Buffalo Philharmonic Presents Buffalo Legends

The BPO presents acclaimed composer David Shire, an Oscar and Grammy winner and multiple Tony and Emmy nominee. Mr. Shire will conduct the Orchestra and perform selections from the remarkably varied music he has written for stage, screen and recordings.

He will be joined by singers Lynne Wintersteller and Mary Kate O'Connell. Also, one of Buffalo's best known jazz artists, Bobby Militello, will be featured in the premiere performance of Shades of Blue, a new concert jazz suite he has written for Mr. Militello and the BPO.

This special performance take place at Kleinhans Music Hall on Saturday, January 27 at 8 p.m. This Pops Series concert is sponsored by BlueCross BlueShield of Western
New York.

Artist Profiles

David Shire is the son of Buffalo society band leader and piano teacher Irving Shire. At Yale, he met his long-time theater collaborator lyricist/director Richard Maltby, Jr., also the son of a band leader, and while at Yale the two of them wrote musicals. After a semester of graduate work at Brandeis University (where he was the first Eddie Fisher Fellow) and 6 months in the National Guard infantry, Shire took up residence in New York City, working as a dance class pianist, theater rehearsal and pit pianist and society band musician while constantly working with Maltby on musicals. Their first off- Broadway show, The Sap of Life, was produced in 1960 at the Sheridan Square Theater. Shire began scoring for television in the 1960s and made the leap to scoring feature films in the early 1970s.

He was married to actress Talia Shire, for whose brother Francis Ford Coppola he scored The Conversation in 1974. creating perhaps his best known score. He has since been known for creating interesting and effective scores for a wide variety of genres, including All the President's Men, The Hindenburg, Farewell My Lovely, 2010: The Year We Make Contact, and Return to Oz. He composed original music for Saturday Night Fever, and also worked on several disco adaptations including "Night on Disco Mountain." He won an Oscar in 1980 for Best Song for his title song for Norma Rae, "It Goes Like It Goes." He was also nominated the same year in the same category for "The Promise (I'll Never Say Goodbye" from the motion picture The Promise. In 1981 his song "With You I'm Born Again", recorded by Billy Preston and Syreeta, was a top five international hit and stayed on the pop charts for 26 weeks.

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three is one of Shire's most effective scores. Shire composed a tone row and placed it against a funky beat for his main theme. It is intended to evoke the bustle and diversity of New York City. Shire received two Grammy nominations for his work on the film. Shire's musical theatre work includes the two off-Broadway reviews Starting Here, Starting Now (Grammy nomination for Best Cast Album) and Closer Than Ever (Outer Critic's Circle Award for Best Musical) and the two Broadway shows Baby (Tony nominations for Best Musical and Best Score) and Big (Tony nomination for Best Score). All of these shows have had hundreds of regional and stock productions worldwide. Shire's television scores have earned six Emmy nominations. He has scored over a hundred television movies, including Sarah, Plain and Tall, Raid on Entebbe, The Kennedys of Massachusetts, Serving in Silence and The Heidi Chronicles. He also composed themes for TV series such as "Alice" and "McCloud". Shire's individual songs have been recorded by Barbra Streisand, Melissa Manchester, Maureen McGovern, Johnny Mathis, Billy Preston, Jennifer Warnes, John Pizzerelli and Pearl Bailey, among many others.

Lynne Wintersteller starred on Broadway in the Tony nominated Rogers & Hammerstein review A Grand Night for Singing! and garnered a NY Drama Desk Nomination (Best Actress in a Musical) for her work in the Maltby/Shire Off-Broadway hit Closer than Ever. She is featured on both original cast albums. Her long and successful association as Grace Farrell in Annie, includes the Broadway Company, First & Fourth National Tours and the Martha Raye Tour. Other National Tour - Revival of Company as karate-loving Sarah. Off-Broadway credits include Emily Cory in Richard Cory (NYMF Best Actress Award), Diane de Poitiers in The Mistress Cycle, Tsarina Alexandra in Rasputin, Amy in I Sent A Letter to My Love (Melissa Manchester's premiere musical), Sister Amnesia in Nunsense, Sadie in The Rise of David Levinsky, Dolly Talbo in The Grass Harp, Fraulein Hatzfeld in Music in the Air and originated the role(s) of City Her in Gifts of the Magi as well as playing Meryl Streep in Manhattan Theatre Club's production of The Times.

