News Release

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CONTACT: Ben Hires at (781) 224-1117 or send an email.

New England String Ensemble Performs Ballets Russes Inspired Concert

(Wakefield, Mass. – March 5, 2009) The New England String Ensemble (NESE) presents its third concert of its 15th anniversary season with a program entitled, “Ballets Russes” to be presented on Friday, April 3 at 7:30pm at the Rogers Center for Performing Arts at Merrimack College, North Andover, Mass. and Saturday, April 4 at 8:00pm at New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, Boston.  This concert is presented in partnership with the Ballets Russes 2009 Festival, which celebrates the cultural legacy Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes has had on music, dance, visual arts, and cinema.

Diaghilev collaborated with many great Russian composers.  The Ballets Russes promoted and advanced Russian culture in Russia and the world.  Nikolai Tcherepnin composed and conducted Le Pavillon D’Armide, the first ballet performed by the Ballets Russes in 1909.  NESE will perform a new string orchestra arrangement of Tcherepnin’s String Quartet in A minor, Op. 11.  Diaghilev hired a young Igor Stravinsky, and he was instrumental in launching Stravinsky’s career.  One of Stravinsky’s many collaborations with Diaghilev will be performed - Apollon musagète, which wascomposed in 1927.  This ballet was choreographed by balletmaster George Balanchine.  Anton Arensky’s Variations on a theme by Tchaikovsky has become established in the concert repertoire as the composer's most lasting orchestral work.  Arensky was a composer that Diaghilev worked with in 1909.  The concert ends with Tchaikovsky’s beautiful Serenade in C for Strings, Op. 48, which appropriately completes the program as the last movement is subtitled Tema russo. 

A pre-performance discussion by Music Director Federico Cortese and Peter Rand, Executive Director of Ballets Russes 2009 will precede each concert by 45 minutes.  Tickets for “Ballets Russes” range from $47, $37, and $27 at Jordan Hall and $35 and $25 at the Rogers Center for the Arts (students receive $10 discount), and are available on‑line at www.newenglandstringensemble.org or by calling 781-224-1117.  Russian Ambassador to the United States Sergey I. Kislyak is the concert’s Honorary Patron.

About the New England String Ensemble
The New England String Ensemble (NESE) was founded in 1994 to champion strings in
performance and education. The mission of NESE is to engage, educate, and inspire with passionate string orchestra performances and innovative community programs.

Music Director Federico Cortese leads this world-class string orchestra, which performs rich and intellectually engaging new and known works, and its educational programs focuses on creating lasting relationships with young composers and performers who promise to be tomorrow's concert artists, audiences and composers.

About Music Director Federico Cortese
Federico Cortese assumed the post of Music Director of the New England String Ensemble in March 2006.  He has conducted throughout the United States, Australia, China, and Europe.  From 1998-2002, he served as Assistant Conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Seiji Ozawa.  In addition to his annual scheduled concerts, Mr. Cortese led the Boston Symphony several times in Symphony Hall and at Tanglewood, most notably performing Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and Puccini’s Madam Butterfly.  Mr. Cortese is also the Music Director at the Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras and has conducted several prominent symphony orchestras, including Atlanta, Dallas, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony and Oslo Philharmonic.  Opera engagements have included Maggio Musicale in Florence, the Spoleto Festival in Italy and the United States, the Boston Lyric Opera, the Saint Louis Opera, the Finnish National Opera, Opera Australia, and the Washington Opera.  Mr. Cortese has been music coordinator and associate conductor of the Spoleto Festival in Italy.  He also served as Assistant Conductor to Robert Spano at the Brooklyn Philharmonic and to Daniele Gatti at the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome.  Mr. Cortese studied composition and conducting at the Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia in Rome and subsequently studied at the Hochschule für Musik in Vienna.  In addition, he has been a conducting fellow at the Tanglewood Music Center.  Mr. Cortese also studied literature and humanities and holds a law degree from La Sapienza University in Rome.

About Ballets Russes 2009
The city of Boston will host an eight-day festival, devoted to the centenary of Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, from May 16th to May 23rd 2009. Collaboration and cosmopolitanism were the hallmarks of this revolutionary performing company from the time of its May 1909 Paris premiere. To honor and explore the legacy of those legendary productions, Ballets Russes 2009 will feature dance, music, visual art, cinema, and other happenings inspired by the genius of Diaghilev's creative team and the extraordinary figure of the impresario himself.  For more information the Ballets Russes website is www.ballets-russes.com.