our Common Nature. That conversation led hatched the idea for a concert in Mammoth Cave.  Abrams composed his work with Yo-Yo Ma in mind—to be performed in the environment of a large open passageway inside the cave known as Rafinesque Hall. He explains:

“My work will position Yo-Yo Ma in the role of spiritual guide, twinned with the voice of Davóne and using a complement of vocalists and musicians from the Orchestra to bring the interdependent natural, human, and mythological stories of Mammoth Cave to life. The inspiration for this work is the interlinking of nature and humanity—the role caves play in our collective imagination and storytelling. From ancient mythology to modern fiction, caves have represented archetypical wonder and terror, symbolized the unknown, and served as the setting for our contemplation of the borders of life, death, and the great beyond.”

Louisville Orchestra Chief Executive Graham Parker adds:

“This once-in-a-lifetime performance represents more than a collaboration between Teddy Abrams the Louisville Orchestra, and the great Yo-Yo Ma; equally important to the collaboration is the mystical splendor of one of the world’s most astounding natural wonders. We are also bringing attention to Mammoth Cave as part of the broader mission of the Louisville Orchestra to serve the entire Commonwealth of Kentucky, from its vibrant cities and small towns to its glorious natural resources.”

Mammoth Cave National Park Superintendent Barclay Trimble says:

“We are thrilled to offer this amazing opportunity to experience the sounds of Yo-Yo Ma and the Louisville Orchestra inside Mammoth Cave. Music is universally loved and recognized as a way to connect and bring people together. Mammoth Cave has been a source of artistic inspiration for thousands of years—and now through a composition created by Teddy Abrams and a historic performance by Yo-Yo Ma, we can add another fantastic musical moment to the cave’s history.”

Zack Winokur will serve as director for the performances. With his work recently being described as “pure poetry” (The Boston Globe) and “my favorite theatrical experience of the last decade” (The New York Times), Winokur is recognized as one of the most innovative and exciting talents working in opera today. He co-founded the American Modern Opera Company, an ensemble of singers, musicians, and dancers committed to creating a body of new, discipline-colliding music-theater works. Winokur explains:

“In the process of creating this piece I have gotten to know people with deep history in these caves and surrounding lands, connecting with their generational stories of curiosity and discovery. I have been inspired by the work of the park guides and am excited to work with the properties of the cave—the pure blackout where you’re left with only your heartbeat, the cacophonous echoes of sound, the sensitivity of a pin dropping, the one light in the dark that can form a glow for us all to gather around—as we transform the stories of the cave into theater.”

Tickets for the performances will be distributed via a lottery system to give all interested visitors an equal opportunity to attend these limited events. The lottery will be open from Monday, January 30 to Monday, February 6 at www.recreation.gov. Only one application per email address is accepted, and each application may request up to 4 tickets. Performances are open to all ages, but youths under the age of 16 years must be accompanied by an adult 18 years or older. All lottery applicants will be charged a $1.00 application fee, but there is no fee for tickets to the events.

Rafinesque Hall, the area of the cave where the performances will take place, is a natural environment, with low lighting and a temperature of around 54ºF (12ºC). There is no seating in the hall, and the performances will last approximately one hour. The performers will be utilizing different zones in the cave and audience members will be encouraged to move around the performance space to experience the aural and visual contrasts as the elements of the composition evolve. Audience members must walk 0.75 miles (1.2 km) round trip to reach the performance area. The access trail includes a steep outdoor hillside to and from the cave’s natural entrance with a total of 130 stairs. Inside the cave, the trail will travel along broad walkways in some of the largest rooms inside Mammoth Cave. The trail is mostly level, but some hilly and uneven areas exist.

About Yo-Yo Ma

Cellist Yo-Yo Ma’s life and career are testaments to his enduring belief in culture’s power to generate trust and understanding. Whether performing new or familiar works from the cello repertoire, collaborating with communities and institutions to explore culture’s role in society, or engaging unexpected musical forms, Yo-Yo strives to foster connections that stimulate the imagination and reinforce our humanity.

Yo-Yo Ma was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris, where he began studying the cello with his father at age four. When he was seven, he moved with his family to New York City, where he continued his cello studies at the Juilliard School before pursuing a liberal arts education at Harvard.

Yo-Yo has recorded more than 100 albums, is the winner of 19 Grammy Awards, and has performed for nine American presidents, most recently on the occasion of President Biden’s inauguration. He has received numerous awards, including the National Medal of the Arts, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Birgit Nilsson Prize. He has been a UN Messenger of Peace since 2006 and was recognized as one of TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2020.

Yo-Yo’s latest album is “Beethoven for Three: Symphony No. 6 ‘Pastorale’ and Op. 1, No. 3,” recorded with pianist Emanual Ax and violinist Leonidas Kavakos.

