David Wroe will conduct the New Jersey Festival Orchestra in concerts titled “An American AND Paris,” in Westfield and Basking Ridge.
The New Jersey Festival Orchestra will present concerts cleverly titled “An American AND Paris” this week, both outdoors (at Hertell Gardens in Westfield, July 30 at 8 p.m.) and indoors (at the Fellowship Cultural Arts Center in Basking Ridge, July 31 at 2:30 p.m.).
NJFO music director David Wroe will conduct the orchestra in a program that includes George Gershwin’s 1928 An American in Paris (which inspired the 1951 movie of the same name) as well as works by French composers Camille Saint-Saëns (The Carnival of the Animals) and Claude Debussy (Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun) and Englishman Ralph Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending. NJFO concertmaster Brennan Sweet will be featured on violin on The Lark Ascending.
For the Westfield, show, lawn chairs are recommended, and attendees are invited to bring their own refreshments. Doors will open at 6 p.m. and pianist Xifei Xu will give pre-concert talk about the evening’s program at 6:30 p.m. Xu will also give a talk in Basking Ridge, at 1:30 p.m.
For information, visit njfestivalorchestra.org.
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