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Avalanche - An Orchestra Short Story
Forming an Orchestra is probably the most exciting thing musicians can do.
Like at the beginning of every good story they start by gathering their colleagues to form a friendly team of passionate musicians and embark on an artistic adventure. On the journey they face many an organizational challenge and adapt to stay the course or rather fine tune it. This constant navigation probably becomes their true craft, pleasure and identity, and once their first project is complete, they instantly find new concerts to produce and keep sailing.
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Avalanche is a perfect example of such journey. What started as a concerto orchestra, under the name Empire State Symphony featuring young soloists, rapidly morphed into NewOrch presenting jazz and contemporary cocktails, epic symphonies and electro-chic parties in underground venues. After a two-year chapter collaborating with Metamorphosis Chamber Orchestra's opera productions at Carnegie Hall and new music recordings, it became urgent for us to create a unique vessel for our endeavors.
In May 2022, we founded Avalanche and the non-for-profit organization Avalanche Arts with the intention to utilize music and arts to serve intercultural exchanges by:
- Fostering artistic creation beyond borders and stylistic boundaries,
- Offering people from all backgrounds unrestricted access to diverse concert experience and music-making opportunities.
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Coming soon - Discover our journey in 4 videos
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Join our Members!
You can also contact us directly at contact@avalanche-arts.com
or via the form below:
Avalanche - past and future Projects
See our first season projects below and help us make them possible!
Avalanche was founded to favor intercultural exchanges through music and unleash the traditional Symphony. In practice, we facilitate the traveling of music and musicians and strive to expose our audiences to new artistic tastes, inviting them to challenge their relationship with orchestral music. We develop this plan in two directions as we collaborate with foreign artists and perform outside the US. Likewise, we export Classical music to unconventional venues and invite non-Classical artists to express themselves with a full Romantic symphony orchestra and perform their music in concert halls.
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A Kaleidoscope of Sound: Centennial Celebration of Gershwin's RHAPSODY IN BLUE - SUPPORT US!
They are making it possible: SUNY Optometry, Private Donors
History has it that Paul Whiteman decided to prove that the new music called Jazz was not any less refined than classical music. He thought it deserved to be heard in a concert hall, with orchestrations for a symphonic band. On February 12, 1924, he presented his "Experiment in Modern Music'' at the Aeolian Hall which as the critic W. Damrosch later wrote "made a lady out of Jazz". This concert featured early traditional Jazz, comedy selections, the latest standards, and two creations: Victor Herbert's Suite of Serenade - the last composition of the operetta master - and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue!
Avalanche is excited to celebrate this piece which crystallized the sound of American music, influencing Jazz, Classical and Music at large for the past hundred years! We will be presenting a concert based on the original 1924 program, with a 25-piece Symphonic Jazz band Avalanche, our favorite Vladimir Rumyantsev at the piano and our Broadway Star guest Mary Callanan.
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Join us on Monday February 12, 2024
at SUNY Optometry (in the historic Aeolian Pianos and Hall building)
33 W 42nd St., New York, NY 10036
7:30-10PM
Centennial Concert & Champagne Reception
We are now raising the last $5000 needed to bring two pianos in the Hall and materialize this project.
Here is how you can help:
1. buy a ticket to the show. They are a bit expensive but they will bring you to us and directly support the orchestra.
2. buy a number of tickets to be donated (contact us directly to make it a tax deductible donation).
3. make a tax-deductible donation to Avalanche Arts, our non-profit (aka 501c3) on PayPal or contact us directly
4. become a member of the Avalanche Orchestra by joining our Patreon circle.
5. listen to early Jazz and send us good vibrations!
There are still three days left until we close 2023 and the fiscal year, we count on you!
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PAST PROJECTS
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Musica Barata, by Columbian composer Fabian Beltran - recorded on June 22, 2022
They made it possible: NYU Science and Art, Avalanche
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"the piece is conceived as a work of popular music that features a strong Latin jazz influence while incorporating a few elements of classical/contemporary composition. The music openly embraces the dancelike, folk, and rhythmic vitality that is often prevalent in popular music genres and non-Western traditions." F. Beltran
Avalanche: celebrating Polish-American Heritage Month with pianist RadosÅ‚awa Jasik and composer MikoÅ‚aj Górecki - performed on November 22, 2022
They made it possible: Polish Diplomacy in Warsaw, Consulate General of Poland in New York, Polish Cultural Institute, Green&Szymanski Offices, Private Donors, Avalanche
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In the Polish Consulate’s stunning Ballroom pianist RadosÅ‚awa Jasik, Louis Arques, and the Avalanche Orchestra championed MikoÅ‚aj Górecki’s penetrating music and interviewed the composer on his work. To expand the artistic dimension of the evening, they invited the artist BolesÅ‚aw Ryzinski to exhibit his latest series of photographs.
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