Performances begin on Valentine’s Day, February 14, and run February 16-18 and 21

This February Peter Nero and the Philly Pops^® performs a program of romantic classics, “That’s Amore!,” subtitled “Music of the Heart.”  Special guests Christiane Noll, star of the Broadway smash musical Jekyll & Hyde, and Ron Raines, best known as Alan Spaulding from the soap opera Guiding Light, return for this exquisite evening of music that’s guaranteed to steal your heart!  Peter and the orchestra will perform special arrangements of great love songs as well as romantic instrumentals from the standard repertoire.  “That’s Amore!” begins with a special Valentine’s Day performance on February 14 and runs February 16-18 and 21, 2007, in Verizon Hall at The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts.  (See listing calendar for concert times.)

Two-time Grammy Award-winner Peter Nero has built an impressive career as a conductor, arranger, composer, and master pianist. “If he weren’t such a superb musician, Peter Nero might be easy to dismiss as a mere great entertainer,” notes Peter Dobrin, music critic for the Philadelphia Inquirer.  For his ability to pick just the right material, Mr. Nero most recently was dubbed “Dr. Feelgood.”  Named “the epitome of the Pops Conductor/Performer” by the Washington Post, Mr. Nero won the Grammy Award for “Best New Artist” in 1961, another in 1962, and since that time has garnered 10 additional nominations and released 67 albums.  Mr. Nero’s recent guest performances include engagements with the Toledo Symphony and the National Arts Centre Symphony in Ottawa.  His recent guest appearances include engagements with the Charlotte Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic, and the Baltimore Symphony, among others.  Mr. Nero has made numerous television appearances on national networks as well as PBS.  He is the recipient of six honorary doctorates and in 1999 received the Pennsylvania Distinguished Arts Award.

Baritone Ron Raines can currently be seen as Alan Spaulding on The Guiding Light, a role for which he was twice nominated for an Emmy Award and three times nominated for a Soap Opera Digest Award.  He has also appeared in My Favorite Broadway: The Love Songs, Gershwin at 100, The Rodgers and Hart Story, and Evening at Pops on PBS’ Great Performances.  Mr. Raines’s Broadway and New York theater credits include Billy Flynn in Chicago, Ravenal in the 1983 revival of Showboat, The Merry Widow (at New York City Opera), The Duchess of Gerolstein, One Touch of Venus (with Susan Lucci), A Little Night Music, and Carnegie Hall’s Tribute to Lerner and Loewe.  Other theater credits include leading roles in South Pacific, Annie,  Kiss Me Kate, The King and I, Brigadoon, Oklahoma!, Carousel, Side by Side by Sondheim, Follies, and Man of La Mancha.  Mr. Raines has appeared in concert with over 50 symphony orchestras, including those in Atlanta, Baltimore, Cleveland, Dallas, Minnesota, Pittsburgh, and San Francisco, in addition to the Israel Philharmonic, the Jerusalem Symphony, and the BBC Concert Orchestra in London.  He has also appeared with Peter Nero and the Philly Pops, mostly recently in “Valentine’s POPS: Isn’t It Romantic!” in February 2006.  Mr. Raines’s solo recordings include Ron Raines: So in Love with Broadway and Ron Raines: Broadway Passion.

Born in New York and raised in New Jersey, Christiane Noll made her Broadway debut in Jekyll & Hyde, creating the role of Emma.  She received an Ovation Award for her comedic turn as Hope Cladwell in the national tour of Urinetown and played Vanna Vane in the new musical The Mambo Kings.  She has been a frequent guest soloist as part of Bravo Broadway with symphony orchestras around the world, including the National Symphony with Marvin Hamlisch, the Cincinnati Pops with Erich Kunzel, the Jerusalem Symphony with Don Pippin, as well as appearances with the Cleveland Orchestra, the Detroit Symphony, the San Francisco Symphony, and the Sinfônica Brasileira in Rio de Janeiro. 

Ms. Noll has released three solo CDs: Christine Noll – A Broadway Love Story, The Ira Gershwin Albums, and Live at the Westbank Café, and she supplied the singing voice of Anna in the Warner Brothers animated feature The King and I.  Ms. Noll was critically acclaimed for her operetta performances as Marianne in The New Moon and Kathie in The Student Prince.  Other favorite roles include the Baker’s Wife in Into the Woods, Mabel in Mack & Mabel, Lizzie in Lizzie Borden, and Carrie in Carousel.  Ms. Noll has toured nationally as Sandy in Grease!, as Ellen in Miss Saigon, and as Mallory/Avril in City of Angels, and internationally as Nellie in South Pacific.  She made her opera debut at Washington National Opera as Valencienne in The Merry Widow and her Carnegie Hall debut with Skitch Henderson and the New York Pops. 

One of America’s premier pops orchestras, Peter Nero and the Philly Pops was founded in 1979 under the musical leadership of Mr. Nero, whose unique talents and innovative programming blending all musical genres have made their concerts widely popular in the pops world. POPS concerts run the gamut from great classics to jazz improvisation, big band to Broadway hits, ragtime to rock ‘n’ roll. Mr. Nero’s participation as piano soloist has been received with boundless enthusiasm and acclaim. Guest artists—both established stars as well as outstanding new vocalists from Broadway and the concert stage—join The POPS each season. The Voices of The POPS, the resident vocal group, has become a member of the Philly Pops family as well. 

Peter Nero and the Philly Pops is the Official Pops Orchestra of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and a significant part of Philadelphia’s cultural scene. The POPS has produced continuously growing and loyal audiences and performs to regularly sold-out crowds as a resident company of The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts. 

On July 4, 2006, Peter Nero and the Philly Pops performed a free outdoor concert on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Their concert on the Parkway the previous Independence Day, featuring Sir Elton John, Patti LaBelle, and Bryan Adams, reached over a half million people. Other notables who have joined them for past city celebrations include James Earl Jones, Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, Ray Charles, Boyz II Men, and Dionne Warwick.

During the 2003-04 season, Peter Nero and the Philly Pops celebrated its 25th anniversary. One of the most significant events of that year was the signing of a three-CD contract with DRG Records, making them one of only a few orchestras in the country with such a deal. Peter and The POPS had the honor of performing at the opening of the National Constitution Center in 2003, and participating in National Public Radio’s nation-wide radio broadcast on July 4, 2002. Another highlight took place in April 2002, when Astronaut and U.S. Senator John Glenn made a guest appearance in a special performance of Peter’s original composition Voyage into Space. Peter and The POPS were featured on ABC-TV’s “Independence Day 2001,” a live, star-studded national broadcast, sharing the stage with such luminaries as Michael Douglas, Morgan Freeman, Kevin Spacey, Whoopi Goldberg, and Garth Brooks. 

More information about Peter Nero and the Philly Pops can be found at www.phillypops.org.