Report To The Community 2021

njpac short stories
classical music,
modern methods
Throughout the 2021 season,
NJPAC and its partners in
the world of classical music
expanded their work online, to
bring sonatas and symphonies
to audiences at home.
NJPAC’s Classical Conversations
series, hosted by the Artistic
Director of the Discovery
Orchestra, George Marriner
Maull continued throughout
the season with virtual deep
dives into Tchaikovsky’s
Symphony No. 4 in F Minor,
Chopin’s Scherzo, Op. 31 in B-Flat
Minor and Handel’s Hallelujah
chorus, each online discussion
geared to allow fans to better
understand these beloved works.
And long before the New Jersey
Symphony would return to
the NJPAC stage in front of an
audience, the ensemble was on
the Betty Wold Johnson stage
in Prudential Hall to create
several concert films including
two exceptional offerings taped
in May, one featuring worldrenowned
violinist Joshua Bell
with soprano Larisa Martínez,
and another featuring leading
opera soprano Renée Fleming.
The performances, conducted
by Xian Zhang, now in her sixth
season as the Symphony’s
music director, were made
available on its website —
and may be broadcast at a
later date, as several of the
Symphony’s films made early in
the pandemic were, via NJ PBS.
The violin-focused concert
featured music by Mendelssohn,
Mozart and Wieniawski.
For Fleming’s performance,
she sang Wagner’s Wesendonck
Lieder for the first time, while the
Symphony also played Wagner’s
Siegfried Idyll and Bizet’s
Adagietto from L’Arlésienne
Suite No. 1, and native
New Jersey poets Michelle
Above: Joshua Bell with the
New Jersey Symphony in
Prudential Hall, taping a concert
made available for streaming on
the Symphony’s website.
Below: George Marriner Maull,
the longtime host of NJPAC’s
popular Classical Conversations.
Moncayo and Jane Wong
read from their own works.
“I’ve been pleasantly surprised
by the response to consuming
music and art online,” says
Bell in an interview included
in the online package. “[The
pandemic] actually forced a lot
of us to be creative in the way
we presented music. And people
were very thirsty for music.”
“I think a lot of what we
discovered during this process
will continue after we’re back
in the swing of things.”
– Jay Lustig
politics take
the stage
From its beginnings, when
Republican Governor Tom Kean
joined Newark’s Democratic
Mayor, Sharpe James, to
advocate for an Arts Center in
the city, NJPAC has been a joint
effort by people of all political
persuasions, encouraging
Garden Staters to find common
ground while still engaging in
the free and frank discussions
that make democracy work.
That tradition continued on
September 28, when incumbent
Democrat Phil Murphy and
Republican challenger Jack
Ciattarelli met in Prudential
Hall for their first debate of New
Jersey’s gubernatorial election.
Outside the Arts Center,
supporters of each candidate
gathered by Military Park,
raising cheers and waving
flags and banners. Inside,
both men came out swinging,
playing to an energetic and
often vocal audience in
the hall, as well as viewers
and listeners on television,
radio stations and online.
Hosts Sade Baderinwa of
WABC, Brian Taff of WPVI,
Adriana Vargas-Sino of
Univision, and NJ Advance
Media reporter Amanda
Hoover moderated the
debate and asked questions
submitted by students,
reporters and the public.
NJPAC proudly hosted the
debate in partnership with a
cohort of Garden State media
and academic institutions,
including WABC-TV, WPVI,
Univision65, NJ Advance Media,
WHYY-FM radio, Rutgers
Eagleton Institute of Politics
and Rutgers School of Public
Affairs and Administration.
Evergreen Partners produced
the debate on behalf of NJPAC.
The debate was sponsored by
PSEG and broadcast on both
ABC-owned TV stations in the
New York and Philadelphia
markets, Univision 41 and WHYY
radio. It was also streamed
across WABC and WPVI’s
streaming apps and on
streaming platforms Fire TV,
Android TV, Apple TV, Roku and
Hulu. WBGO Radio in Newark
was also a debate partner.
Ciattarelli started strongly,
saying that because the
Governor had not immediately
declared a state of emergency
during Hurricane Ida, he bore
Left: Governor Phil Murphy and opponent
Jack Ciattarelli debate at NJPAC.
Right: Sade Baderinwa and Jim Gardner
were among the evening’s moderators.
some responsibility for the
death of 30 New Jerseyans
in the disaster. Murphy
countered that catastrophic
events like Ida were a
product of climate change,
which his administration
was committed to fighting.
The cost of living in New
Jersey was, not surprisingly,
another point of contention,
with Ciattarelli citing the state’s
property taxes, the highest in
the nation. Murphy flipped the
subject around, ticking off what
New Jersey’s taxes paid for
under his administration, from
an increase in school aid to full
funding of workers’ pensions.
The real winners of the evening?
New Jersey voters, who got
to hear extensively from both
candidates, as NJPAC proved
again that its stage was a
fitting place for all of the
state’s great performances —
even the political ones.
— Stephen Whitty
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