Vivaldi’s ‘The Four Seasons’ – Porcine Version

I have once again dreamed up a humorous setting for the Lenape Chamber Ensemble‘s Children’s Concert, which is coming up Saturday, November 12 at Delaware Valley University. The Lenape Chamber Ensemble is a group of world-class musicians who twice a year host a delightful hour of playful information and performance for kids and their parents, on the weekend when they also perform magnificent concerts for adults at other times and venues. Their talent is sublime, but for their children’s concert I am permitted to draw a light-hearted fantasy of a scene for a poster, just for entertainment’s sake. For this one, I chose pigs as my musicians.

The concert November 12th features the most popular of Vivaldi’s works, The Four Seasons, as well as works by J. S. Bach and Jean-Marie Leclair. I felt a dance ensemble might be fun to accompany my little pigs’ musical performance, so I drew an audience of piglets admiring the dancers representing the seasons, while their accompanists play behind them.

I first sketched pigs in different music & dance positions –

• and then placed them within the space I have on the flyer, hand-lettering the info above and below them. The final poster is below – I also looked up the names the the seasonal movements of the Vivaldi. I’m hoping some enterprising children might learn a little French in the bargain! I highly recommend this concert for kids & parents alike, it’s really a delightful hour of music and fun!

My Pirates of Penzance Artwork in Australia

I’m always delighted to get requests from outside the US for my artwork.

I’ve had Gilbert & Sullivan companies in the UK request my G&S illustrations for their production posters, a woman in France purchased my ‘fox playing the cello’ notecards for her cello-playing daughter, and a music school in Switzerland used my sketch of a flutist for a concert program.

Last week I received an email from the Kelvin Grove Wind Orchestra in Brisbane, Australia – my first request from the southern hemisphere! They have a concert next month and will perform music to lift people’s spirits, so they’ve chosen some from the Gilbert & Sullivan operetta The Pirates of Penzance. They asked if they could project my artwork from the Bucks County Gilbert & Sullivan Society’s production on a screen while the orchestra plays.

It’s gratifying to know my art will be seen by audiences in Australia! My illustration is below – and if you want to enjoy the magnificent buoyancy that’s the hallmark of Gilbert & Sullivan music, listen to the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields play the Pirates overture here.