Released on: March 11, 2008, 1:31 pm

Press Release Author: Fran Berger/The New England Institute of Art

Industry: Financial

Press Release Summary: Take one part symphony, mix with creative interactive media
and experience a once-in-a lifetime interpretation of music, courtesy of The New
England Institute of Art students and the Metrowest Symphony Orchestra

Press Release Body: (Brookline, MA) March 10, 2008- What do you get when a group of
art students collaborate with a symphony orchestra? On Sunday, April 13, the answer
will be revealed when Interactive Media Design students from The New England
Institute of Art (www.artinstitutes.edu/boston) in Brookline perform with the
Metrowest Symphony Orchestra (MSO) in Hopkinton, as part of the Orchestra\'s Marathon
Week Kickoff concert.

The students are part of a unique class called Interactive Performance led by
composer Chris Florio. Students come to the class having already been trained in
audio, video, animation, design and programming. Florio created the class to give
the students an opportunity to use these talents in live performance situations.
Each semester, students in the class create a new performance piece using the skills
that they bring to the class. This semester they will be working for the first time
with a live orchestra.

Florio has collaborated numerous times with Dr. Peter Cokkinias, the musical
director of the Metrowest Symphony. When the two discussed the performance class
over coffee this past spring, Dr. Cokkinias invited Florio and his students to
collaborate on a concert with the MSO.

The second half of the April 13 concert will feature pieces by Prokofiev,
Stravinsky, Bach, Mussorgsky and Holst, as well as a new work composed by Florio.
For each piece the students will create an interactive visual performance. "Students
who normally listen to hip-hop and electronica are learning classical repertoire and
how to read an orchestral score so that they can create tightly integrated visuals
that fit to spirit of the music," says Florio.

They are reprogramming Nintendo Wii game controllers to fly spaceships during
Holst\'s "The Planets" and to launch fireworks during \"Pictures at an Exhibition\" by
Mussorgsky. "The students have created some video and animation in advance of the
concert but much of it will be created in real-time using software such as Adobe
After Effects, Flash and Arkaos VJ. We will be bringing a small arsenal of computers
and hardware to Hopkinton.\"

The first half of the concert features a Piano Concerto performed by Ronald Kmiec, a
concert pianist and marathon runner.

The Marathon Kickoff Week concert will be held Sunday, April 13, 2008 at 3 pm at
Hopkinton High School Auditorium, 90 Hayden Street, Hopkinton, MA. Tickets are $15
for Adults, $6 for Students and Seniors and there is no charge for children under
12. For more information visit: http://www.metrowestsymphony.org/


Web Site: http://www.artinstitutes.edu/boston

Contact Details: Fran Berger, PR Director
The New England Institute of Art
10 Brookline Pl West,
Brookline Ma 02445
617 582-4442
fberger@aii.edu