Holiday Pops to feature Maestro Dirk Hillyer and The Hillyer Festival Orchestra

The 17th Annual Holiday Pops Concert on Saturday night, December 13, at Abbot Hall in Marblehead will be a festive evening of magnificent music featuring Dirk Hillyer and The Hillyer Festival Orchestra, soloist Katie O’Reilly, and the Old North Church Youth Choir under the direction of Rebecca Kenneally.

“The Hillyer Festival Orchestra (HFO ) is committed to offering the highest quality ‘pops’ musical standard in a professional symphony concert format to all ages, and to upholding the great American Broadway, film and parlor music that defines what is musical about our vast and varied country,” Hillyer said. In addition to performing familiar music, the orchestra also tries to foster new, up-and-coming composers and artists. “The talent and variety of musicians working with and for this special orchestra is quite extensive and I’m grateful for the constant energy and creativity that the members and guest artists bring to each rehearsal and concert.”

Originally established as a holiday ensemble for the City of Peabody, the HFO has performed for the Essex National Commission at the Hynes Auditorium, for five years at the WCRB Summer Concert Series on the Esplanade/Hatch Shell, Boston, and for 14 years as the main event at the Salem Fourth of July Festivities.

Hillyer enjoys the creativity of developing the music program for the Holiday Pops concert and selecting soloists from the exceptional talent for which Boston is well known, including the Boston Lyric Opera, New England and Boston Conservatories, the Boston Singers Resource, local professional theater companies, and more recently New York performers with experience on Broadway and the Metropolitan Opera.

Hillyer himself is a highly recognized figure on Boston’s North Shore not only as a conductor but also as a musician, French horn player and mentor. His varied experiences from the classical genre to “pops” music of Broadway and Film has placed the HFO in the limelight with 150 performances so far in Marblehead, Salem, Danvers, Peabody, Lynn, Swampscott, Gloucester, Northborough, Chelmsford, Boston, and other communities. Salem’s July 4th concert alone attracts 30,000 people each year. Recently, the HFO opened the season at Wolfeboro (NH) to a rousing reception.

Additionally, the orchestra, comprised of some of the best pops players in the Boston area, played Boston’s Hatch Shell on the Esplanade five years in a row.

Hillyer has conducted his orchestra for 17 years and local pops orchestras for the last 20 years but also maintains a vital interest in playing in concerts, pit-orchestras, and shows backing up world-class artists including Luciano Pavarotti and Frederica von Stade, under the batons of William Steinberg, Gunther Schuller, Seiji Ozawa, and Michael Tilson Thomas, and in popular genres with Todd Rundgren (Music Director), Maynard Ferguson (at Berklee), Arturo Sandoval, Carol Channing, Bobby Vinton, Anthony Newley, Shirley Jones and Joanne Worley. A tenured member of the Boston Lyric Opera, he has performed over 250 operas under the batons of Keith Lockhart and David Angus, among others.

Jazz and Rock play a significant part in his work also. He was Musical Director for Todd Rundgren’s “Healing” tour (2010-11) and performed the 2013 Prague Jazz Fest that toured throughout the Czech Republic and southern Germany. In 2015, Hillyer will take the baton on a Disney-In-Concert tour featuring all the classics, including “Frozen.”

Hillyer earned a PhD from Tufts University with two additional degrees from the New England Conservatory of Music. He is also a professor in Salem State University’s music department.

The Holiday Pops evening will begin at 7 p.m. with a Dessert Reception for all ticket holders; the concert will begin promptly at 8 p.m. The raffle for Martha Quigley’s original painting, “Snow Shower” will be held the night of the concert during intermission.

Floor tickets are $60 each and available exclusively by mail through the order form in the November 13 issue of The Marblehead Reporter or through the downloadable order form at www.rcomh.org.

Balcony tickets are $35 each and are available online at www.rcomh.org or in person in Marblehead at Arnould Gallery and Framery, 111 Washington Street; National Grand Bank, 91 Pleasant Street; and, Spirit of ’76 Bookstore, 107 Pleasant Street.

Raffle tickets for an opportunity to win Martha Quigley’s Holiday Pops logo painting, “Snow Shower,” are available where balcony tickets are sold, at the Rotary Club of Marblehead Harbor’s table at the Artisans’ Holiday Marketplace during Christmas Walk, and the night of the concert. Giclee prints and notecards featuring the artwork are available online at rcomh.org, at the Artisans’ Holiday Marketplace and the night of the concert.

Proceeds from the concert will benefit the scholarships and philanthropic projects of The Rotary Club of Marblehead Harbor.

For more information, visit www.rcomh.org or contact Bill Bartin at 781-476-0600 or wbartin@infinexgroup.com.

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