About the Louisville Orchestra

Established in 1937 through the combined efforts of Louisville mayor Charles Farnsley and conductor Robert Whitney, the Louisville Orchestra is a cornerstone of the Louisville arts community. With the launch of First Edition Recordings in 1947, it became the first American orchestra to own a recording label. Six years later it received a Rockefeller grant of $500,000 to commission, record and premiere music by living composers, thereby earning a place on the international circuit. In 2001, the Louisville Orchestra received the Leonard Bernstein Award for Excellence in Educational Programming, presented annually to a North American orchestra. Continuing its commitment to new music, the Louisville Orchestra has earned 19 ASCAP awards for Adventurous Programming of Contemporary Music and was also awarded large grants from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music and the National Endowment for the Arts, both for the purpose of producing, manufacturing, and marketing its historic First Edition Recordings collections. Over the years, the orchestra has performed for prestigious events at the White House, Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, and on tour in Mexico City, and their last two albums for the Decca Gold label, All In (2017) and The Order of Nature (2019)—the latter launched with an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon—both topped the Billboard Classical and Crossover charts. The feature-length, Gramophone Award-winning documentary Music Makes a City (2010) chronicles the Louisville Orchestra’s founding years, and in spring 2018, Teddy Abrams and the orchestra were profiled on the popular television program CBS Sunday Morning.

About Mammoth Cave

Mammoth Cave National Park is a park on two levels—52,830 acres of reclaimed hardwood forest and winding riverways, and below it, the longest-known cave system in the world, surveyed at 428 miles to date. The park preserves evidence of prehistoric indigenous people at Mammoth Cave from between 4,000 and 5,000 years ago and evidence of modern humans who rediscovered the cave around 1800. These modern settlers left behind more than 200 years of artifacts from the early days of saltpeter mining operations, science/health experiments, cave tour activities, and historic structures that were built in the development of the park as a tourist destination and national park. Music has been an important part of Mammoth Cave’s over 200-year modern history with classical musicians, choirs and contemporary artists composing and often performing their music inside the cave. Located within a day’s drive of several major population centers, Mammoth Cave National Park offers camping, hiking, horseback riding, bicycling, canoeing, picnicking, and cave tours. The park was established as a national park in 1941, designated a World Heritage Site in 1981, an International Biosphere Reserve in 1990, and certified as a Dark Sky Park by the International Dark Sky Association in 2021.

High-resolution photos are available here.

www.louisvilleorchestra.org
www.facebook.com/pages/The-Louisville-Orchestra
twitter.com/louorch
www.nps.gov/maca

Media Contacts:
Jenny Recktenwald                                      Quin Welch
jrecktenwald@c2strategic.com                   qwelch@c2strategic.com
(502) 994-9167                                             (859) 388-0510

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Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps

Long praised for visionary thinking about the role of an orchestra in its community, in its 2022 – 2023 season The Louisville Orchestra began its Creators Corps program.

Since its founding, the Louisville Orchestra has had a historic and unrivaled commitment to supporting and sustaining living composers and contemporary music. In 1937, the LO board chairman (and later Louisville’s mayor) Charles Farnsley and Robert Whitney, the LO’s founding Music Director and conductor, conceived an adventurous plan: To make the commissioning, performance, and recording of new works a centerpiece of the LO’s global mission. Between 1950 and 1992, the Louisville Orchestra commissioned and recorded up to 52 new compositions from composers worldwide, releasing nearly 150 LPs on its First Edition Records label of more than 450 works by living composers.

Conceived as a successor project to First Edition Records, the Creators Corps also represents a giant leap forward. The initiative asks the three invited creators to act as artist-leaders, developing meaningful relationships with neighborhood residents and embodying the orchestra’s conviction that music is a fundamental part of civic life.

The Creators Corps, a first-of-its-kind program that deeply integrates artists in the city of Louisville and with the orchestra, selects three Creators each year to move to Louisville for the upcoming season and live in the Shelby Park neighborhood for at least 30 weeks. The Creators serve as LO staff members, receiving an annual salary, health insurance, housing, and custom-built studio workspaces. Throughout their residencies, the Creators compose new works to be performed by the orchestra, participate in educational and community engagement activities, and become active, engaged citizens of Louisville.

The Creators Corps program has been funded by a three-year, $750,000 grant from The Mellon Foundation and from the generous support of additional individual donors locally and nationally.

Creators Corps participants have been chosen for the 2023 – 2024 and 2024 – 2025 Season. They are:

2023 – 2024 CrEators Corps

Alex Berko                                                                      Learn More

Nkeiru Okoye                                                                 Learn More

Tanner Porter                                                                 Learn More

2024 – 2025 creators corps

Baldwin Giang                                                               Learn More

Brittany Green                                                               Learn More

Oswald Huỳnh                                                              Learn More

Important Dates

• September 1, 2023: Residency period begins for 2023-24 cohort
• July 1, 2024: Residency period begins for 2024-25 cohort

For questions, please get in touch with Jacob Gotlib, Creators Corps Program Manager, at jgotlib@louisvilleorchestra.org or call 502.587.8681.

Click Here for more information and HOW to apply for the Creators Corps of 2025 – 2026

Free Music/Storytelling Events for Families

Louisville Free Public Library and Louisville Orchestra
Collaborate to Bring Music and Reading to Families throughout Metro Louisville

FREE CONCERTS From the “HeARTS” Initiative

The Louisville Orchestra is pleased to announce a brand-new series of free concerts as the LO’s MUSIC WITHOUT BORDERS series is presented throughout Metro Louisville with nine performances across the California, Shelby Park, and Jeffersontown neighborhoods.

Presented with the support of Jim and Irene Karp, Louisville Metro’s HeARTS program, and the Fund for the Arts, our traditional MUSIC WITHOUT BORDERS concerts are offered with a brand-new expansion for the 2022-2023 season. All concerts will be free – removing the economic barriers to enjoying the essential public service that the LO represents. The multi-faceted program will help achieve Metro Louisville’s goal of Building Community and Healing after the challenges of the last several years – unifying and inspiring neighbors in the unique way of the arts.

