Discover Beethoven's 5th - NJ TV Premier

Discover Beethoven’s 5th New Jersey Premiere on NJN – May 23

The Discovery Orchestra’s educational Discovery Concert™: Discover Beethoven’s 5th© New Jersey premiere broadcast will take place on Monday, May 23, 2011, 9:00 PM on public television affiliate NJN based in Trenton. 

Discover Beethoven’s 5th, a one-hour interactive music experience taped before a live audience in Victoria Theater at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark is designed to bring audience members more pleasure from classical music listening.  Focusing on the First Movement of Beethoven’s famous Symphony No. 5, the program features sixty members of The Discovery Orchestra™ and is hosted by Artistic Director and Conductor George Marriner Maull. 

The program, distributed nationally by American Public Television, has already reached over 50 million households across the United States.   Discover Beethoven’s 5th follows the orchestra’s first educational television program, the Emmy-nominated Discovery Concert™: Bach to the Future©.

The Discovery Orchestra (TDO) is the only orchestra in America with a mission to focus exclusively on teaching the listening skills that help people connect emotionally with classical music.   The orchestra’s first Discovery Concert, produced in 1996, was very positively received by audience and press alike.  Each Discovery Concert begins with a short 5-10 minute musical selection.  What follows is a series of enjoyable interactions between the conductor and the audience members who are cajoled to respond to questions which can only be answered by listening carefully to the next musical excerpt to be played.

Another feature of the Discovery Concerts involves the use of a printed Listening Guide.  This simplified "picturization" of the score, with numbered musical events such as a crescendo or sequence, provides each audience member with the visual means to follow and stay absorbed in the music.  At the conclusion of the concert, the entire selection is played straight through for a second time.  On stage, the numbers in the Listening Guide are displayed so that audience members can, if they wish, follow along.

This second performance is a rare occurrence at any classical music concert and a unique opportunity for a very focused listening experience for those who have just become more aware of specific aspects the music.  Discovery Concert audience members frequently comment that the second performance sounds so different and revelatory.  TDO Artistic Director George Marriner Maull has stated: " the more detail we notice in music, the greater our potential for increased enjoyment and for receiving more 'goose bumps' from the experience."

While some historical content is always included, Maestro Maull keeps the focus on the music itself.  With his entertaining and high energy style, he facilitates awareness of detail, and allows audience members to draw their own conclusions about the music's meaning for them.  The Discovery Concert format has proven effective with mixed audiences spanning children as young as eight to adults in their eighties, and listeners ranging from those with untapped musical awareness to those with considerable sophistication.  One professional music educator shared: "I must tell you how truly remarkable your Discovery Concert was.  Seeing fully grown, obviously intelligent people reacting like youngsters who have found joy in something wonderfully new, and watching them voluntarily follow the listening guide was thrilling!”

Underwriters of Discover Beethoven’s 5th include Mary & Michael Johnston, Jean T. Burgdorff , Elizabeth & Frank Gump, Judy & Josh Weston, The Frank & Lydia Bergen Foundation, Glenmede Investment and Wealth Management, Martha & Garnett Keith, The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, The Peter R. & Cynthia K. Kellogg Foundation, The NYMEX Foundation, Antonia Marotta-Brinton & Jervis Brinton, Judith Musicant & Hugh Clark, Wilma Nurse & David Blue, William K. Hengen, Jr., and Linda & John Quinn.  Funding for The Discovery Orchestra is made possible in part by funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment for the Arts.

The Discovery Orchestra offers various interactive live programs such as Discovery Concerts, Discover More listening sessions, Fall in Love with Music classes, and Intimate Evening & Afternoon in-home chamber music recitals as well as free weekly educational Discovery Chats via its YouTube Channel and other social media programs.  For further information, visit www.DiscoveryOrchestra.org or call 908-226-7300.