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Feb.18th, 2020 - 7pm

VPO Presents

GEORGE GERSHWIN

Variation for Piano and Orchestra 
“ I Got Rhythm “

JOHN WILLIAMS

Orchestra Suite from
E.T. 
the Extra-Terrestrial

GUEST

ARTISTS

Pianist

Francesco Maria Navelli

 

Violinist

Salvatore Lombardo

 

Vocalists
Whitney Morse and Sean Stork

 

FRANCESCO MARIA NAVELLI

Francesco Maria Navelli was born in 2003 in a family of musicians. He started very

early studying piano. At the age of thirteen he starts studying at the prestigious “Incontri col Maestro” Music Academy of Imola, in Italy, with Professor Leonid Margarius.

He won several national and international Piano Competitions, such as “6°Concorso Internazionale Premio Accademia Giovani 2016” in Rome, “Concorso

Internazionale di Esecuzione Musicale” in Salerno, “Concorso Internazionale

Leopoldo Mugnone” in Caserta, “Concorso Internazionale Paola Galdi” in Vietri sul

Mare, “Concorso pianistico Napolinova” in Naples, “Concorso Bach” in Sestri

Levante, , “IV Concorso Europeo di esecuzione musicale Jacopo Napoli” in Cava

de’ Tirreni.

At the age of fifteen he won the third prize at the prestigious “21° Concorso

Internazionale Pietro Argento” in Gioia del Colle. At the age of sixteen he won the third prize at the Cantù Piano Competition. Hewas the only italian finalist for the classic and romantic music sections.He attended several Masterclasses with Professor Alexander Romanovsky,Professor Roberto Prosseda and Professor Antonio Pompa Baldi.

Francesco was invited to perform in many recitals in different italian cities, such as

Venezia, Verbania, Imola, Naples, “Concerti in terrazza” at the Teatro San Carlo,

Rovereto and Milan. He also performed in Madrid and Leon, in Spain.

Francesco is also part of a Piano-Violin Duo with his older brother, Davide Navelli.

Together they won several competitions, getting attentions from music critics and

audience.

SALVATORE LOMBARDO

Salvatore Lombardo, Italian, born in 1977 in Catania (Sicily), made his debut at a very young age obtaining the first prize at the "Campochiaro" international competition. He made his debut as a soloist performing "la campanella" by Paganini with the orchestra of the Bellini theater in Catania. Winner of the violin contest in the orchestra of the Teatro San Carlo in Naples at the age of 19, he perfected with Franzetti, Marin, Belkin. Member of the "Kubrik trio" in Italy, he plays as the first violin in the Carlo Felice orchestra in Genoa in 2015 and in other chamber ensembles. In his professional career he meets and collaborates with Muti, Maazel, Prêtre, Sinopoli, Inbal, Pappano, Valerio, Mehta, Valchua, Zukerman, Vengerov, and many others. With the "Collegium Philarmonicum" orchestra he recorded the concert for violin and orchestra by Antonello Paliotti, a living Neapolitan composer. He has an intense concert activity in duo with the piano and collaborates with the group "Cinquetto", an instrumental ensemble that re-read the classical repertoire in a humorous way, performing in concert halls, schools and hospitals for children, to transmit through the humor the beauty of music and art.

WHITNEY MORSE

Whitney is an actor and singer who grew up in The Villages, Florida. She attended Rollins college and spent 4 years working as an actor in both Aspen, Colorado, and Chicago, Illinois afterward. Whitney completed her studies in 2011, earning an MFA in Acting from Columbia University School of The Arts in New York City, where she studied with some of the world’s leading teaching artists including Kristin Linklater, Andrei Serban, Olympia Dukakis, Larry Singer and Anne Bogart. While at Columbia Whitney had the opportunity to study the art of teaching acting at Columbia’s sister school Barnard College under Rebecca Guy, who is an acting professor at Julliard. In the years following her graduation, Whitney has worked as an actor in New York City, Chicago, and now she has added Orlando, Florida to her extensive resume.

Whitney has been working as a private monologue, dialect and scene study coach since her graduation from Columbia in 2011. As an actor, Whitney is a Broadway World Award Nominee for Best Actress and has received rave reviews being called “one of Chicago’s finest young actresses” by Colin Douglass of Chicago Theatre Review. Whitney is also an accomplished cabaret performer and has performed her one-woman show Aphrodite Don’t Forget Me: Confessions of a Serial Monogamist in both New York City and The Villages, Florida.

Whitney was a founding company member of Prologue Theatre Company in Chicago where she served as Literary Manager and currently held the title of Casting Director. She spent the eight years with Prologue producing works from under-represented voices throughout history in Chicago to much acclaim. While continuing to work as a theatre maker and actor around the country, Whitney is also The Artistic Director at The Sharon L. Morse Performing Arts Center and The Studio Theatre Tierra Del Sol.

SEAN C STORK

Sean Christopher Stork, lyric baritone, has been singing across the state of Florida since graduating from Florida State University in 2007, including regular engagements with Florida Opera Theatre as well as First Coast Opera in St. Augustine, The Florida Lyric Opera in Tampa, and the Villages Philharmonic and Orlando Philharmonic Orchestras. He has made his unique mark on such roles as Guglielmo Cosí fan tutte, Count Almaviva Le nozze di Figaro, Escamillo Carmen, Procolo Le convenienze ed inconvenienze tetrali, Fiorello Il barbiere di Siviglia, Captain Corchoran HMS Pinafore, and musical theater roles such as Hucklebee The Fantasticks, Rapunzel’s Prince Into the Woods, and Harold Hill The Music Man. Sean has also been a featured Master Work soloist for such works as Theodore Dubois’ Seven Last Words of Christ, Franz Schubert’s Mass in G, W.A. Mozart’s Regina Coeli and Requiem in Dm as well as George Friderick Handel’s The Messiah, Giaccomo Puccini’s Messa di Gloria and Ralph Vaughan William’s Five Mystical Songs and Dona Nobis Pacem. A strong supporter of modern music, he has collaborated with local composers in recordings of new works such as The Sculptor, War and Peace and Kevin Lay’s Starboy. He is also an active composer and arranger, having commissioned works for the Basilica Choir of the National Shrine of Mary, Queen of the Universe, The Villages Philharmonic Orchestra, and numerous choruses and ensembles. Mr Stork is currently performing across the country with such auspicious ensembles as Diversita Opera Arts Company, Opera Tampa, The Villages Philharmonic Orchestra; Orlando Philharmonic; The Hudson Valley Chorale; Orlando Harmony; Orlando Exchange; the Dickens Carolers; and the Basilica Choir of the National Shrine of Mary, Queen of the Universe.
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