Tuesday, February 4, 2020 3:00pm
For over 50 years Ellis Island operated as an immigration hub, with countless families now able to trace their history through its doors. As with so many events and places in our history, the lives touched and stories told by Ellis have inspired artwork across genres. In anticipation of Musicfest’s upcoming presentation of Peter Boyer’s Ellis Island: The Dream of America, join Allan Naplan in surveying some of the many pieces created commemorating both large and small experiences.
Find a sampling of Ellis Island: The Dream of America below:
Allan E. Naplan joined Arizona Musicfest in 2013. Since his arrival, the organization has realized transformative growth and success. During his tenure, Musicfest has greatly expanded the number of concert performances offered each season; the breadth of musical genres presented; the caliber of guest artists engaged; and the total number of patrons attending the annual concert season, now exceeding 50,000 per year. Further, charitable support for the organization has dramatically increased, providing the non-profit with a healthy fiscal balance of earned vs. unearned revenue. Under his direction, Arizona Musicfest has presented a distinguished roster of guest artists, including Jason Alexander, Paul Anka, Emanuel Ax, Joshua Bell, Michael Bolton, Chris Botti, Rosanne Cash, Kristin Chenoweth, Il Divo, Michael Feinstein, Renée Fleming, David Foster, Sutton Foster, Kenny G, Augustin Hadelich, Samara Joy, Lyle Lovett, Patti LuPone, Johnny Mathis, Midori, Rita Moreno, Marie Osmond, Mandy Patinkin, Bernadette Peters, LeAnn Rimes, Lea Salonga, Gil Shaham, and Mavis Staples, as well as the Carnegie Hall Big Band, Pink Martini, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy, The Manhattan Transfer, The Ten Tenors, The Texas Tenors, Steep Canyon Rangers, The Piano Guys and many others.
Beyond the concert stage, under Allan’s direction the organization has expanded to include Music Alive!, the organization’s popular lifelong learning and creative aging series (over 350 presentations each season), as well as Musicfest Theatricals, a new division of Musicfest, which offers fully staged theatrical concert productions of Broadway musicals, featuring guest Broadway artists.
In 2020, Naplan was recognized as an “Arts Hero” by On Stage/On Media magazine, the official publisher of arts performance programs for the Phoenix valley. Previously in 2018, Naplan was named as a “Best of Arts and Culture” winner by the Phoenix Jewish News for his leadership of Arizona Musicfest and his artistic contributions to the community.
* returning Musicfest artist