Music Director Teddy Abrams explains, “The journey toward reinventing the Louisville Orchestra as an essential public service for our city has re-centered us to use all our creative power to affect momentous cultural change. We strive to make the LO truly an orchestra of and for the people. Our city will thrive by finding the communal inspiration and strength necessary to confront whatever challenges we face in the future. Music Without Borders is our vehicle to accelerate community recovery and connection.”

In its new format, the Music Without Borders programs will emphasize appearances by the LO in selected neighborhoods. Returning at least every three months throughout the concert season to specific venues, the LO will surround the concerts with a wide range of orchestral music and activities for residents seeking creative enrichment and a place to gather and share in the arts. A full schedule will be announced.

For the 2022-2023 season, the neighborhoods chosen for these concerts reflect the diverse range of Louisville’s residents. Venues included for these concerts (more will be added throughout the season) are the California Community Center (1600 West St. Catherine Street in California Park, 40210), the Logan Street Market (1001 Logan Street in Shelby Park, 40204), The Jeffersonian (10617 Taylorsville Rd, Jeffersontown 40299), the Iroquois Amphitheater (1080 Amphitheater Rd, South Louisville 40214), and Shawnee Park (4501 W. Broadway in West Louisville, 40211).

Additional Community Activities

In addition to concerts, an array of arts activities will surround the performances building connections within the selected communities through in-school activities, musician engagements in community centers, integration with the LO Creators Corps program, and music-making at all levels.

The LO’s second year presenting the “Once Upon An Orchestra” concerts in conjunction with the Louisville Free Public Libraries offers another part of this free concert and outreach effort. Last season 21 storytelling-with-music concerts were presented by LO ensembles and reached every branch library in the LFPL system. Hundreds of families found their way back to the libraries for the first time in many months during these presentations during the 2021-22 season.

When awarding the Louisville Orchestra funding support for this program, Mayor Greg Fischer said, “This partnership with the City, the Louisville Orchestra, and Fund for the Arts is a commitment to the health, well-being, and healing of the neighborhoods and people of our community. Working together across agencies ensures a sustainability of impact that none of us are able to accomplish on our own. We look forward to building these and many other collaborations to honor the inherent creativity and artistic power of every person in our community.”

ADMISSION
These concerts are free. Reservations in advance are requested for the indoor concerts. Doors open 90 minutes before the performance.  No tickets will be issued.
Additional concerts will be added as scheduling permits.

PERFORMANCES

“Symphonic Sparks”

THU 27 OCT at 7:30PM
     The Jeffersonian
FRI 28 OCT at 7:30PM
Logan Street Market
SAT 29 OCT at 7:30PM
California Community Center
Teddy Abrams, conductor
A program featuring two popular romantic orchestral masterworks and music by a member of the LO Creators Corps: Finlandia by Jean Sibelius, Fictional Migrations by Lisa Bielawa, and Symphony No. 9 by Dmitri Shostakovich. Two selection explores the theme of freedom from different perspectives – as an individual and as a country. The third is a humorous and magical romp through the colors of the orchestra.

“Love at First Listen”

THU 16 FEB at 7:30PM
The Jeffersonian
FRI 17 FEB at 7:30PM
Logan Street Market
SAT 18 FEB at 7:30PM
     California Community Center
Gabriel Lefkowitz, conductor and violin
A program featuring music that laid the foundations of classical music: the Concerto for Violin & Oboe by J. S. Bach and the Symphony No. 5 by Franz Schubert

“An American Flair”

THU 23 MAR at 7:30PM
    The Jeffersonian
FRI 24 MAR at 7:30PM
    Logan Street Market
SAT 25 MAR at 7:30PM
     California Community Center
Kelly Corcoran, conductor
A program featuring music of Americans inspired by the energy and diversity of our country including the Overture to West Side Story by Leonard Bernstein, The Tender Land Suite by Aaron Copland, and music by LO Creators Corps member TJ Cole.

Meet the Creators

Teddy Abrams & Louisville Orchestra Announce Inaugural Group of Composers for New “Creators Corps” Residency Program Beginning Sep 1

“If we’re relying on the younger generation to help boost interest in classical music, look no further than Teddy Abrams.” — NPR Music
“A genre-defying orchestra in Louisville? Believe it.” — Time magazine

 (July 2022)—Long praised for visionary thinking about the role of an orchestra in its community, galvanizing Music Director Teddy Abrams and the Louisville Orchestra (LO) are pleased to announce the inaugural group of creators for their newest initiative, the Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps, which transcends traditional commissioning and composer-in-residence paradigms with a radically new model for collaborating with symphony orchestras in the 21st century. The selected creators are Lisa Bielawa, TJ Cole, and Tyler Taylor. Abrams, who was named Conductor of the Year for 2022 by Musical America and begins his eighth season with the orchestra in September, explains:

“I was overwhelmed by the diverse talent of the 186 applicants for the initial year of the LO’s Creators Corps. I believe this reflects the widespread desire for artists to build deeper and more impactful relationships with civic institutions and the communities they represent. With an extraordinarily dedicated selection committee, we were able to find three exceptional creators to join us in Louisville for the 2022-23 Season. Lisa, TJ, and Tyler are examples of consummate 21st-century artist-leaders; their musical talents match their intellects and they all share a remarkable sensitivity to the needs of the world beyond the boundaries of contemporary musical composition. While each creator has a unique background and aesthetic perspective, their collective accomplishments and capabilities will make them a tremendous part of the LO family and the creative fabric of Louisville (and in Tyler’s case, as a Louisvillian, we are honored to offer him the Orchestra’s broad civic platform). This is an historic and immensely consequential moment for the LO, and I can’t wait to begin collaborating with these three outstanding creators.”

