RundgrenRadio.com To Present Todd Rundgren’s First Ever Symphonic Shows In North America This June in Rockford Illinois With The Rockford Symphony Orchestra

Posted on May 2, 2012 by AmateurPianists No Comments

Rockford, IL (PRWEB) February 29, 2012

RundgrenRadio.com is proud to announce two concerts featuring Todd Rundgren, accom­panied by the Rockford Symphony Orchestra, on June 1st and 2nd, 2012 at the historic Coronado Performing Arts Center in Rockford, IL.

These will be Rundgren’s first ever symphonic shows in North America; in September of last year, Todd performed two sold out concerts in the Nether­lands backed by the Dutch Metropole Orchestra, and was smitten by the genre.

A Wizard, A True Star — the title of Todd Rundgren’s 1973 solo album aptly sums up the contri­bu­tions of this multi-faceted artist to state-of-the-art music. As a song­writer, video pioneer, producer, recording artist, computer software developer, concep­tu­alist, and inter­active artist , Rundgren has made a lasting impact on both the form and content of popular music.

Among his myriad hits are “Hello It’s Me”,“I Saw the Light”, “Can We Still be Friends”, “We Gotta Get You A Woman”, “Open My Eyes”, and “Bang the Drum “, the latter a mainstay on ESPN and in tele­vision commer­cials. Rundgren’s prolific producer’s discog­raphy includes such classics as Skylarking by XTC, We’re an American Band by Grand Funk Railroad, War Babies by Hall & Oates, Wave by Patti Smith,and Meat Loaf’s auspi­cious debut Bat Out of Hell, the fifth best selling album of all time (42 million).

Inter­na­tionally acknowl­edged as the godfather of the marriage of music and multi­media, he is respon­sible for many pioneering “firsts” :

1978: The first inter­active tele­vision concert, broadcast live over the Warner/QUBE system in Columbus, Ohio (the home audience chose each song.in real time during the concert by voting via QUBE’s 2-way oper­ating system)

1978: The first live nationally broadcast stereo radio concert (by microwave), linking 40 cities around the country

1979: The opening of Utopia Video Studios, a multi-million dollar state-of-the-art facility. The first project produced by Todd there is Gustav Holst’s The Planets, commis­sioned by RCA Selec­taVision as the first demon­stration software for their new videodisc format.

1980: Creation of the first color graphics tablet, which was licensed to Apple and released as The Utopia Graphics Tablet

1981: Time Heals, the first music video to utilize state-of-the-art compositing of live action and computer graphics (produced and directed by Todd), becomes the eighth video to be played on MTV on launch day

1982: The first live national cablecast of a rock concert (on the USA Network), simulcast in stereo to over 120 radio stations

1982: The first two commer­cially released music videos, one of which was nomi­nated for the first-ever Grammy awarded for “Best Short Form Video” the following year

1992: The release of “No World Order”, the world’s first inter­active record album on CD-i. Also the first commer­cially available music down­loads via CompuServe

1994: The release of “The Indi­vid­u­alist”, the world’s first full-length Enhanced CD

1995: The world’s first inter­active concert tour

1998: Launches PatroNet, the world’s first direct artist subscription service

The Rockford Symphony Orchestra is one of the leading cultural insti­tu­tions in Northern Illinois, performing over twenty clas­sical and pops concerts annually. The RSO was incor­po­rated in 1943 after performing for the community for nine seasons under its first Music Director and Manager, Arthur Zack, who led the orchestra for twenty-seven years. In 1970, the Board of Directors appointed Crawford Gates its next music director, bringing renowned guest artists to perform with the orchestra including Van Cliburn (1972), Victor Borge (1973), Phyllis Diller (1974), and Benny Goodman (1975).

Upon the retirement of Crawford Gates, the RSO Board named Charles Born­stein as music director in 1986. Bornstein’s intel­lectual and artistic vision were char­ac­ter­istics of his tenure.

In 1991, the Board named Steven Larsen as the RSO’s fourth music director. Described as a “Renais­sance musician,” Larsen went to work and over the last seventeen years has expanded the orchestra’s reper­toire, attracting musi­cians of the highest caliber. Youth education and community outreach programs have expanded, increasing the RSO’s presence in the lives of Rockford area resi­dents. During his tenure, Larsen added a pops series, an outdoor summer perfor­mance series and a fully-staged opera to the Symphony’s concert rosters. He has endeavored to bring the RSO’s perfor­mances to wider audi­ences by performing in new and non-traditional venues. His accomplish-ments have been recog­nized through numerous awards, including the Illinois Council of Orchestras’ 2006 Conductor of the Year and a 1999 Mayor’s Arts Award for indi­vidual achievement.

Under Larsen’s artistic lead­ership, the orchestra continues to develop the audi­ences of tomorrow through the RSO’s Youth Concerts and KinderKonzert programs, and through a wide variety of other educa­tional programs involving the entire Rockford community. Overall, the Rockford Symphony’s mission is to enlighten, educate and entertain the people of Northern Illinois through symphonic music perfor­mance of the highest artistic excellence.

The Coronado opened on October 9, 1927 as an atmos­pheric style theatre and movie palace — complete with Spanish castles, Italian villas, oriental dragons, starlit skies and a Grande Barton Pipe Organ. Countless show business legends, including the Marx Brothers, Tommy Dorsey, Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong, George Gershwin, Bob Hope, Sammy Davis, Jr., and Gypsy Rose Lee have performed on the Coronado stage.

The Coronado was the romantic setting for countless movie-going couples on their first date, and a Saturday outing for kids watching cartoons and movies through 1984. Over the years, the theatre has also played host to high school grad­u­a­tions, political rallies and community events.

After decades of use, the grand dame Coronado received a much needed facelift between 1999 and 2001, with the community-wide support of the city of Rockford, indi­viduals and corpo­ra­tions. Spear-headed by the Friends of the Coronado, a non-profit orga­ni­zation formed in 1997, the theatre was reborn in January, 2001 in its original grand style as a state-of-the-art perfor­mance and enter­tainment facility after an $ 18.5 million restoration.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVga4iMFTDk

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