The ILLIAC Helps Bring Sinfonia da Camera into the Community
On Saturday, August 23, The ILLIAC returns to Hessel Park in Champaign. Presented by the same promoters who bring you PYGMALION, The ILLIAC boasts a day of free outdoor musical performances. Headlining the event will be Sinfonia da Camera, the professional chamber orchestra in residence at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts. The ILLIAC will also feature performances by The Marching Illini, Bandoneon Massacre, and The Soul Syndicate. We spoke with Elizabeth Churchya, executive director of Sinfonia da Camera, and Seth Fein, producer of The ILLIAC and PYGMALION, to learn more about this event.
Fein first launched The ILLIAC in 2014 as a street music festival in Downtown Urbana. The name pays homage to “The Illiac Suite,” considered the first piece of music composed by a computer. In 1957, two composition professors at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign programmed the ILLIAC I computer to generate musical material for a string quartet, which became “The Illiac Suite.” According to The ILLIAC’s website, “The idea is to use the name to dream up different engagements rooted in musical offerings designed to both delight and challenge those who wish to attend.”
After its first outing in 2014, The ILLIAC went on hiatus until the summer of 2024, when it was relocated to Hessel Park to avoid impacting local businesses with street closures. Fein decided to repurpose it as a means for Sinfonia da Camera to get out into the community and broaden its audience. As a member of the orchestra’s advisory board since 2022, Fein has been an asset, leveraging his background as an event promoter outside the classical sphere to devise creative programming ideas for the orchestra.
Held in July last year, The ILLIAC proved to be a great success. “Last year, we saw such a diverse audience,” Churchya said. “There were so many families, so many children, so many people that we would not normally see as the demographic distribution of an audience member in a classical music concert.”
The laid-back outdoor setting helped break down both tangible and intangible barriers to access for people who may have felt that classical music was not for them. The event gave audiences a chance to dip their toe in classical music without having to spend money on tickets and sit still in an uncomfortable seat, all for something they aren’t sure they will enjoy. But enjoy it they did: “You would see people dancing, you would see kids dancing, you’d see people smiling, being really into the climactic moments—they seemed really riveted,” Churchya said.
This strategy yielded tangible results in the rest of the orchestra’s 2024/25 season. “We did see the demographic of people coming to the Krannert Center shift a little bit,” Churchya explained. “I think some of those people had this positive experience on the Hessel lawn and then thought, ‘Oh, I do like classical music.’”
This year, The ILLIAC hopes to capitalize on this success and bring in even more audiences. The event has been scheduled for move-in weekend (Saturday, August 23), when Champaign-Urbana is bustling with visitors and students and faculty have returned to town. Gates will open at 3 pm. Admission is free and open to all ages, and food and drinks will be available for purchase from a variety of local food trucks and vendors. Just bring a picnic blanket or lawn chair.
The iconic Marching Illini will kick off the event with what promises to be a rousing performance at 3:30 pm. At 5 pm, tango orchestra Bandoneon Massacre will perform, followed by jazz sextet The Soul Syndicate at 6:30. (You might have heard The Soul Syndicate at Krannert Center Uncorked back in February, sponsored by IPM’s Illinois Soul.)
Sinfonia da Camera will take the stage at 8 pm with a program of classical hard-hitters. Their set will begin with the overture to The Barber of Seville by Rossini, followed by Borodin’s “Polovtsian Dances” and Johann Strauss Jr.’s “The Blue Danube.” Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture will close out the evening with a bang—literally. The work famously calls for 16 cannon shots, notated in the score. Most modern orchestras simulate these blasts with recorded cannons, but Sinfonia has managed to obtain actual cannons from the ROTC (firing blanks, mind you).
Although audiences may not know these pieces by name, they will undoubtedly recognize them when they hear them. When audiences have that spark of recognition, they realize that maybe classical music isn’t so foreign after all. Fein, as someone without much background in classical music himself, explained: “Now that it’s accessible to you and you’ve had this emotional experience and hopefully this very positive interaction with the music in this context, it opens up the door to the idea that they’d be like, ‘Right, why am I not going to this thing? Because this is a rewarding experience that is different from what I’m experiencing on a daily basis.’ And that, I think, is the big goal.”
In addition to highlighting Sinfonia da Camera in The ILLIAC, Fein has also featured the chamber orchestra in his main project, PYGMALION. Now entering its 21st year, the multidisciplinary festival hosts a wide variety of musical acts in locations across Champaign-Urbana. However, last year’s festival was the first time a classical ensemble was involved. Sinfonia made their PYGMALION debut last September with a performance of George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue in honor of the work’s 100th birthday.
For this year’s festival, Sinfonia da Camera will give four performances at Parkland College’s Staerkel Planetarium on Saturday, September 20. The audiovisual spectacle will feature Darius Milhaud’s jazz-inflected ballet score for chamber orchestra, La Création du monde (1923), which traces the creation of the world based on African folk mythology. An original visual projection will be synchronized with the music to depict what is occurring in the piece. It promises to be an immersive feast for the senses.
Music lovers of all stripes can only hope that this partnership between Fein and Sinfonia da Camera continues long into the future. Taking an innovative approach to classical programming is the only way to ensure its survival, and we look forward to seeing what they come up with next.
Don’t miss The ILLIAC on Sunday, August 23, at Hessel Park in Champaign. More information can be found on their website at https://theilliac.com.