Regionally Lynne has spent the last few years presenting and developing new musicals all around the country: Dr. Zhivago, Great Big Radio Show, Night of the Hunter, and the West Coast Premiere of The Ghost & Mrs. Muir as Mrs. Lucy Muir (Los Angeles Ovation Nomination). Most recently Dorothy Brock in 42nd Street at Pittsburgh CLO; Lizzie in 110 In the Shade and Kate in Kiss me Kate at TUTS/Houston; Rhetta Cupp in Pump Boys and Dinettes and Helga Gallimard in M. Butterfly both at Charlotte Rep.; Karen in Dinner with Friends at Alley Theatre/Houston; Mrs. Alsager in Polly Penn's new musical Embarrassments at The Eugene O'Neill Conference; Ella Peterson in Bells are Ringing and Thea in Fiorello both at Goodspeed; Alice Kinnian in Charlike & Algernon at the Kennedy Center; Claire Ganz in Rumors and Diana in Lend Me a Tenor both productions at Philadelphia's Walnut Street Theatre.

Mary Kate O'Connell is a life long resident of Western New York, an award winning actress/director/producer and the Executive/Artistic Director of O'Connell & Company. Her recent O'Connell & Company favorites performances include, A Big Band Christmas with The Colored Musicians Club, Buffalo Zings!, The Lounge, Afterglow and Listen to my Heart. Currently onstage at O'Connell & Company, is David Shire's Award Winning Musical Revue Starting Here, Starting Now. Mary Kate was named as one of the "Outstanding Women of WNY" Women of Accomplishment Legacy Project, Women's Pavilion PanAm 2001; Outstanding Businesswoman of the year 2001; NCCJ Brotherhood-Sisterhood Award in the ARTS, 2003; Leadership Buffalo Class of 2002; The Arts & Culture Award for Building a Better New York 2002; Amherst Women's Interclub Council Outstanding Woman 2004; 2005 Arts Council Arts Supporter of the Year; 2005 Honored as one of The Buffalo News Outstanding Citizens and The 2005 Athena Award winner.

She is a Board member of the Friends of the Child Advocacy Center and a Trustee Board Member at Hilbert College. Outside of her own Theatre, Mary Kate was featured in the Harold Arlen Centennial Concert with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra & in the Shea's production of The Vagina Monologues at Studio Arena Theatre. She wrote, directed and performed in an adaptation of Peter and the Wolf with The Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. Mary Kate has performed in original revues with Bobby Militello and the Bobby Jones Trio at the Tralfamadore Cafe, among other venues. Mary Kate performed with David Shire and Didi Conn - In Concert with David Shire at the Nichols School.

Bobby Militello has been playing Alto & Flute with the Dave Brubeck Quartet since 1982 and has been on over 150 recordings and various television and film scores. He played with Maynard Ferguson from 1975 to 1979 on Baritone Sax and Flute. During his tenure with Maynard, Bobby appeared in the Downbeat Readers polls from 1977 to 1979 on Bari and Flute and recived critical acclaim in many articles and reviews. Other major artists he has worked and recorded with are The Bill Holman Big Band, The Bob Florence Big Band, Doc Severinsen and the Tonight Show Band, Cheryl Benteen from Manhattan Transfer, Jeff Jarvis and Emiel Van Egdom, to name a few. Bobby has played with most of the major symphonies in the world and has done a number of recordings with the London Symphony, with Dave Brubeck, along with many TV appearances with Brubeck, Maynard and on his own.

Throughout his career, spanning some 40 years, he has formed various groups of his own ranging from Fusion/Funk to Bebop. His first national recording was with Maynard Ferguson in 1975 and his first solo album was recorded in 1982 on Motown Records, entitled BobbyM Blow. Enjoying a large range of musical styles, Bobby has merged his love for many types of music into his present style of bop. This, combined with his obvious ability to express emotion in his playing, makes for a unique sound and approach to playing the alto sax, tenor sax, flute and soprano. -- www.bpo.org