Graham Parker, the Louisville Orchestra’s Interim Executive Director, adds:

“The Creators Corps marks a new chapter for innovation and leadership for the Louisville Orchestra, and I am proud that we are demonstrating the most impactful way composers, community leaders, musicians, and civic partners can come together to fundamentally change the conversation around creativity, the creative process, access to and impact from the arts. The entire LO family is dedicated to delivering on this new model and showcasing it across Metro Louisville, the Commonwealth, and the country.”

The Creators Corps, an innovative first-of-its-kind program that puts artists in the community for deeper integration with the orchestra and the city of Louisville, selects three creators in the spring to move to Louisville for the upcoming season and live in the Shelby neighborhood for at least 30 weeks, serving as LO staff members with an annual salary of $40,000, health insurance, housing, and a custom-built studio workspace. Throughout their residencies, the creators will compose new works to be performed by the orchestra and/or in other settings, participate in educational and community engagement activities, and be active, engaged citizens of their neighborhood. The three selected creators will each have a preexisting work performed on the opening night program on September 17. The world premieres of their new works will be performed in Louisville during the 2022/23 season on Classics programs on January 14, March 4, and March 11 – the latter two dates as part of the Festival of American Music – and will appear as well on Music Without Borders programs.

The Creators Corps program has been funded by a three-year, $750,000 grant from The Mellon Foundation and from the generous support of additional individual donors locally and nationally.

About the Creators Corps Composers          

Lisa Bielawa

Composer, producer, and vocalist Lisa Bielawa is a Rome Prize winner in musical composition. She takes inspiration for her work from literary sources and close artistic collaborations. Gramophone reports, “Bielawa is gaining gale force as a composer, churning out impeccably groomed works that at once evoke the layered precision of Vermeer and the conscious recklessness of Jackson Pollock.” Her music has been described as “ruminative, pointillistic and harmonically slightly tart,” by the New York Times, and “fluid and arresting … at once dramatic and probing,” by the San Francisco Chronicle. She is the recipient of the 2017 Music Award from the American Academy of Arts & Letters and a 2020 OPERA America Grant for Female Composers. She was named a William Randolph Hearst Visiting Artist Fellow at the American Antiquarian Society for 2018 and was Artist-in-Residence at Kaufman Music Center in New York for the 2020-2021 season.

Bielawa has established herself as one of today’s leading composers and performers, one who consistently executes work that incorporates community-making as part of her artistic vision. She has created music for public spaces in Lower Manhattan, the banks of the Tiber River in Rome, on the sites of former airfields in Berlin and in San Francisco, and to mark the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall; she composed and produced a twelve-episode, made-for-TV opera that featured over 350 musicians and was filmed in locations across the country; she was a co-founder in 1997 of the MATA Festival, which continues to support young composers; and for five years she was the artistic director of the San Francisco Girls Chorus, bringing the chorus to the NY PHIL BIENNIAL and introducing the young performers to the music of today through numerous premieres and commissions from leading composers. From 2019-2022, Bielawa was the founding Composer-in-Residence and Chief Curator of the Philip Glass Institute (PGI) at The New School’s College of the Performing Arts.

In addition to performing as the vocalist in the Philip Glass Ensemble, Bielawa performs in many of her own works as well as in the music of John Zorn, Anthony Braxton, Michael Gordon, and others. She will have her third residency as a performer/composer at Zorn’s venue The Stone in November 2022. She recently made her orchestral conducting debut leading the Mannes String Orchestra in a special presentation by the Philip Glass Institute, featuring her music, music by Jon Gibson and David T. Little, and Philip Glass’s Symphony No. 3.

Born in San Francisco into a musical family, Lisa Bielawa played the violin and piano, sang, and wrote music from early childhood. She moved to New York two weeks after receiving her B.A. in Literature in 1990 from Yale University and became an active participant in New York musical life.

TJ Cole

TJ Cole (they/she) is an American composer, originally from the suburbs of Atlanta. They have been commissioned by the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Carnegie Hall, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the Louisville Orchestra, the New Haven Symphony Orchestra, Nashville in Harmony, Intersection, Time For Three, the Sun Valley Summer Symphony, Play On Philly, the Music in May Festival, Music in the Vineyards, the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival, One Book One Philadelphia, and the Bakken Trio, among others.

​Their music has been performed by various ensembles, including the Minnesota Orchestra, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, the Utah Symphony, Ensemble Connect, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the Curtis Symphony Orchestra, the Interlochen Arts Academy Orchestra, the Dover Quartet, the Bakken Trio, and the Nebula Ensemble, among others. They have also worked on numerous projects with Time for Three as an orchestrator and arranger, and served as a composer-in-residence at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in 2014.

TJ has also been a singer-songwriter, producer, and engineer in the fully electronic synth-pop band Twin Pixie, which focuses on making music at the intersection of queerness, pop culture, and the supernatural.

