The Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) was founded by Theodore Thomas in 1891. The ensemble makes its home at Orchestra Hall in Chicago and plays a summer season at the Ravinia Festival. The music director is Riccardo Muti, who began his tenure in 2010. The CSO is one of five American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five".
Vladimir Davidovich Ashkenazy is an internationally recognized solo pianist, chamber music performer, and conductor. He is originally from Russia and has held Icelandic citizenship since 1972. He has lived in Switzerland since 1978. Ashkenazy has collaborated with well-known orchestras and soloists. In addition, he has recorded a large storehouse of classical and romantic works. His recordings have earned him five Grammy awards plus Iceland's Order of the Falcon.
Dame Kiri Janette Te Kanawa is a New Zealand soprano. She has a full lyric soprano voice, which has been described as "mellow yet vibrant, warm, ample and unforced".
Valerie Pitts, Lady Solti was one of the BBC's original team of television presenters during the 1950s. She left the programme in 1960 to marry James Sargent who was stage manager of the Sadler's Wells Opera Company. She also worked at Granada Television. She is the widow of Sir Georg Solti.
Margaret Eleanor Hillis was an American conductor. She was the founder and first director of the Chicago Symphony Chorus.
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) was the 16th President of the United States.
The history of the Chicago Symphony Chorus began on September 22, 1957, when the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) announced that Margaret Hillis would organize and train a symphony chorus. Music Director Fritz Reiner’s original intent was to utilize the Chorus for the two weeks of subscription concerts that season, performing — George Frideric Handel’s Messiah in December and Giuseppe Verdi’s Requiem in April. When Bruno Walter informed the Orchestra’s management that his March 1958 appearances would be his last in Chicago the board president Eric Oldberg insisted that Walter conduct Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Requiem utilizing the new Chorus. During that first season, it would have been logistically impossible for Hillis to audition and prepare a new Chorus for three major works within less than four months. As an interim fix the Apollo Chorus of Chicago was used for the Christmas Messiah concerts.
Ryan Bell McAdams is an American conductor.
Edward Elgar's Symphony No 2 was first recorded complete in 1927 by His Master's Voice conducted by the composer. This recording was reissued on LP record and later on compact disc. There was no further recording for seventeen years, until Sir Adrian Boult made the first of his five recordings of the symphony in 1944. Since then there have been many more new recordings, the majority played by British orchestras with seven of them recorded by the London Philharmonic.
The conductor Sir Georg Solti recorded throughout his career for the Decca Record Company. During the 1950s and 1960s Decca had an alliance with RCA Records in the USA and some of Solti's recordings were first issued on the RCA label.
Johannes Gelert (1852-1923) was a Danish-born sculptor, who came to the United States in 1887 and during a span of more than thirty years produced numerous works of civic art in the Midwest and on the East Coast.
Abraham Lincoln is an outdoor bronze sculpture of Abraham Lincoln by George Fite Waters, located in the South Park Blocks in Portland, Oregon, United States. The 10-foot statue was donated by Henry Waldo Coe. It was cast at Claude Valsuani's foundry in France in 1927, on Lincoln's birthday, and was dedicated on October 5, 1928.
Paternoster, also known as Shepherd and Sheep or Shepherd with his Flock, is an outdoor 1975 bronze sculpture by Elisabeth Frink, installed in Paternoster Square near St Paul's Cathedral in London, United Kingdom.
Campane di Ravello is a short orchestral composition by the American composer John Corigliano. The work was commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for the 75th birthday of its then music director Georg Solti. Its world premiere was given by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Kenneth Jean on October 9, 1987.
Horse and Rider is a 1974 bronze equestrian sculpture by Elisabeth Frink. The work was commissioned for a site in Mayfair; another cast is in Winchester. It was described by Frink as "an ageless symbol of man and horse".
