Indiana University's Summer Festival of the Arts welcomes Giancarlo Guerrero. He''s conducting the final concert by the Jacobs School of Music's Festival Orchestra in the IU Auditorium on Friday, August 5.
Resting At Home After Travels Around The Globe
Guerrero is in his second season with the Nashville Symphony. He has been conducting, quite literally, all around the globe. We caught up with him by phone in his native Costa Rica, where he was preparing for the 70th Anniversary Gala Concert of the Costa Rican National Orchestra.
"I am looking forward to coming to Bloomington for my third visit," he said, "but right now I'm enjoying being here visiting with friends in familiar places and preparing for the concert."
A Motley Mix With The Same DNA
Although Guerrero is a fervent champion of new music and contemporary composers, the program for the Bloomington concert is a mix of familiar pieces by Gioachino Rossini, Ottorino Respighi and Ludwig van Beethoven.
"I'm very much looking forward to working with the orchestra. It's such a nice mix of experienced players and students. In part we're playing standard pieces because they're great works and also because it's important for the students to experience them."
More specifically, he said, "Rossini's William Tell Overture is a lovely display of how that master can encapsulate a whole opera in just the overture. It's also nice to show people that some themes from classics are so familiar that they're part of our DNA. Two years ago when I came, we played Respighi's Fountains of Rome. This summer we'll play The Pines of Rome. I think that anyone who's been to that great city will hear echoes in the music."
As for Beethoven, Guerrero said, "Well, in the symphonic literature after Mozart and Haydn, he's the one that all musicians come to and the seventh of the symphonies is a truly wonderful piece."