TJ has participated in composition programs including the Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute, the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival, and the Next Festival of Emerging Artists, and studied with Samuel Adler for a summer at the Freie Universität Berlin. They have won two ASCAP Morton Gould Young Composer awards (2014 and 2020), including the Leo Kaplan Award in 2020 for their string sextet ‘Playtime’.

​TJ has also been involved with music-related community outreach projects. They collaborated with bassist Ranaan Meyer as an orchestrator on his project The World We All Deserve Through Music, and with First Person Arts by co-curating and performing in a musical story slam. During a yearlong ArtistYear Fellowship (2016-17), TJ was able to co-run and collaborate in musical performances and songwriting workshops with residents of Project HOME, a Philadelphia-based organization fighting to end chronic homelessness.

​TJ received their Bachelor’s degree in composition from the Curtis Institute of Music, and studied at Interlochen Arts Academy. Their mentors include John Boyle Jr., Jennifer Higdon, David Ludwig, and Richard Danielpour.

​

Tyler Taylor

Tyler Taylor, a Louisville native, is a composer-performer whose work explores the different ways identity can be expressed in musical scenarios. Common among these pieces is a sense of contradiction – sometimes whimsical, sometimes alarming – that comes from the interaction of diverse musical layers. This expression of contradiction likely comes from his being a person of mixed race; being raised on hip hop and R&B while inheriting a European tradition of Western art music as his primary form of musical expression in spite of having little or no other cultural ties to Europe; and pursuing a career in a field that generally lacks representation of his demographic.

Tyler has recently held fellowships at the National Orchestra Institute and the Bowdoin International Music Festival. During these residencies, he had several works performed, including two premieres, and worked alongside Marin Alsop, Derek Bermel, Andreia Pinto Correia, and many other distinguished artists. His work has been recognized by awards including the BMI Student Composition Award (2019) and the Howard Hanson Ensemble Prize (2017, 2016), and has been featured during the College Orchestra Directors Association Convention (2022), the University of Louisville Annual New Music Festival (2018, 2017, 2016) and the Midwest Composers Symposium (2019). He has recently been commissioned by the Washington and Lee University Orchestra, the Chicago Composers Orchestra, the Albany Symphony Contemporary Ensemble, the Youth Performing Arts School, the Louisville Orchestra, the Indiana University New Music Ensemble, and the Indiana Bandmasters Association.

In addition to his composition, Tyler is an avid performer of contemporary music, playing horn in many of his own works and those by his colleagues. He has honed his skill as a contemporary performer in groups such as the IU New Music Ensemble, Eastman’s Musica Nova, Ossia New Music, the University of Louisville New Music Ensemble, and more.

Tyler holds degrees from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music (Doctor of Music in Composition, with minors in music theory and horn performance), the Eastman School of Music (Master of Music in Composition and Horn), and the University of Louisville (Bachelor of Music in Composition). His principal composition teachers include Tansy Davies, Aaron Travers, Don Freund, David Liptak, Robert Morris, Krzysztof Wołek, and Steve Rouse. His principal horn teachers include  Emily Britton, Dale Clevenger, Jeff Nelsen, W. Peter Kurau, Bruce Heim, Steve Causey, and Diana Morgen.

Creators Corps Works in 2022-23 Classics Season

Sep 17
“Swing, Swagger and Sway”
Teddy Abrams, conductor
Tessa Lark, violin
Wynton MARSALIS: Violin Concerto in D
Tyler TAYLOR: Facades
Lisa BIELAWA: Drama/Self-Pity
TJ COLE: Megalopolis
STRAVINSKY: Symphony in Three Movements

Jan 14
“Fifths Of Beethoven”
Teddy Abrams, conductor & piano
BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 5, “Emperor”
World premiere commissioned from the Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps
BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 5

March 4
“Festival Of American Music: Journeys of Faith”
Teddy Abrams, conductor
Louisville Chamber Choir
World premiere commissioned from the Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps
Olga NEUWIRTH: Masaot/Clocks Without Hands
BERNSTEIN: Symphony No. 3, “Kaddish”

March 11
“Festival Of American Music: The Literary Influence”
Teddy Abrams, conductor
Sebastian Chang, piano
Joel THOMPSON: To Awaken the Sleeper
World premiere commissioned from the Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps
BERNSTEIN: Symphony No. 2, “The Age of Anxiety”

LO is on the move… literally!

2022-23 SEASON ANNOUNCEMENT

A VIDEO MESSAGE FROM TEDDY ABRAMS

LOUISVILLE ORCHESTRA ANNOUNCES 2022-23 SEASON CONCERTS NOW ON SALE
Highlights include world premiere works by the new Creators Corps, Beethoven’s Fifth, and a performance by Broadway star KELLI O’HARA

(Louisville KY… Apr 19, 2022)  Now in its ninth season under the dynamic and inspiring leadership of Music Director Teddy Abrams, the Louisville Orchestra is proud to announce a season of creativity in 2022-23.  Highlights of the season include new works by composers from the newly launched Creators Corps, the eighth annual Festival of American Music featuring works by the American cultural hero Leonard Bernstein, premieres and commissioned works by important voices of today’s composers including the 2021 Grawemeyer Award-winning composer Olga Neuwirth, acclaimed composers Joel Thompson, Thomas Adés, Mason Bates and Christopher Cerrone. Teddy Abrams performs as pianist and conductor for Ludwig van Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto in a program where he also conducts Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, plus performances by Avery Fisher Career Grant winner TESSA LARK and a long-awaited return to the stage of the momentous Symphony No. 7 by Anton Bruckner will engage the classical music lovers of Louisville. Headlining the Pops Series is Grammy Award-winning Broadway and Hollywood star KELLI O’HARA. Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt has lined up a season packed with entertainment including vintage films with some of the finest music scores are on display; the exceptional voice of CAPATHIA JENKINS in “Aretha: A Tribute,” and the Emmy-Award winning vocal group THE TEXAS TENORS who have amassed a huge fan base worldwide.

