Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra

Current News

Young Artist Competition Winners Awarded

The Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra is pleased to announce the winners of the 2008 Young Artist Competition, held on January 27 at the Patton Auditorium of BRCC. The first place winner, Josianne Bailey, will receive a $500 cash award and play with the Hendersonville Symphony at its April 19th concert. Second place and a $300 award went to Elizabeth Gergel, and third place and $200 went to Eric Weigel. The Competition is made possible by our sponsor, SunTrust Bank.

	Josianne Bailey, age 17 and a native of Fletcher, NC, has played flute since the age of nine. She studies currently with Pam Caldemeyer. She plays with the Asheville City/Buncombe County Schools Youth Orchestra as principal flutist. She has recently placed first, second and third in solo auditions, including one at Furman University. Her gospel bluegrass band has recorded both CDs and DVDs. She also studies harp with Jacquelyn Bartlett and piano with Ruth Nussbaum-Borden. She is a senior at Bailey Prep School and takes classes at Blue Ridge Community College.

	Elizabeth Gergel, age 15, began playing cello at five years of age. She has studied with Francis Duff of Asheville and currently studies with Dr. Christopher Hutton at Furman University. Elizabeth was twice selected as a member of the Suzuki Association of the Americas Youth Orchestra. In 2004, 2006 and 2007 she won second place at the Music Academy of NC Cello Competition in Greensboro. She is co-principal cello of the Carolina Youth Symphony in Greenville, SC.

	Eric Weigel, age 17, began his musical studies at age five on the violin. At twelve he began piano studies and has been under the instruction of Dr. John Cobb for the past five years. In 2006, Eric made his orchestral debut playing Mozart's Piano Concerto #21 with the Asheville Chamber Orchestra. In 2007, he placed first in the advanced division of the Asheville Area Piano Forum's annual competition. Eric is currently a junior at Asheville School.

The Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra Receives a
National Endowment for the Arts Challenge Grant

The Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra is proud to announce that it has received a $10,000 Challenge America Reaching Every Community Fast-track Grant from the National Endowment for the arts in support of our March 11, 2007 performance of the Brahms German Requiem. Quoting from a national press release dated Friday, March 2, 2007.

The National Endowment for the Arts announces grant awards totaling $1,360,000 through the Challenge America Reaching Every Community Fast-track grant program. Bringing the arts to all Americans is a significant part of the NEA's mission and this program is integral to that effort. NEA Deputy Chairman for Grants and awards Tony Chauveaux said, "Providing broad access to the arts is key to the NEA's work."

The NEA recognizes and honors excellence on a national level. The HSO is among only three organizations chosen in the state of North Carolina to receive this award. It honors not only our organization, but our community as a whole. Such recognition puts us into very rarified company, indeed.

Bravo HSO!
Bravo Hendersonville!

News Archives

2007 Young Artist Competition Winners Announced

Each year the Hendersonville Symphony sponsors the Young Artist Competition, for ninth through twelfth graders who are residents of Buncombe, Cherokee, Clay, Graham, Haywood, Henderson, Jackson, Macon, Madison, Polk, Swain, Transylvania or Yancey counties. This year, auditions were held on Sunday, January 28 in the Patton Auditorium of Blue Ridge Community College.

The Hendersonville Symphony is proud to announce this year's winners: First place went to Drew Prichard, a tuba player who studies at the South Carolina Governor's School. Drew will play with the Hendersonville Symphony on April 14 and receive a $500 award. Second place was pianist Michael Dowling of Brevard. Michael will receive a $300 award. Josianne Bailey won third place and will receive $200. She is a flutist.

These young people are to be congratulated for their high level of performance. We are grateful for the support of SunTrust Bank, which provides the funding for this competition.

For information about the 2008 competition, please contact the Hendersonville Symphony Office at 828-697-5884 or Cheryl Hagymassy at 828-696-3953.

