Jess Shead, narrator
Andrew Crust, conductor
Vancouver Symphony Orchestra
JAMES M. STEPHENSON: Compose Yourself! (Once Upon a Symphony)
How does the symphony orchestra actually work? The perfect blend of entertainment and education, Compose Yourself helps kids discover the instruments of the orchestra and how you actually put a symphony together. Jess Shead makes a behind the scenes visit to the Orpheum.
Jess Shead, narrator
Jess Amy Shead is a performer, creator and producer, with a focus on site-specific micro-performance, puppetry, theatre for young audiences, American Sign Language/English theatre, collective creation, and musical theatre. She is the co-recipient of two Jessie Richardson Theatre Awards for Outstanding Production and Outstanding Performance in the Theatre for Young Audiences Category, a Vancouver Fringe Artistic Risk Award, and the Bill Millerd Artist Fund. She is currently co-creating a table-top puppetry show with Randi Edmundson, Shizuka Kai and the Little Onion Puppet Co. called Otosan, which means father in Japanese. She has worked as an actor at The Globe Theatre, Pacific Theatre, Chemainus Theatre, The Gateway Theatre, The Belfry Theatre, and Theatre SKAM, among others.
Andrew Crust, conductor
Andrew Crust has developed a versatile international career as a conductor of orchestral, opera, ballet and pops programs. Currently serving as the Associate Conductor of the Vancouver Symphony in Canada, Andrew conducts a large number of subscription, pops, educational and contemporary concerts with the VSO each season. Andrew is the newly-appointed Music Director of the Lima Symphony Orchestra beginning in the 20/21, where he programs and conducts the Grand Classics, Pops and Educational series, featuring such soloists as Awadagin Pratt, Amit Peled and Kathrine Jolly.
In the current and upcoming seasons Andrew will debut with the Arkansas and Vermont Symphonies as Music Director finalist, and with the San Diego Symphony and Calgary Philharmonic as a guest conductor. Other recent engagements include performances with the Winnipeg Symphony, Memphis Symphony, Hartford Symphony, Bozeman Symphony and l’Orchestre de la Francophonie in Québec.
Andrew is a 2020 winner of the Solti Foundation US Career Assistance Award. In 2017 he was awarded first prize at the Accademia Chigiana by Daniele Gatti, receiving a scholarship and an invitation to guest conduct the Orchestra di Sanremo in Italy. He was a semi-finalist for the Nestlé/Salzburg Festival’s Young Conductors Award competition, and was selected by members of the Vienna Philharmonic as a winner of the Ansbacher Fellowship, with full access to all rehearsals and performances of the Salzburg Festival.
Andrew is equally at ease in the pit, having conducted ballet with Ballet Memphis and the New Ballet Ensemble, and opera with Opera McGill, College Light Opera Company, Boulder Opera Company, and others. As a Pops conductor, Andrew has collaborated with such artists as Rufus Wainwright, Steven Page, Michael Bolton, Cirque de la Symphonie, and the United States Jazz Ambassadors. Andrew has also established himself as a conductor of films with orchestra.
Andrew served as Assistant Conductor of the Memphis Symphony Orchestra from 2017-2019 where he conducted around forty concerts each season. He stepped in last minute for a successful subscription performance featuring Bernstein’s Serenade with violinist Charles Yang. Andrew also served as Conductor of the Memphis Youth Symphony Program. As the Assistant Conductor of the Portland Symphony Orchestra in Maine from 2016-2018, he conducted a variety of concert series, helped coordinate the orchestra’s extensive educational programs, and helped lead a program for concertgoers under 40 called “Symphony and Spirits”.
Crust was the Assistant Conductor of the National Youth Orchestra of the USA (NYO-USA) in the summers of 2017 and 2018, assisting Michael Tilson Thomas on an Asian tour, as well as Giancarlo Guerrero, Marin Alsop and James Ross at Carnegie Hall and in a side-by-side performance with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He has also served as Cover Conductor of the Kansas City Symphony, San Diego Symphony and Nashville Symphony, Assistant/Cover Conductor of the Boulder Philharmonic and Assistant Conductor of Opera McGill.