5 Different Concert Series

Each year the Louisville Orchestra plays a wide array of public, education, and outreach performances. With more than 100 performances annually by the orchestra or its ensembles, the LO is central to life in Louisville. We announce programs and dates for five different concert series for the 2022-23 Season that are currently available for sale with discounted multi-concert subscription packages available to the public. Complete programming and descriptions of individual concerts are available at www.LouisvilleOrchestra.org.

CLASSICS SERIES – A 9-concert series created by Music Director Teddy Abrams, the Classics Series presents an inspiring slate of exceptional music featuring the annual FESTIVAL OF AMERICAN MUSIC, a concert with Teddy at the piano performing Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto plus conducting Beethoven’s Fifth, and the massive grand finale of the Symphony No. 7 by Anton Bruckner – a piece that’s been missing from our programs for over 20 years. The newly launched Creators Corps will have new works premiered at concerts starting in January 2023. The Creators Corps is a unique residency program that brings three composers to live and work in Louisville as a way to enhance our thriving creative community with music that is made in our city for our citizens. Acclaimed guest performers on the Classics Series include violinist TESSA LARK, LO’s own principal horn JON GUSTELY, piano virtuosos TIMO ANDRES and SEBASTIAN CHANG, rising star violinist ALEXI KENNEY, and baritone DASHON BURTON. 9-concert packages from $207. 5-concert packages from $130. That’s $26 per concert!

POPS SERIES – Six concert series under the direction of Principal Pops Conductor Bob Bernhardt. Opening with a performance by KELLI O’HARA, and featuring a tribute concert to Aretha Franklin, our traditional Holiday Pops, a look back at the music of the 80s, and closing with the massively entertaining TEXAS TENORS. 6-concert packages from $156.

COFFEE SERIES – Six-concert matinee series offering a sampling of the music from the Classics Series. Concerts are presented on Fridays at 11AM at the Kentucky Center. 6-concert packages from $108.

FAMILY SERIES — Three-concert series presented at Old Forester’s Paristown Hall (NEW location). Programs are centered on storytelling and music to entertain and educate children ages 4 to 12 years. Affordable and fun! 3-concerts for $42 (adult) and $27 (child)

NIGHTLITES at the Ogle – Four-concert series presented at the Ogle Center at Indiana University Southeast in New Albany. Popular classical music prices at $90 for all 4 events.

LINK TO VIEW OUR 2022-23 SEASON and SUBSCRIPTION OPTIONS

READ MORE FROM LOUISVILLE PUBLIC MEDIA

Statewide Touring Funded by $4.3M Appropriation

Louisville Orchestra Announces Annual Statewide Touring Program Funded by $4.3M Appropriation from KY General Assembly

(Louisville, KY…March 31, 2022) The Louisville Orchestra (LO) is pleased to announce that it will receive a $4.3M appropriation from the Kentucky General Assembly to resume an annual statewide touring program. This appropriation is an unprecedented commitment from the state, allowing the orchestra to visit every region of the Commonwealth of Kentucky over two years, beginning in 2023.

Including multiple tours by the full Louisville Orchestra, as well as strategic engagement of local ensembles and artists across the next two concert seasons, the statewide project will launch a new era of deep community partnerships reflecting the character and interests of each town on the tour. The engagements, unlike anything conceived of previously, will carry the LO’s dedication to building creative communities beyond its hometown by presenting performances, sharing music-making, and celebrating artistic partnerships in cities and towns across Kentucky. Participation in all touring activities, including tickets to all performances, will be free.

By working with arts and civic leaders to develop multiple community-based activities, partnering with local musicians and creators, and bringing entire communities together with full orchestra concerts, the LO hopes to soften the rigid lines of urban-rural division that have hindered mutual support and understanding between citizens of Kentucky.

The budget passed with bipartisan support through both the House and the Senate on Wednesday, March 30, and the LO will begin the planning phase of the touring program immediately. Single performances in nearby towns will launch the initiative beginning in fall 2022, while full touring activities will begin in 2023. The LO’s tour management team will use the next 12 months to deepen relationships across the state to understand where LO partnerships can have the most impact.

Working with State Legislative Leadership

The Louisville Orchestra Commonwealth tour would not have been possible without the support given by House and Senate Leadership in Frankfort, Kentucky. House Speaker David Osborne (R-District 59), Senate President Robert Stivers (R-District 25), Senate Majority Leader Damon Thayer (R-District 17) and Budget Conference Chair Senator Julie Raque Adams (R-District 36) were all immediate and passionate champions of the initiative, seeing it as essential to a vibrant and thriving community and to continuing the task of bridging the urban-rural divide in Kentucky.

