Upcoming Guild Programs include our Fall Fundraiser: 7 p.m. Wed., Thurs., Nov. 6 and 7
THE WEDNESDAY CONCERT IS SOLD OUT.
The Fall Fundraiser will take place at 7 p.m. on TWO different evenings. Wednesday, Nov. 6, at the home of Hope and Joe Mena. Dessert and coffee will follow this intimate concert. A second concert will take place Thursday, Nov. 7 at the home of Rich Schell and Greg Wragge. Dessert and coffee will follow. Both concerts are being limited to create a rich and personal experience. Tickets are $150 and benefit Wiley's James 1 Foundation, plus the ongoing programs of the C S Philharmonic Guild. Thank you for your ongoing support. We look forward to seeing you, first at the October program, and then at the November Fall Fundraising event. Reserve your tickets for the Fall Fundraiser and pay electronically Reserve your tickets for the Fall Fundraiser and pay by check The Colorado Springs Philharmonic looks forward to the Guild's upcoming Fall Fundraiser, and as a gift, the Philharmonic will provide one voucher for its upcoming concert on Sunday, November 10, 2:30 p.m., All Jazz: Gershwin's Original Rhapsody*. One voucher will be donated for each purchased seat at the Guild's Fall Fundraiser.
For the details of the concert, click here. *(No tradeouts, no substitutions. Good for day/time listed) The Colorado Springs Philharmonic
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Wiley Skaret is a 17-year-old American classical pianist and improviser. Born in South Bend, Indiana, he began studying piano in the Washington, DC, area at age five. Before his 6th birthday, Wiley gave his first solo piano concert to include an on-stage improvisation, which was soon followed by his 2009 New York City debut at Carnegie Hall. Since that time, as a state, regional, and international award winner, Wiley was invited back to Carnegie Hall in 2013, and invited to play at other prestigious U.S. venues such as the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage in Washington, D.C., and solo opportunities in more than a dozen states from the East Coast of the U.S., to the mountains of Colorado, to the Big Island of Hawaii.
Since 2007, Wiley has studied with Dr. Marjorie Lee, Rosita Mang, Linda Skaret, and for the last five-and-a-half years in Colombia, under the instruction of Pilar Leyva. He is homeschooled, and is also a part-time student at Boston’s Berklee College of Music, where he was awarded a scholarship grant on behalf of composer, Alf Clausen. Wiley has also had the privilege of performing in public and private masterclasses with various world-class concert pianists including Dr. Gerardo Teissonniere of the Cleveland Institute of Music; Dr. Mayron Tsong of the University of Maryland School of Music; Dr. John Salmon of the University of North Carolina Greensboro School of Music; Brazilian pianist, Dr. Paulo Steinberg, of James Madison University; Venezuelan concert pianist and classical improvisation master, Gabriela Montero; French concert pianist, Lise de la Salle; and Colombian-Russian pianist, Anita May. In 2014, Wiley moved from the United States to Bogota, Colombia. There, he continued his concert career, playing as a featured guest throughout Colombia in venues such as Bogota’s National Museum, the Fabio Tadeo Lozano Theater, Manizales’ Fundadores Theater, Medellin’s Pablo Tobón Uribe Hall, the Cartagena Convention Center, and the U.S. Ambassador’s Residence for various events, including the 2016 U.S. Independence Day Celebration, where he opened for Los Lobos. Wiley is honored to have played Beethoven’s First Concerto with Bogota’s Unimusica Youth Orchestra under the direction of conductor Camila Barbosa in 2015, to include his own on-stage arrangement of Beethoven’s “Unfinished” Cadenza. In 2017, he performed Grieg’s Piano Concerto with Spanish conductor, Gorka Sierra, and the Caldas Orchestra in Manizales, Colombia. The Manizales-based newspaper, La Patria, labeled the performance as “Incredible!” And in late 2017, Wiley was honored to play under the baton of Maestro Andres Jaime and the Antioquia Symphony in Medellin, as Colombia’s 2017 National Soloist Champion. Colombian national radio station, La FM, reported that Wiley’s audiences were left with “mouths wide open!” Wiley is also currently under contract to play back-to-back concerts with the Bogota Philharmonic in September 2019. From his earliest notions of music making, Wiley has valued sacred music performance. As a young member at his Christian church in the Washington, DC, area, Wiley’s first-ever concerto performance with full orchestra in 2012 was composed specifically for him and three award-winning young American violinists, all of whom performed before an audience of over 10,000 people. Since then, Wiley has been privileged to perform in his local church’s praise team, as well as with leading U.S. Christian artists, including violinist Lori Jean Smith, saxophonist Nathan Woodward, the Burchfield Brothers, and legendary tenor, Russell Newport. In 2017, nationally-syndicated newspaper in Colombia, El Espectador, referred to Wiley as the “Pianista de las Buenas Causas.” Indeed, Wiley made his international concert debut in Guatemala at age 12, playing sold-out back-to-back concerts in Guatemala City, raising over $15,000 USD for Guatemala’s Margarita Tejada’s Down Syndrome foundation. After moving to Colombia, Wiley created a U.S. not-for-profit foundation called “James 1,” which seeks to raise a university scholarship endowment for the children of Colombia’s fallen police heroes. As part of Wiley’s leadership of this initiative, Wiley and his team of U.S. cinematographers have produced music videos throughout Colombia -- from Bogota, to Guasca, to Chingaza National Park, to Pereira, to the Valle de Cocora, to Cartagena, to Isla Baru, and to La Guajira -- and given benefit concerts in Colombia and the United States in support of this cause. Wiley’s James 1 production piano is currently on display as a principal exhibit at the Colombian National Police Museum in Bogota. For his leadership of James 1, Wiley was awarded the 2016 world-wide winner of the Foreign Service Youth Foundation prize for community service and the 2017 Home School Legal Defense Association Foundation’s National Servant Leadership Award. Wiley’s leadership of James 1 has also been featured in leading national Colombian media sources, to include live radio, television, documentaries, and print interviews. And recently, James 1 was showcased in State Magazine, a publication of the U.S. Department of State, featuring projects and stories from diplomats around the world. To see Wiley’s music videos and to learn about his project for the Colombian National Police, please visit www.james1.net. Apart from his performance schedule, schooling, and foundational interests, Wiley is proud to have worked at the U.S. Embassy in Bogota, Colombia: first, as an intern at the Office of the Judicial Attache; and second, as a full-time paid two-time summer protocol assistant to U.S. Ambassador Kevin Whitaker. Wiley also enjoys a number of outdoor activities including slalom water skiing, equestrian jumping, and motocross. |