She begins work Aug. 1, and her contract extends through the 2023-24 season.
A native Australian who came to the United States to lead the Interlochen Arts Academy Orchestra, Watsonâs conducting credits include Austin Symphony, Detroit Symphony Civic Orchestra, Kansas City Ballet, Kansas City Chamber Orchestra and the Lyric Opera of Kansas City. In 2017, she was a Dallas Opera Hart Institute Fellow and in the forthcoming season will lead productions at Des Moines Metro Opera and Amarillo Opera.
Watson is currently director of orchestral studies at the University of Kansas and still returns to Interlochen each summer to conduct. In 2022, she will lead the all-state orchestras in Colorado and Washington.
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He says the group initially came together to perform benefit concerts for the Little Traverse Bay’s emerging youth orchestra, which is now at Crooked Tree Arts Center.
The musicians enjoyed playing in these benefit concerts so much that they decided to create a more permanent orchestra in the region.
In October 2001, the newly minted Great Lakes Chamber Orchestra gave its first official concert.
Pattengale says some of the early concerts were sparsely attended. Sometimes we would get 25 people, and sometimes we’d have more players in the orchestra than we had in the audience, he says.
Credit Interlochen Center for the Arts
Founded in 1993, the Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation seeks to help people in many ways.
The Foundation not only offers grants to support those who need medical and dental care, but it also regularly awards scholarships to music students.
The Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation Scholarship has supported dozens of Interlochen Arts Camp and Academy students over the past two decades.
On today s program, we talk with four of those scholarship recipients about their time at Interlochen and how their current careers embody values that Ella Fitzgerald held dear, such as education and equity.
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