House Speaker David Osborne stated: “Our investment provides a unique opportunity to bring the incredible music of the Louisville Orchestra to communities throughout the state while honoring the talent in each region. I look forward to seeing this series become reality.”

Senator Julie Raque Adams says: “Music has always been an integral piece of Kentucky’s cultural heritage. Teddy’s vision to engage students through collaboration and performances in unique venues across our Commonwealth provides a well-timed opportunity to celebrate what unites us—our love and appreciation for great Kentucky music!”

Teddy Abrams, Music Director, named Musical America’s “Conductor of the Year” for 2022, is the visionary behind the touring initiative, which he hopes will bring inspiration to and foster connection between the people of Kentucky. He explains:

“This is a moment to reforge the human relationships that unite our communities and to celebrate our commonalities; music is perhaps the greatest tool for overcoming differences in backgrounds and demographics. Kentucky is famous around the world for its outsize contributions to music in so many genres—from bluegrass to rock, rap, and (of course) orchestral music—and so we developed the idea of taking the Louisville Orchestra throughout the Commonwealth, from the smallest communities to larger cities, to collaborate and share music-making with our fellow Kentuckians living in every part of the state.

“I’ve grown to deeply love both my adopted hometown of Louisville and the beautiful Commonwealth beyond; I am proud to call myself a Kentuckian, and at the Orchestra we’ve made it our mission to do right by this beautiful state and its exceptional people. We can’t wait to get on the road and make music across the state! The Orchestra and I are incredibly grateful to the Kentucky General Assembly and our legislative leaders for believing in this vision and making this project possible. This is indeed a historic day for music in the Commonwealth and for your Louisville Orchestra.”

Graham Parker, Interim Executive Director has made the LO Commonwealth tour a top priority since assuming his post a few short months ago. Parker says: “The Louisville Orchestra demonstrates meaningful artistic and community leadership by making a commitment to the entire Commonwealth of Kentucky to bring people together through music. Our vision has been to create bridges across an urban-rural divide and to serve audiences who are often overlooked, bringing them the distinctive and celebrated artistry of Teddy Abrams and the LO. This is the right way for a modern American orchestra to engage with communities locally and regionally.”

Lee Kirkwood, Chairman of the Louisville Orchestra Board of Directors sees strong potential in the business and community relationships that will develop as the LO’s impact extends past Louisville. Kirkwood says: “The board of directors, staff, and musicians of the Louisville Orchestra extend sincere appreciation to the leaders in the Kentucky House and Senate for the confidence this appropriation shows in our ability to bring people together through music. Forging connections that unify and creating relationships across boundaries will improve the lives of everyone from business leaders to schoolchildren.”

About the Louisville Orchestra Touring Initiative

Louisville Orchestra as a Resource for the Commonwealth

The Commonwealth of Kentucky presents a rich landscape of history, community, industry, and ecology, with extraordinary depth of both innovation and tradition. Despite numerous successes across the state, there is little doubt that many regions feel left out or underserved in receiving access to arts and culture programming. Additionally, the reality of rural areas being left behind by investment focused on urban areas has created an urban-rural divide, with those living outside the Louisville Metro looking toward the city with frustration.

The Louisville Orchestra firmly believes that beyond the primary human essentials like employment, housing, and healthcare, a truly healthy and unified community needs the arts to provide it with cohesion and purpose. Music, as a universal language requiring no intermediary or translation, has an especially great power to create community.

The LO is a proactive community partner and pioneer of artist-driven civic leadership, actively working to provide access to its performances, free family engagement activities, and free community parks concerts that ensure the removal of economic or social barriers. Until now, this increased access has been restricted to the Louisville Metro; the next step is to provide access across the state.

Through the vehicle of an annual Kentucky tour beginning in 2023, the LO will return to a moment in its own history when it was a resource for the entire Commonwealth. Bridging communities from all corners of the state, the orchestra will provide access to mainstage concerts and act as a cultural resource, building community partnerships, bringing enrichment activities designed for youth and families, and incorporating local musicians and musical traditions into LO programming and performances. The opportunity for Abrams and the orchestra to spread their message of community-building and musical collaboration outside of Louisville and across the state of Kentucky only reaffirms what Arts-Louisville concluded long ago: “The orchestra, specifically this orchestra, is a living, breathing, evolving, and relevant art form.”

Launch of Creators Corps

Teddy Abrams & Louisville Orchestra Establish New “Creators Corps” Residency Program for Composers

Long praised for visionary thinking about the role of an orchestra in its community, galvanizing Music Director Teddy Abrams and the Louisville Orchestra embark in the 2022-23 season on their newest initiative, the Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps, completely transcending traditional commissioning and composer-in-residence paradigms with a radically new model for collaborating with symphony orchestras in the 21st century. Each year, the orchestra will select three creators to move to Louisville and live in the Shelby Park neighborhood for at least 30 weeks, serving as staff members with an annual salary of $40,000, health insurance, provided housing, and a custom-built studio workspace. Creators with experience beyond the Western classical tradition are encouraged to apply, and those participating in the program will have the option of re-applying/renewing for one or two additional years. Throughout their residencies, they will compose new works to be performed by the orchestra, participate in educational and community engagement activities, and be active, engaged citizens of their neighborhood. The program has been funded by a three-year, $750,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and individual donors. Applications are due by May 2, and the three finalists will be publicly announced in mid-June. The residency begins on September 1.

