Touched By The Gospel:
A Symphonic and Choral Tapestry

Friday, January 27, 2006 8 p.m. War Memorial Auditorium

The Greensboro Symphony will take a joyous spiritual journey when it presents Touched by the Gospel, a multilayered, multicultural tapestry of the finest American musical threads. Conducted by Isaiah Jackson, Touched by the Gospel features the glorious voices of 200 choristers from more than ten Greensboro Community Churches as they raise their voices in jubilant songs like For God So Loved the World and I Shall Not Be Moved.

Touched by the Gospel promises to bring audiences to their feet with expressive, soul-stirring music rendered in classic Gospel style.

American conductor Isaiah Jackson, a native of Richmond, Virginia, is now in his sixth season as Music Director of the Youngstown Symphony. In addition, he is the newly appointed Music Director of the Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra of Boston. As guest conductor, he has led many distinguished North American orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the symphony orchestras of Houston, Dallas, Toronto, San Francisco, Detroit, Baltimore, and Indianapolis, as well as the Boston Pops, Grant Park Festival Orchestra, Calgary Philharmonic, Rochester Philharmonic, Louisville Orchestra, and National Symphony (Washington, DC). While still a student at The Juilliard School of Music, Jackson was engaged as Leopold Stokowski's assistant with the American Symphony Orchestra and named Music Director of the New York Youth Symphony. He later held posts with the Baltimore Symphony, the Rochester Philharmonic, and the Dayton Philharmonic, where he was Music Director. He recently became the first person of color to conduct the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra.

Highlights of 2001 and 2002 include return engagements in Australia and in the Czech Republic, where Jackson makes his concert debut on the World Wide Web with the Prague Radio Symphony. Jackson made his European orchestral debut with the Vienna Symphony in July 1973. During that summer he served at Leonard Bernstein's suggestion as Artistic Director of Vienna's Youth Music Festival. He became the first American to hold a major post at Covent Garden when he was appointed Principal Conductor and, later, Music Director of The Royal Ballet.

In Europe, he has also conducted the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, the BBC Concert Orchestra, the Helsinki Philharmonic at the Helsinki Festival, the Malmø and Gaevleborg Symphonies, and the R.A.I. Orchestra in Rome. He has appeared at the Spoleto Festival in Italy and during the 1994-1995 season made debuts with the Czech Symphonic Orchestra at the opening of the Prague Autumn International Music Festival, the Stockholm Symphonic Wind Orchestra, and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. He has conducted before members of Britain's Royal Family on several occasions, including the 90th birthday gala for Royal Ballet founder Dame Ninette de Valois which was attended by Her Majesty the Queen, and the memorial service for Sir Frederick Ashton in Westminster Abbey.

A particular favorite in Australia, Isaiah Jackson has served as Principal Guest Conductor of both the Queensland and Canberra Symphony Orchestras and has also led the orchestras of Sydney, Perth, Hobart, Adelaide, Victoria, and Melbourne.

Active in the world's recording studios, Isaiah Jackson has made three recordings with the Berlin Symphony: string music by the film composers Bernard Herrmann, Miklós Rózsa, and Franz Waxman, and dance music by William Grant Still, both for Koch International Classics; and a live- performance CD of the orchestra's 1991 New Year's Eve concert, for European Sony. He has also recorded the harp concertos of Ginastera and William Mathias for K. I. C. with the English Chamber Orchestra and Ann Hobson Pilot as soloist. His CD devoted to the music of Australian composer Nigel Butterley was recorded for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's ABC Classics label with the Melbourne Symphony. Jackson's most recent CD, on Ivory Classics, features the debut of the American String Orchestra in works of Schumann and Dohnányi. The soloist is Grammy Award winning pianist Earl Wild.

A noted recording on Koch International Classics combines gospel music and the symphonic tradition. The CD features Jackson conducting The Louisville Orchestra and gospel choirs from throughout the Louisville area under the choral direction of Alvin Parris, III. The CD is an outgrowth of The Gospel Project, a bridge-building effort directed by Jackson and Parris; Gospel Project concerts have been performed in fourteen U.S. cities to date, including Cleveland, Boston, Chicago, Denver, and Houston. Internationally The Gospel Project has appeared at the opening of the Brisbane Biennial Festival of Music and in the Liverpool Anglican Cathedral with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic.

Jackson's concerts with the orchestras of Australia, as well as his appearances before the National Press Club, Canberra, have been beamed nationwide by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. His Boston Pops appearances have been heard on the Pops's network in the United States. His performances with the Gaevleborg Symphony were broadcast throughout Sweden. He has been seen and heard throughout Great Britain with the BBC Concert Orchestra. Jackson also conducts on the Royal Ballet video, Still Life at the Penguin Cafe , on the London/Decca label.

