Pacific Symphony Orchestra

An enthusiastic crowd packed the Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre on Saturday night to hear the Pacific Symphony Orchestra, led by Carl St.Clair, perform a lively mix of music by composer John Williams, including his most famous film scores and the fanfare he wrote for the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. St.Clair, who was making his first Orange County appearance since the death of his son last month, leaned into the music, seeking to draw the utmost from each instrument in the orchestra. St.

So its full name is Pacific Symphony Orchestra after all. When the term "Orange County's Pacific Symphony" showed up recently in official announcements and as part of the orchestra's new, 25th-anniversary season logo, some people began wondering. To answer inquiries, management sent out a note saying the board had changed the name "to make a closer connection with Orange County residents to thank them for 25 years of support." But that's not entirely true. Or false.

Carl St. Clair, an assistant conductor of the Boston Symphony, Monday was named music director of the Pacific Symphony. St. Clair--at 37, the youngest of eight announced candidates for the position--will assume his duties Oct. 1 and expects to spend about three months of next year in Orange County. He said Monday that although he will leave Boston, he will hold onto one of two other jobs he currently holds elsewhere around the country.

Someone send out a search party: Beethoven is missing. Mozart and Bach aren't around much anymore either. In an age when flashy music videos dictate fashion and TV commercials scream for attention with rock songs, classical music is often relegated to a forgotten corner of the pop culture arena. The Pacific Symphony Orchestra hopes to polish that image and grab some new fans this weekend, with free concerts in Santa Ana and Anaheim.

The Pacific Symphony Orchestra will play its second annual free summer concert complete with a fireworks display from 6 to 9 p.m. Friday at Centennial Park. The park is at Fairview Street and Edinger Avenue.

Orange County's close-knit classical music world was in mourning Tuesday over news that the toddler son of Pacific Symphony conductor Carl St.Clair drowned in a swimming pool while his mother was incapacitated by a seizure. Cole St.Clair, 18 months, apparently slipped into a neighbor's Laguna Beach swimming pool late Monday afternoon after Susan St.Clair suffered a diabetic seizure and lost consciousness in an adjacent hot tub, authorities said.

Despite their fund-raising efforts, student musicians at Adelaide Price Elementary School are $500 away from seeing a performance of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra at the Orange County Performing Arts Center. Price is one of 10 county schools that participate in Class Act, a program sponsored by the symphony program that includes monthly performances at schools by musicians and free performances at concert halls.

In the tradition of Chinese New Year celebrations, 110 supporters of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra wore red- and gold-colored cocktail attire to the Ritz in Newport Beach Sunday. Red and gold symbolize prosperity and good luck, which is what everyone wishes for in a new year, said Arlene Cheng, president of the Chinese-American League of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra.

Wesley Brustad, executive director of the Spokane (Wash.) Symphony for the past five years, has been appointed executive director of the Orange County Pacific Symphony, officials of the Fullerton-based orchestra announced this week. Brustad, 42, will assume his new post Aug. 5, said Raymond Ikola, chairman of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra Assn. As chief administrator, Brustad will direct audience-development and fund-raising campaigns.

Russian conductor Dmitri Liss, who leads the Pacific Symphony's final summer concert Saturday at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater, has racked up successes in Kuzbass, Omsk, the Ural area--places that are not household names for most Southern Californians. "Dmitri, simply by a matter of geography, doesn't have the wide reputation that he deserves," Pacific Symphony assistant conductor Mark Mandarano said recently from his home in Long Beach. "He's working in Russia.

Although a prolific composer in most of the standard genres (and the innovator of a few new ones), Philip Glass didn't write a symphony until he was past 50, older even than such late symphonic starters as Brahms or Bruckner. That first one in 1993, the "Low" Symphony, was also a new invention, a symphonic metamorphosis on an iconic '70s art-rock album by David Bowie and Brian Eno. Since then, however, symphonies have flowed extravagantly from Glass.

The Pacific Symphony Orchestra will play its second annual free summer concert complete with a fireworks display from 6 to 9 p.m. Friday at Centennial Park. The park is at Fairview Street and Edinger Avenue.

There have been larger, more ambitious, more ceremonial pieces of music written than Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. But when the occasion is an especially important one, solemn or celebratory, when the need to instill a genuine sense of hope and promise is crucial, the Ninth is the inevitable choice. The wall in Berlin falls, and Bernstein is right there with the Ninth.

An enthusiastic crowd packed the Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre on Saturday night to hear the Pacific Symphony Orchestra, led by Carl St.Clair, perform a lively mix of music by composer John Williams, including his most famous film scores and the fanfare he wrote for the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. St.Clair, who was making his first Orange County appearance since the death of his son last month, leaned into the music, seeking to draw the utmost from each instrument in the orchestra. St.

When Pacific Symphony Orchestra conductor Carl St.Clair steps onto an Irvine stage Saturday night, barely a month into mourning the death of his 18-month-old son, he intends to project a welter of emotions, not least of them a sense of celebration. In part, his professional ethic guided his decision to lead the orchestra so early in his bereavement for Cole Carsan St.Clair, who drowned July 26. "If I could do it, I should do it," the orchestra's musical director said this week in an interview.

Elementary school children from the Santa Ana Unified School District performed Tuesday with the Pacific Symphony Orchestra, beginning a three-day series of youth concerts aimed at protecting an endangered species--the orchestra. About 18,000 students from throughout Orange County are expected to attend the free "Ode to Peace" concerts at the Orange County Performing Arts Center, sponsored by Taco Bell.

A band of gypsies set up camp at the home of Pat and Marvin Weiss on Saturday to bring good fortune to the Pacific Symphony Orchestra. "When Gypsies Gather" was the theme of the Pacific Symphony Orchestra League's first major gala, which attracted about 200 guests wearing rainbow-colored scarves and gold bangles. The $150-per-person dinner-dance raised about $70,000 for the symphony. Gypsy Spirit "I love the gypsy theme," said Pat Weiss, who wore a flowing gypsy skirt.

Orange County's close-knit classical-music world was in mourning Tuesday over news that the toddler son of Pacific Symphony conductor Carl St.Clair drowned in a swimming pool after his mother was incapacitated by a seizure. Cole St.Clair, 18 months, apparently slipped into a neighbor's pool late Monday afternoon after Susan St.Clair fell unconscious after suffering a diabetic seizure in an adjacent hot tub, authorities said.

Orange County's close-knit classical music world was in mourning Tuesday over news that the toddler son of Pacific Symphony conductor Carl St.Clair drowned in a swimming pool while his mother was incapacitated by a seizure. Cole St.Clair, 18 months, apparently slipped into a neighbor's Laguna Beach swimming pool late Monday afternoon after Susan St.Clair suffered a diabetic seizure and lost consciousness in an adjacent hot tub, authorities said.