Musical Co-Productions
Ideal for fund-raising events, meetings, festivals and conventions.

Knowing that people learn more efficiently when they participate, Musical Co-Productions weave historical narration with student performance. Your students play the repertoire they have prepared. Around each performance, Robert Wyatt spins the story you have selected (see menu below). With your students being the stars, two hour, half-day and full-day seminars provide a stimulating and informative gathering for students, their families, teachers and community members. Archival recordings, documentary videos and colorful PowerPoint presentations accompany each session.

Program I
The Piano: A Magical Machine and Its Music
Students perform compositions from each stylistic period interspersed with a narration revealing the fascinating history of the piano. Learn about different instrument makers, evolving mechanisms, the virtuosic super-stars and immortal composers that make the piano the most versatile of all instruments. Mr. Wyatt was an organizer and exhibition artist for the Smithsonian Piano300 celebration in Washington, D.C. during 2000 - 2001.

Program II
Franz Schubert: A Life Devoted to Art
Although Schubert's true passion lay in the composition of music for the human voice, he was certainly prolific and adept in many other genres. The session will focus on Lieder and examine the more prominent chamber works as well as his glorious compositions for piano.

Program III     
Mozart in Vienna
Mozart's residency in Vienna (1781 - 1791) produced a decade of enlightened productivity. And here, within a culture of growing middle-class values, Mozart would produce his most glorious masterworks.

Program IV 
Chopin in Paris
At a time when the pianoforte was undergoing some of its most profound structural changes, Chopin employed the tonal and technical innovations of the instrument in creative ways. In effect, his genius changed the course of piano composition forever.

Program V
Gershwin, By George!
A young Jewish composer/pianist from Brooklyn became famous overnight when his Rhapsody in Blue premiered in 1924. He is remembered not only as the composer of enlivening Broadway music and serious music written for the concert hall, but also for a life both charmed and tragic.

 

Program VI
Robert Schumann: A Portrait of Pain and Passion
Modern scholarship has helped to unravel details about the life and music of Robert Schumann, yielding the portrait of a man who had but few goals in his life—to generate magnificent music, to elevate the standards of musical taste, and to nurture a wife and children who were thoroughly dedicated to him.

 

Program VII    
The Golden Age of Broadway
Re-live an era when Kern, Berlin, Gershwin, Rodgers, Hart, Hammerstein and Porter were heralded as gods. Analyze their music, learn intimate stories of their lives and partner your students with Mr. Wyatt at the piano to produce music that has enlivened generations of listeners.