Albany Symphony puts on ‘Mozart’s Magical Voyage’ for Albany area school students

ALBANY – The Albany Symphony Orchestra delighted students from Dougherty, Lee, Terrell and other surrounding counties with music and theater, Friday morning.

In partnership with Classical Kids Music Education’s Classical Kids Live, the orchestra and two actors presented “Mozart’s Magical Voyage,” a performance that combined fiction and history as well as storytelling and music to teach students about the famous composer.

LeeAnna Anglin, the Albany Symphony’s general manager, said the performance opens the arts up to children and hopefully inspires them to pursue music or other art forms.

“It’s proven that bringing in music and the arts … helps children thrive in their regular curriculum,” Anglin said.

There were about 850 students split between two performances Friday. Anglin said they come from public, private and even home schools and are mostly between kindergarten and eighth grade. She said this is the Albany Symphony’s third year partnering with Classical Kids Live, but it’s put on children’s programming for the last 20 years.

Paul Pement, Classical Kids Music Education’s executive and artistic director, said he wants to inspire children to take up the arts as well as create future classical musicgoers through the performances.

The program travels around the world to put on shows. Pement said he’s designed shows in China, Malaysia and throughout North America and for a couple hundred orchestras. He said the shows are carefully designed by combining story and music into a captivating performance for school children.

“It’s kind of our magic ingredient,” Pement said. “We’re able to share with them a lot of historical information about the composer’s life, but because we have a child on stage … they are the point of entry for kids in the audience.”

He said students see themselves in the child character and learn about the composers through the character’s journey. The performance lasts about an hour. The actors move across the stage, all the while including the orchestra in their story.

Claire Hillard, the Albany Symphony’s conductor, said the orchestra is part of the action and interaction. The young character, Carl, at one point gets up and conducts the orchestra. The two actors interact with the piano player. They move the story through the music.

This children’s program is put on each spring. Pement said next year’s show will highlight Saint-Georges, who is widely known as the first classically established black composer.

He said he thinks this will have a strong impact on Albany’s diverse student audiences.

“We’re excited to bring the Saint-Georges show here,” Pement said. “I think it’s going to be really important for kids in the audience to see representation of themselves on stage. It’s not only about a black composer, but our actors are African American.”

Hillard said he hopes these shows break stereotypes placed on the symphony.

“We face stereotypes about orchestras – ‘Oh it’s for old people’ or ‘Oh, it can’t be for me. What do I wear? I can’t afford to go,’” he said. “By children coming to this, they get in their head ‘Oh, that was cool. I like it.’”

Hillard said it reaches kids at different levels.

“Music has power,” he said. “If we did this for 10,000 kids, and two of them were affected, then it’s worth it.”