LUKAS Foss
Symphony No. 1
Renaissance Concerto
3 American Pieces
Ode

ARTISTS: JoAnn Falletta, Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, Amy Porter, Nikki Chooi
COMPOSER: Lukas Foss
LABEL: Naxos American Classics
CAT ID: 8.559938 / 636943993828

GRAMMY® CATEGORY:
Best Classical Compendium

German-American composer Lukas Foss transformed the Buffalo Philharmonic into an adventurous and world-renowned orchestra during his tenure as music director, and he was a mentor to the orchestra’s current music director, JoAnn Falletta, at the start of her career. This album celebrates the 100th anniversary of Foss’s birth with four works, including the lyrical Symphony No. 1 and the Renaissance Concerto.

JoAnn Falletta

GRAMMY Award-winning conductor JoAnn Falletta serves as music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and music director laureate of the Virginia Symphony Orchestra. She has guest conducted many of the most prominent orchestras in America, Canada and throughout Europe, Asia and South America. As music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic, Falletta became the first woman to lead a major American orchestra. Credited with bringing the Philharmonic to an unprecedented level of national and international prominence, she is a leading recording artist for Naxos, and won her most recent GRAMMY as conductor of the Buffalo Philharmonic for Richard Danielpour’s The Passion of Yeshua (8.559885-86). Other GRAMMY awards include a 2019 win as conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra for Kenneth Fuchs’ Spiritualist (8.559824), and 2 GRAMMY wins in 2008 for her Naxos recording of John Corigliano’s Mr. Tambourine Man: Seven Poems of Bob Dylan (8.559331). From 2011 to 2014 she served as principal conductor of the Ulster Orchestra, with whom she made her BBC Proms debut and recorded six highly acclaimed Naxos albums. She was the first woman and the first American to fill this post. Falletta is a member of the esteemed American Academy of Arts and Sciences, has served as a member of the National Council on the Arts, is the recipient of many of the most prestigious conducting awards and was named Performance Today’s Classical Woman of the Year 2019.

For more information, visit www.joannfalletta.com/

Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra

Founded in 1935, the GRAMMY Award-winning Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra (BPO) is Buffalo’s leading cultural ambassador, presenting more than 120 classics, pops and youth concerts each year. Since 1940, the orchestra’s permanent home has been Kleinhans Music Hall. In March 2018, the BPO became the first American orchestra to perform at the Beethoven Easter Festival in Warsaw, Poland. In 2022, they made their 24th appearance at Carnegie Hall celebrating the life and works of Lukas Foss, former BPO music director. Over the decades, the BPO has matured in stature under leading conductors William Steinberg, Josef Krips, Lukas Foss, Michael Tilson Thomas, Julius Rudel, Semyon Bychkov and Maximiano Valdés. During the tenure of JoAnn Falletta, the BPO has rekindled its distinguished history of radio broadcasts and recordings, including the release of around 50 albums of diverse repertoire on the Naxos and Beau Fleuve Records labels. The Philharmonic’s recording of John Corigliano’s Mr. Tambourine Man: Seven Poems of Bob Dylan (Naxos 8.559331), featuring soprano Hila Plitmann, received GRAMMY Awards for Best Classical Vocal Performance and Best Classical Contemporary Composition, and its recording of Richard Danielpour’s The Passion of Yeshua (Naxos 8.559885-86) received a GRAMMY Award for Best Choral Performance.

For more information, please visit: www.bpo.org

Amy Porter

Flutist Amy Porter has been praised by critics both for her exceptional musical talent and her passion for scholarship. Through a versatile and distinguished career as a concert performer, she has become a skillful and creative muse for composers of our time, and given numerous performances at Carnegie Hall. The multifaceted Porter is also an acclaimed professor of music at the University of Michigan. She has won praise both as a recording artist and chamber musician. The winner of the Third Kobe International Flute Competition, she is a member of Trio Virado alongside violist Jaime Amador and guitarist João Luiz. Formerly a member of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Porter graduated from The Juilliard School. She is the host of the PorterFlute Pod podcast and her AOS-Wellness website offers her Anatomy of Sound™ curriculum.

For more information, please visit: www.amyporter.com