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Chicago College of Performing Arts Celebrates Release and Success of New CD


Mythology CD cover

CHICAGO–(ENEWSPF)–December 1, 2015.  A new CD featuring orchestral works composed by Roosevelt University music professor Stacy Garrop and performed by the University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts (CCPA) Chamber and Symphony Orchestras has been released this fall by Cedille Records.

The album Mythology Symphony: Orchestral Works by Stacy Garrop is the first to feature the flourishing Chicago-based composer’s orchestral music and also is the first professional, internationally distributed recording with performances by CCPA students.

“This is wonderful exposure for our music composition faculty member Stacy Garrop, as well as for our music college and its student orchestras,” said Henry Fogel, dean of CCPA.

Presenting Garrop’s major orchestral output from 1999 to 2013, the new CD includes Mythology Symphony, a dramatic, lyrical, five-movement work inspired by female characters of Greek legend as well as world-premiere recordings of Garrop’s Thunderwalker and Shadow.

All three pieces were recorded at the Benito Juarez Community Academy Performing Arts Center in Chicago. Alondra de la Parra, the Billboard-charting internationally-known conductor who has been selected to become music director and principal conductor of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra in Australia, conducted Roosevelt’s CCPA Orchestra for Mythology Symphony in January 2015.  Markland Thakar, music director of the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra and co-director of graduate conducting at the Peabody Conservatory, conducted Roosevelt’s Chamber Orchestra for Thunderwalker and Shadow in March 2014.

“We had the opportunity to work with different conductors who brought out our best. It has been a fantastic journey for all of us – not just for me, but also for our students,” said Garrop.

The Mythology Symphony album is the ninth Cedille recording to feature Garrop’s work.  The composer’s orchestration on the new CD has been called “stunning” by blogger and music reviewer Rad Bennett, who also credits more than 100 Roosevelt student musicians on the recording with performing with “amazing conviction and finesse.”

“It was a pleasure to be part of the recording process and to be able to interact as a musician with the composer,” said Tom Johnstone, a second-year Master’s in Music Performance student at CCPA who plays a trombone solo on the Mythology Symphony’s second movement, “Penelope Waits.”  “It’s definitely something to point to on my resume,” Johnstone said.

“It’s definitely been great to see how professional recordings are made and to have that kind of experience under my belt,” added Allison Chambers, a second-year Master’s in Music Performance student at CCPA and  principal cello on the recording, whose performance includes a solo on Mythology Symphony’s fourth-movement, “The Fates of Man.”  “I am so happy that the finished product is such a high-quality recording,” she said.

Mallory Linehan, an undergraduate violin performance major, plays the instrument on all three pieces recorded for the album. “The experience has helped me to understand that recording music is a collaborative experience,” said Linehan. “It was a difficult and challenging project, but all of us came together in the end because we realized that this was something that was bigger than ourselves. It was a project about Roosevelt, its music program, its faculty member Stacy Garrop and her music.”

To listen to portions of the new album and/or to order a copy visit: http://www.cedillerecords.org/albums/mythology-symphony

Source: www.roosevelt.edu


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