Abrams, who was named Conductor of the Year for 2022 by Musical America and is now in his eighth season with the orchestra, explains:

“The LO Creators Corps is the most ambitious large-scale project the Orchestra has undertaken since I arrived in Louisville. The concept developed from four critical lines of inquiry: how can we establish Louisville as a global center of creative music-making, how can we reposition composers as visible leaders with public service responsibilities, how can we provide our city with a direct and deep connection to the art-making process, and how can we offer a 21st-century response to the LO’s historic First Edition commissioning and recording project? The resulting concept will be a grand experiment – a first amongst American orchestras – to employ (and house!) multiple, full-time composers (called creators to represent all musical genres) who will regularly present new music for both the Orchestra and the community beyond, serving as creative artists committed to helping our city grow and flourish. I like the idea of deploying artists for a real purpose, getting them involved in a way that involves a deeper collective vision, like the Peace Corps.”

Composer Angélica Negrón, a member of the Creators Corps Advisory Panel which will review all the applications, adds:

“The LO Creators Corps is a uniquely special opportunity for composers to have a meaningful and sustainable relationship with a wonderful orchestra that’s deeply committed to not only supporting new music but also to making this new music a vital part of their community. To have the chance to imagine, create and develop with such a substantial and strong support system is a rare gift for music makers – particularly in the context of orchestras – that could have a huge impact on a composer’s career, and I’m excited to hear the music and conversations that this new initiative sparks.”

The Creators Corps initiative builds on the Louisville Orchestra’s earliest history and personality as an institution. Starting in 1947, the orchestra began an ambitious and unprecedented project of commissioning new orchestral works from composers around the world. At a time when even the most prestigious orchestras were offering few works by living composers, the Louisville Orchestra commissioned and premiered 21 works in just three seasons. With the launch of First Edition Recordings in 1955, the LO became the first American orchestra to own a recording label when it received a Rockefeller grant of $500,000 to commission, record, and premiere music by living composers. Known as a pioneer in new music ever since, the orchestra has commissioned more than 150 works from luminary composers including Aaron Copland, William Schuman, Paul Hindemith, Darius Milhaud, Jacques Ibert, Heitor Villa-Lobos, and a host of others. From 1947 to the 1977-78 season, no other orchestra equaled the impact of the Louisville Orchestra in bringing to life the works of contemporary composers. The New York Philharmonic came closest with a total of 110 works created compared to the Louisville Orchestra’s 136 commissions. During the same period, the Boston Symphony Orchestra premiered 87 commissions, the Houston Symphony 81, the American Composer’s Orchestra 76, and the Chicago Symphony 75. A survey of premieres starting in 1958 shows that the Louisville Orchestra’s active advocacy of the works of living composers stimulated a dramatic worldwide increase in support that continues to this day.

Though conceived as a successor project to First Edition Records, the Creators Corps also represents a giant leap forward. The initiative asks the three invited creators to act as artist-leaders, developing meaningful relationships with neighborhood residents and embodying the orchestra’s conviction that music is a fundamental part of civic life. Responsibilities will include creating orchestral works to be featured in the LO’s annual Festival of American Music; community-based projects; education initiatives; collaboration with performers of diverse genres and backgrounds; curating portions of orchestral programs at Old Forester’s Paristown Hall; and participating in public activities in the Shelby Park neighborhood and throughout Louisville.

The Louisville Orchestra has assembled an Advisory and Selection Committee to determine each year’s three finalists from an open application process. The committee will search for creators from a variety of backgrounds who have distinctive artistic voices, are dedicated to community and educational outreach, and care deeply about grounding their musical practice in social engagement. The ideal applicants will be early or mid-career creators with bold ideas about writing for and interacting with an orchestra. They must be civic-minded and interested in utilizing music as a vehicle for community change. Finally, the creators must be outgoing, social, and self-directed, with the desire to initiate projects and be active in neighborhood life. Creators with wide-ranging experiences and training are encouraged, but applicants must have the ability to compose for a symphony orchestra or be willing to partner with other creators with those skills.

Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer says:

“Our Louisville Orchestra’s tradition as an innovator and an international center for new works takes another leap forward with the launch of the Creators Corps. Our Orchestra benefits from exciting new music, and Shelby Park and our entire community benefit from the educational and community events. Hats off to Teddy Abrams and the entire Louisville Orchestra team for their efforts to show how a community can shape the arts, and how the arts can shape a community.”

Graham Parker, interim Executive Director of the Louisville Orchestra, concludes:

“The Louisville Orchestra has always led the national conversation about the role of composers in the shaping of artistic and civic impact. The new Creators Corps program is the next bold chapter of that story, providing our community and audiences with consistent relationships with leading creative voices of the day, as well as providing a stable and deep opportunity for a composer to hone their voice and understand how their music can bring the community together. This is the only way forward.”

Application Process

Artists can apply and view details at  https://louisvilleorchestra.org/creators-corps.

Important Dates & Deadlines

• March 23, 2022: Applications open
• May 2, 2022: Application deadline
• End of May 2022: Notification
• August 2022: Selected residents begin relocating to Louisville
• September 1, 2022: Residency period begins

For questions, please contact Jacob Gotlib, Creative Neighborhood Residency Program Manager, at jgotlib@louisvilleorchestra.org or call 502.587.8681.