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Ravinia's 'Bernstein 101' continues the great American composer's legacy

Centennial celebrations tied to the birth of late composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein officially ended last year. But the Ravinia Festival in Highland Park is keeping the party going with “Bernstein 101: The Celebration Continues,” featuring a series of classical concerts, stage performances, film screenings and the Grammy Museum's traveling “Leonard Bernstein at 100” exhibit.

“We realized even before we even got to Bernstein's centennial last summer that there was so much there with him as a conductor, a composer, a pianist, a great music teacher, an activist - so many facets to this most wonderful of American musicians,” said Ravinia president and CEO Welz Kauffman.

Bernstein (1918-1990) only conducted 13 performances at Ravinia, making his Chicago Symphony Orchestra debut 75 years ago in 1944. But with globe-trotting conductor Marin Alsop on staff at Ravinia as its “artistic curator,” it made sense to celebrate Bernstein because she was one of his last students and protégés to go on to a major career.

Other living links to Bernstein are his three children with the late Felicia Montealegre: Jamie, Alexander and Nina. Jamie Bernstein is returning to Ravinia this summer to promote her father's legacy as a concert narrator and a pre-screening panelist to two Chicago Symphony Orchestra performances: “Lenny: A Musical Portrait in Symphony, Song and Story” on Saturday, July 27, and “On the Waterfront” (a live performance of Bernstein's score for the 1954 film).

Jamie Bernstein, daughter of Leonard Bernstein, is the narrator of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert "Lenny: A Musical Portrait in Symphony, Song and Story" on Thursday, July 27, and a pre-screening lecturer to "On the Waterfront" on Friday, Aug. 9, at the Ravinia Festival. Courtesy of Ravinia Festival

“We're so thrilled that Ravinia decided they weren't done celebrating,” said Jamie Bernstein. “My brother and sister and I really love our dad's music, so it's no hardship to have attended so many concerts and performances and hear his music being played all over the world.”

As a writer, Jamie Bernstein has taken the lead among her siblings in promoting her late father's work. She shared plenty of impressions and eyebrow-raising details, including family drug use, in the revealing 2018 memoir “Famous Father Girl,” which was released in paperback this week. The book's title came from a playground taunt Jamie received as a kid.

Conductor Marin Alsop was a protégé of the late composer/conductor Leonard Bernstein. She is actively involved in the Ravinia Festival's "Bernstein 101: The Celebration Continues" performance series. Courtesy of Adriane White

“I involved my brother and sister from the beginning of the project and I told them that they had total veto power over anything I wrote,” Jamie Bernstein said. “My general rule of thumb was that any detail that you try to suppress or obfuscate is going to come around and bite you.”

Jamie Bernstein has gone on record citing last year's Chicago Symphony Orchestra performance of “Mass,” a massive 1971 oratorio that Bernstein wrote to open the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., as one of the best she has ever seen. That sold-out performance, featuring Tony Award-winning opera baritone Paulo Szot as “the Celebrant,” generated so much buzz and demand for tickets that Kauffman and Alsop programmed an encore of “Mass” on Saturday, July 20.

Szot is a soloist for the July 27 concert, and he's also the leading man opposite soprano Patricia Racette for two Chicago Philharmonic performances of “Trouble in Tahiti.” Bernstein's 1952 one-act opera actually name-checks Highland Park in its lyrics listing suburban enclaves full of surface bliss.

The 1961 film version of "West Side Story" will be screened with live accompaniment by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Ravinia on Friday, July 12. Courtesy of United Artists/MGM

The Grammy Museum's “Leonard Bernstein at 100” exhibit is planned for late July.

Both Kauffman and Jamie Bernstein are hopeful for two major film projects tied to Leonard Bernstein coming in the future. A Steven Spielberg-directed remake of “West Side Story” is now in production, so another generation will get a chance to fall in love with the Leonard Bernstein/Stephen Sondheim score. A potential biopic starring Bradley Cooper is also in the pipeline.

“Leonard Bernstein is someone that we'll be celebrating for multiple seasons,” Kauffman said. “He has such a huge impact on the world today, even with him gone so long.”

“Leonard Bernstein 101: The Celebration Continues”

Location: Ravinia Festival, 418 Sheridan Road, Highland Park

Performances featuring Bernstein's music“Songfest”: The Caroga Arts Ensemble teams with The Poetry Foundation at the Martin Theatre at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, June 20. $25-$30/$10 lawn.“West Side Story”: David Newman conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra to accompany the 1961 film at 8 p.m. Thursday, July 12. $35-$90 pavilion/$25 lawn.“Mass”: Marin Alsop conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra with Tony Award winner Paulo Szot as the Celebrant at 8 p.m. Saturday, July 20. $25-$90 pavilion/$15 lawn.“Lenny: A Musical Portrait in Symphony, Song and Story”: Marin Alsop conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra with Jamie Bernstein as narrator at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, July 27. $35-$105 pavilion/$15 lawn.“On the Waterfront”: David Newman conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra to accompany the 1954 film at 8 p.m. Friday, Aug. 9. $35-$90 pavilion/$25 lawn.“Trouble in Tahiti”: Marin Alsop conducts the Chicago Philharmonic with opera stars Patricia Racette and Paulo Szot in the Martin Theatre at 5 and 8:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 22. $25-$35/$10 lawn.“Candide”: Eric Jacobsen conducts The Knights at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 28. $25-$90 pavilion/$10 lawn.For more information on other concerts in the series, call (847) 266-5100 or see

ravinia.org.

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