Local All Star Orchestra Concerts To Benefit Syrian Refugees

Musicians from the Winston-Salem and Greensboro symphonies are teaming up this weekend for a good cause. They are performing for free, and they're doing it to raise money for Syrian refugees. The concerts include some of the most challenging music for chamber orchestra, and they'll feature two outstanding local soloists: flutist Debra-Reuter Pivetta, and cellist Lee Richey.

Richey, who organized the event, will also conduct the program. He says that while he typically keeps his political views private, the current plight of Syrian refugees compelled him to act. “What I feel strongly about is that all of humanity is one, large, global community”, says Richey. “When there is conflict, and people are displaced and hurt and terrified and have to flee their homeland, I'm all for opening your arms as a nation, as a people—especially artistically, musically—and giving them assistance, no matter where they are, where they come from. I think we can all agree that the one principle in life that's most important is generating and demonstrating love for our fellow human being. That's why I'm doing this.”

That nurturing spirit was cultivated early on by Richey's late mother Elaine, longtime concertmaster of the Winston-Salem Symphony, and a beloved music educator. In addition to raising three musical sons of her own, for decades she led a full studio of young violin students at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, where she was both mentor and mother figure for many. “I miss her terribly,” says Richey. “And her playing and her joy, and her wonderful presence in the community and in my life, and the lives of many others.”

After graduating from UNCSA, Lee Richey left North Carolina to perform in orchestras around the world. When he returned to Greensboro in 2012, he reconnected with his Triad colleagues, many of whom form the benefit concert chamber orchestra. “They are musicians in the Winston-Salem Symphony [and] the Greensboro Symphony. They're dear friends from my NC School of the Arts days, and I feel so incredibly touched and moved and impressed that so many of my friends have agreed to join me.”

The ensemble—fifty musicians strong—will perform Tchaikovsky's Variations on a Theme Rococo with Richey as cello soloist, Claude Debussy's Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, and a suite by Benjamin Godard featuring flute soloist Debra Reuter-Pivetta, principal flutist with the Greensboro Symphony. “Debi is a brilliant, and terrifically musical flutist, and I am delighted—thrilled—to have her on the program, as well as Winston-Salem Symphony Assistant Conductor Jessica Morel who will conduct the Tchaikovsky.”

The program concludes with The Bourgeois Gentleman, an orchestral suite by Richard Strauss. The Benefit Chamber Orchestra Concert for the Syrian Refugees will take place in Winston-Salem on Friday night, August 18th at 7:30 pm in St. Timothy's Episcopal Church. On Saturday afternoon, August 19th at 3:00 pm, the same program will be performed in Greensboro's Starmount Presbyterian Church. Both concerts are open to the public with free-will donations of any amount to: Lutheran Services of Georgia Refugee Services Program the Syrian refugees