Eric Owens and Riccardo Muti Perform For Young Chicago Inmates

In April 2013, bass-baritone Eric Owens, accompanied by Riccardo Muti, performed for inmates as part of the
 CSO's Citizen Musician program. The singer commented, "It's actually one of the proudest moments of my career!"
To learn more about Mr. Owens and his upcoming engagements, click here. (Photo: Facebook)

"The concert was part of a unique outreach that's the brainchild of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's musical director, the Italian-born Riccardo Muti, who attended the event at the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center on Chicago's West Side. The concert included half a dozen of the orchestra's members. But the center-stage performers were some 10 inmates who participated in a weeklong musical workshop at the lockup. It culminated in the Sunday concert featuring compositions the inmates wrote in collaboration with the professionals. 'This is a wonderful beginning for you and for us,' Muti, 71, told the group after the 45-minute performance ended. 'You will join society with the sense of harmony you learned here.'....The Naples-born Muti has taken his act into prison before. He once performed Robert Schumann's 'Warum?' — which means 'why' in German — in a Milan prison. The work, he explained later, was his way of asking inmates what had brought them to such misfortune. Muti spoke philosophically to the detainees in Chicago after Sunday's concert and just before a dozen burly guards escorted the inmates-turned-musicians back to their holding cells. 'We will meet again in the future,' he said. He quickly added, 'Not here! But on the outside.' [Source]

Renée Fleming and Yo-Yo Ma Perform at the Mall in Chicago

More photos of the musical outreach day can be found here. 

(Photos by Alex Garcia/Chicago Tribune)