Maestro Ludwig von BEARthoven


Photos show, from left to right: Bill Humleker, HSO President loading the bear for a trip to the studio. The partially completed bear is shown with artist Beth Donahue. The nearly completed bear is waiting for his debut.

The Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra's entry in the 2006 "Bearfootin' in Downtown Hendersonville" is rapidly nearing completion in the hands of artist Beth Donahue. His name is Maestro Ludwig von BEARthoven and as you can see, he has already come a long way from his arrival in January. That day, when board president Bill Humleker picked him up for transport to Donahue's studio, he was an extremely pale white. He showed no musical talent at all, much less a genius for composing and conducting. As you can see, he has grown thick unruly locks, an 19th century costume, also very musical, as well as a conductor's baton and music stand. The 2006 bears will be presented to the community on April 29th. We're still waiting for word of our Maestro's extact display location. We'll post that exciting news here as soon as available.

A dream achieved: The Symphony

Louise Bailey
ALONG THE RIDGES

When the Hendersonville Symphony Orchestra begins tuning up for its Christmas concert Friday, many of us will be thinking of Chan Harbour and wishing he were there to see what has grown out of his dream of providing for the people of Hendersonville the music he felt they deserve. He came for retirement, but when he found our community markedly involved in literature and art and music, he declared, "Now we need to round out our artistic lives with a symphony orchestra." He was determined to get one started, and in one way it was no sudden decision on his part, for ever since he was a 9-year-old lad he had longed to play in a symphony orchestra.

But not in just that. Although he was a gifted instrumentalist, his ambition spent some years wavering between a symphony and a circus band, depending on which he was listening to at the moment. Then many years later he found Hendersonville and a surprising number of outstanding musicians already in residence. Among them was Joseph Falvo, who had worked with John Phillip Sousa and never failed to get the audience on its feet when he played The Stars and Stripes Forever on his piccolo. Falvo had played flute with a number of orchestras, and in Orson Welles' Invasion from Mars, and had taken part in shows starring Eddie Cantor, Fred Allen, Lucille Ball, Dinah Shore and on Popeye cartoons.

Achieving a goal

Hendersonville 's new symphony orchestra began under the direction of James Stokes, and "with musicians who never lost faith in achieving our goal," according to Chan Harbour . Comments after that first performance were highly complimentary, such as "....a great thing for Hendersonville and I want to see it continue;" "It's the greatest thing that has happened in Hendersonville in a long time...," "It fills a long vacant gap in the music life of Hendersonville and I want to see it become a part of our culture in this community."

People doubted if another town of Hendersonville's size in the entire United States could boast of such a fine orchestra by which the "numbers were beautifully performed." People were amazed that so much talent existed in a small town, and more was coming in as industries and retirement brought people from all over the country.

Chan Harbour was fully aware of the Brevard Music Center , which held performances only in summer. He kept thinking. Why not have concerts the year-round?

When Chan was 9 years old his father, who played a French horn, gave him a clarinet. Three years later Chan was playing both clarinet and trombone. He earned a place in his high school orchestra and went on to play in his college orchestra and later in an orchestra in Ohio . Disappointed over not qualifying for a place in a symphony, he turned to composing music, some of his numbers being Queen of Hearts, Weeping Willow Trees and Alone with Memory, the latter being a particular favorite of piano teachers working with students in their early stages of piano training. While Chan's compositions are no longer well-known today, they hold a permanent place in the music world, some of them having been published in foreign countries.

Chan Harbour liked to point out that it took 17 years of hard work for The Philadelphia Orchestra, now one of the world's greatest, to reach its zenith, while the first performance of the Hendersonville group was a "progress appearance to show what had been done in seven months." And the performers played for the love of music, not for pay.

Louise Bailey is a native of Henderson County and lives in Flat Rock. She is the author of several historical books on the people of Henderson County and writes from a lifelong interest in the history of the area.

back to the top >>