Abroad, he has led concerts with the Orchestra Giovanile Italiana in Italy, Hamburger Symphoniker at the Mendelssohn Festival in Germany, the Moravian Philharmonic in the Czech Republic and the Orquesta Sinfónica de Chile in Santiago.
As an arranger/orchestrator, Andrew is currently working with Schirmer to make orchestrations of a set of Florence Price’s art songs, has orchestrated works by Alma Mahler and Prokofiev, as well as many pops and educational selections.
Andrew is dedicated to exploring new ways of bringing the classical music experience into the 21st century through innovative programming and marketing, creating community-oriented and socially-sensitive concert experiences, and utilizing social media and unique venues. Andrew is a firm believer in meaningful music education, having produced and written a number of original educational programs with orchestras.
Vancouver Symphony Orchestra
Founded in 1919, the Grammy and Juno-award winning Vancouver Symphony Orchestra is the third largest orchestra in Canada, the largest arts organization in Western Canada, and one of the few orchestras in the world to have its own music school.
Led by Music Director Otto Tausk since 2018, the VSO performs more than 150 concerts each year, throughout Vancouver and the province of British Columbia, reaching over 270,000 people annually. On tour the VSO has performed in the United States, China, Korea and across Canada.
The orchestra presents passionate, high-quality performances of classical, popular and culturally diverse music, creating meaningful engagement with audiences of all ages and backgrounds.
Recent guest artists include Daniil Trifonov, Dawn Upshaw, James Ehnes, Adrianne Pieczonka, Gidon Kremer, Renée Fleming, Yefim Bronfman, Itzhak Perlman, Bernadette Peters, Tan Dun, and more.
For the 2020-21 season the VSO has created the innovative streaming service TheConcertHall.ca, a virtual home for a virtual season, where more than forty performances will be released throughout the year.
JAMES M. STEPHENSON
b. Lockport, IL, USA / February 4, 1969
Leading American orchestras, instrumentalists and wind ensembles around the world have performed the music of Chicago-based composer James M. Stephenson, both to critical acclaim and the delight of audiences. The composer is largely self-taught, making his voice truly individual and his life’s work all the more remarkable. Recent and upcoming premieres include the Chicago Symphony with Riccardo Muti, St. Louis (Robertson), Montreal, and Minnesota Orchestra (Vänskä), and the Cabrillo Festival (Macelaru), as well as the US “President’s Own” Marine Band (Col. Fettig). Over 150 orchestras and bands play his music annually.
His recent CD - "Liquid Melancholy - the music of James Stephenson" (featuring Chicago Symphony clarinetist John Yeh) was a 2019 Grammy nominee for Best Engineered, Classical. Additionally, his monumental Symphony #2 - VOICES - has earned the esteemed Ostwald Award (2018) from the American Bandmasters Association, after just having won the 2017 National Band Association's annual Revelli Award.
His 3rd symphony - VISIONS - received its premiere in April, 2019. The Memphis Symphony (Robert Moody) recorded his powerful and emotional “Concerto for Hope” (trumpet concerto #3) with soloist Ryan Anthony in the spring of 2019.
After a recent 10-year stint as Composer-in-Residence with the Lake Forest Symphony, he has recently been named Musical Collaborator with the Grand Rapids Symphony for the 20-21 season, and Composer-in-Residence with the International Chamber Artists, for whom he will compose his first opera.
Jim Stephenson’s popular work “Compose Yourself!” (aka Once upon a Symphony) was composed in 2002 for the Naples Philharmonic. It is a 50-minute showcase for symphony orchestra, designed to introduce young audiences to the wonders of the orchestra. Additionally, and uniquely, it engages the audience in the compositional process, resulting in a unique world premiere created each and every performance.
The interactive, educational and entertaining show is designed to introduce the musical instruments and families to children of all ages. It has been performed over 350 times nationally and internationally. Original music that incorporates bottles, hoses, and just plain fun has resulted in thousands of young people laughing and loving the experience of hearing an orchestra, sometimes for the first time. Composed with flexibility in mind, the piece can be performed in a concert setting with conductor, narrator and full symphonic orchestra, or can travel as a self-narrated presentation in its original setting for a chamber ensemble of 15 players.