Born in 1945, Jackson is a cum laude graduate of Harvard, where he majored in Russian history and literature. He holds graduate degrees from Stanford University and The Juilliard School of Music, and he studied at Fontainebleau, Aspen, and Tanglewood. He has been Visiting Professor of Conducting at the Hochschule der Kuenste, Berlin's premier conservatory. At the University of Southern Queensland, he was invited to present the Eighth Concannon Oration. Jackson is Artist-in-Residence at the University of Dayton, where he assists in conference planning and curriculum development, and where he team-teaches Philosophy of Music. He has also taught at The Juilliard School, Stanford, the University of Michigan, and Youngstown State University.

Among the facilities that Jackson has inaugurated are Goosens Concert Hall at Ultimo Centre, Sydney, new home of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation; the USTA's Arthur Ashe Stadium at Flushing Meadow; and the Mahoning Valley's own Cafaro Field. Jackson's contributions to the music field have been recognized through many awards and honors, including the Signet Society Medal for Achievements in the Arts, awarded by the Signet Society of Harvard University. Past recipients of the medal include Robert Lowell, T. S. Eliot, and Robert Frost.

Isaiah Jackson is married to Helen Tuntland Jackson, a consultant in the field of music education. The couple have three children, Benjamin, Katharine, and Caroline.

Associate Pastor Rev. Alvin Parris
Rev. Alvin Parris, III has been a preacher of the gospel since 1976, and has served as both an Associate Pastor and the Director of Fine Arts Ministry at New Life Fellowship since December, 1990. He is a native of Washington, D. C., and a graduate of the Eastman School of Music (B.M., Music Education/Trombone). Rev. Parris' compositions - a wide variety of gospel songs, hymns, anthems and symphonic works - have been performed both in the United States and abroad.

He is a highly sought music workshop presenter and has led Praise and Worship seminars throughout the United States and the world, most recently in Hawaii, Ghana, Nigeria, Australia and the United Kingdom. Rev. Parris and his wife, Debra, (Eastman School of Music, '76, Music Education/Violin) have been married since 1976, and are the proud parents of 4 musicians: Benjamin, Christopher, Jonathan, and Cherise. Rev. Alvin Parris gives God ALL the glory for the many achievements and recognition bestowed upon him.

Alvin Parris, III was born in Washington D.C. and is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York ('73, Trombone, Music Education). Since 1976, he directed the Gospel Choir, and has periodically been a guest lecturer in Music Theory, Music History and Jazz Improvisation at the University of Rochester. In addition, for the Rochester City School District, he has served as Instrumental Music Supervisor at John Marshall High School and as director of the Inter-High Jazz Ensemble and the Inter-High Brass Quintet. He has established Gospel Choirs at Rochester Institute of Technology, Nazareth College, St. John Fisher College, as well as the Gospel Choirs at Monroe Community College and the University of Rochester, which he founded in 1976 and continues to direct. Rev. Parris has also served as a professor in Black church studies at the community division of the Colgate-Rochester Divinity School.

Mr. Parris' compositions - a wide variety of gospel songs, hymns, anthems, and symphonic works - have been performed both in the United States and abroad. His works for gospel chorus and orchestra have been played by the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, the Boston "Pops", the Atlanta Symphony, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Syracuse Symphony, Dayton Philharmonic, San Diego Symphony, Sacramento Symphony, the Orchestra of St. John's Square, and by other orchestras throughout the America and Europe. His Symphony No. 1 (Symphony of Faith) was commissioned by the Arts for Greater Rochester to celebrate the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1988. The Song of the Universal (for violin, soprano, tenor, chorus and orchestra) was commissioned by the Rochester Lilac Festival in 1990 and premiered by Parris' wife, Debra, a concert violinist and pianist.

In 1988, Alvin Parris served as music director of the 3600-member choir for the Greater Rochester Community Gospel Choir since 1985. He has presented music workshops and led Praise and Worship seminars throughout the United States and the world, most recently in Hawaii, Ghana, Nigeria, Australia and the United Kingdom. Mr. Parris has produced many recordings and theatrical events, and has appeared as accompanist and guest pianist/organist with such artists as Edwin Hawkins, Daryl Coley, Yolanda Adams Douglas Miller, Cleophus Robinson, Oliver Nelson, Phil Driscoll, Miss Jessye Norman with a number of orchestras throughout the country.

Future projects for 1998 include performances with the Cleveland Orchestra, the Buffalo Philharmonic (with Gladys Knight), the Philadelphia Orchestra, and a return to Australia with the Queensland Symphony and Isaiah Jackson.

In 1976, Mr. Parris was licensed and ordained as a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In 1990 he accepted the position of Associate Pastor of New Life Fellowship Church in Rochester, where he also serves as the Minister of Music.

Alvin and his wife, Debra (Eastman School of Music, '76, Music Education/Violin) have been married since 1976, and are the proud parents of 4 children: Benjamin, Christopher, Jonathan, and Cherise.

All Glory to God!