Jess Shead, narrator
Andrew Crust, conductor
Vancouver Symphony Orchestra
JAMES M. STEPHENSON: Compose Yourself! (Once Upon a Symphony)
How does the symphony orchestra actually work? The perfect blend of entertainment and education, Compose Yourself helps kids discover the instruments of the orchestra and how you actually put a symphony together. Jess Shead makes a behind the scenes visit to the Orpheum.
Jess Shead, narrator
Jess Amy Shead is a performer, creator and producer, with a focus on site-specific micro-performance, puppetry, theatre for young audiences, American Sign Language/English theatre, collective creation, and musical theatre. She is the co-recipient of two Jessie Richardson Theatre Awards for Outstanding Production and Outstanding Performance in the Theatre for Young Audiences Category, a Vancouver Fringe Artistic Risk Award, and the Bill Millerd Artist Fund. She is currently co-creating a table-top puppetry show with Randi Edmundson, Shizuka Kai and the Little Onion Puppet Co. called Otosan, which means father in Japanese. She has worked as an actor at The Globe Theatre, Pacific Theatre, Chemainus Theatre, The Gateway Theatre, The Belfry Theatre, and Theatre SKAM, among others.
Andrew Crust, conductor
Andrew Crust has developed a versatile international career as a conductor of orchestral, opera, ballet and pops programs. Currently serving as the Associate Conductor of the Vancouver Symphony in Canada, Andrew conducts a large number of subscription, pops, educational and contemporary concerts with the VSO each season. Andrew is the newly-appointed Music Director of the Lima Symphony Orchestra beginning in the 20/21, where he programs and conducts the Grand Classics, Pops and Educational series, featuring such soloists as Awadagin Pratt, Amit Peled and Kathrine Jolly.
In the current and upcoming seasons Andrew will debut with the Arkansas and Vermont Symphonies as Music Director finalist, and with the San Diego Symphony and Calgary Philharmonic as a guest conductor. Other recent engagements include performances with the Winnipeg Symphony, Memphis Symphony, Hartford Symphony, Bozeman Symphony and l’Orchestre de la Francophonie in Québec.
Andrew is a 2020 winner of the Solti Foundation US Career Assistance Award. In 2017 he was awarded first prize at the Accademia Chigiana by Daniele Gatti, receiving a scholarship and an invitation to guest conduct the Orchestra di Sanremo in Italy. He was a semi-finalist for the Nestlé/Salzburg Festival’s Young Conductors Award competition, and was selected by members of the Vienna Philharmonic as a winner of the Ansbacher Fellowship, with full access to all rehearsals and performances of the Salzburg Festival.
Andrew is equally at ease in the pit, having conducted ballet with Ballet Memphis and the New Ballet Ensemble, and opera with Opera McGill, College Light Opera Company, Boulder Opera Company, and others. As a Pops conductor, Andrew has collaborated with such artists as Rufus Wainwright, Steven Page, Michael Bolton, Cirque de la Symphonie, and the United States Jazz Ambassadors. Andrew has also established himself as a conductor of films with orchestra.
Andrew served as Assistant Conductor of the Memphis Symphony Orchestra from 2017-2019 where he conducted around forty concerts each season. He stepped in last minute for a successful subscription performance featuring Bernstein’s Serenade with violinist Charles Yang. Andrew also served as Conductor of the Memphis Youth Symphony Program. As the Assistant Conductor of the Portland Symphony Orchestra in Maine from 2016-2018, he conducted a variety of concert series, helped coordinate the orchestra’s extensive educational programs, and helped lead a program for concertgoers under 40 called “Symphony and Spirits”.
Crust was the Assistant Conductor of the National Youth Orchestra of the USA (NYO-USA) in the summers of 2017 and 2018, assisting Michael Tilson Thomas on an Asian tour, as well as Giancarlo Guerrero, Marin Alsop and James Ross at Carnegie Hall and in a side-by-side performance with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He has also served as Cover Conductor of the Kansas City Symphony, San Diego Symphony and Nashville Symphony, Assistant/Cover Conductor of the Boulder Philharmonic and Assistant Conductor of Opera McGill.
Abroad, he has led concerts with the Orchestra Giovanile Italiana in Italy, Hamburger Symphoniker at the Mendelssohn Festival in Germany, the Moravian Philharmonic in the Czech Republic and the Orquesta Sinfónica de Chile in Santiago.
As an arranger/orchestrator, Andrew is currently working with Schirmer to make orchestrations of a set of Florence Price’s art songs, has orchestrated works by Alma Mahler and Prokofiev, as well as many pops and educational selections.
Andrew is dedicated to exploring new ways of bringing the classical music experience into the 21st century through innovative programming and marketing, creating community-oriented and socially-sensitive concert experiences, and utilizing social media and unique venues. Andrew is a firm believer in meaningful music education, having produced and written a number of original educational programs with orchestras.
Vancouver Symphony Orchestra
Founded in 1919, the Grammy and Juno-award winning Vancouver Symphony Orchestra is the third largest orchestra in Canada, the largest arts organization in Western Canada, and one of the few orchestras in the world to have its own music school.
Led by Music Director Otto Tausk since 2018, the VSO performs more than 150 concerts each year, throughout Vancouver and the province of British Columbia, reaching over 270,000 people annually. On tour the VSO has performed in the United States, China, Korea and across Canada.
The orchestra presents passionate, high-quality performances of classical, popular and culturally diverse music, creating meaningful engagement with audiences of all ages and backgrounds.
Recent guest artists include Daniil Trifonov, Dawn Upshaw, James Ehnes, Adrianne Pieczonka, Gidon Kremer, Renée Fleming, Yefim Bronfman, Itzhak Perlman, Bernadette Peters, Tan Dun, and more.
For the 2020-21 season the VSO has created the innovative streaming service TheConcertHall.ca, a virtual home for a virtual season, where more than forty performances will be released throughout the year.
JAMES M. STEPHENSON
b. Lockport, IL, USA / February 4, 1969
Leading American orchestras, instrumentalists and wind ensembles around the world have performed the music of Chicago-based composer James M. Stephenson, both to critical acclaim and the delight of audiences. The composer is largely self-taught, making his voice truly individual and his life’s work all the more remarkable. Recent and upcoming premieres include the Chicago Symphony with Riccardo Muti, St. Louis (Robertson), Montreal, and Minnesota Orchestra (Vänskä), and the Cabrillo Festival (Macelaru), as well as the US “President’s Own” Marine Band (Col. Fettig). Over 150 orchestras and bands play his music annually.
His recent CD - "Liquid Melancholy - the music of James Stephenson" (featuring Chicago Symphony clarinetist John Yeh) was a 2019 Grammy nominee for Best Engineered, Classical. Additionally, his monumental Symphony #2 - VOICES - has earned the esteemed Ostwald Award (2018) from the American Bandmasters Association, after just having won the 2017 National Band Association's annual Revelli Award.
His 3rd symphony - VISIONS - received its premiere in April, 2019. The Memphis Symphony (Robert Moody) recorded his powerful and emotional “Concerto for Hope” (trumpet concerto #3) with soloist Ryan Anthony in the spring of 2019.
After a recent 10-year stint as Composer-in-Residence with the Lake Forest Symphony, he has recently been named Musical Collaborator with the Grand Rapids Symphony for the 20-21 season, and Composer-in-Residence with the International Chamber Artists, for whom he will compose his first opera.
Jim Stephenson’s popular work “Compose Yourself!” (aka Once upon a Symphony) was composed in 2002 for the Naples Philharmonic. It is a 50-minute showcase for symphony orchestra, designed to introduce young audiences to the wonders of the orchestra. Additionally, and uniquely, it engages the audience in the compositional process, resulting in a unique world premiere created each and every performance.
The interactive, educational and entertaining show is designed to introduce the musical instruments and families to children of all ages. It has been performed over 350 times nationally and internationally. Original music that incorporates bottles, hoses, and just plain fun has resulted in thousands of young people laughing and loving the experience of hearing an orchestra, sometimes for the first time. Composed with flexibility in mind, the piece can be performed in a concert setting with conductor, narrator and full symphonic orchestra, or can travel as a self-narrated presentation in its original setting for a chamber ensemble of 15 players.
