Brooke Knoll
ContributorBrooke Knoll is a freelance contributor for Classical KC.
She holds an MA in Cultural Policy and Arts Management from University College Dublin, where her research focused on organizational improvisation. She is a freelance harpist, cat lover, and aspiring knitter.
An advocate for arts accessibility, she was previously the digital audience specialist and on-air host for Classical KC. She has additionally worked with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Cuban American Youth Orchestra and Minnesota Orchestra on their initiatives to engage younger audiences and cultivate the next generation of classical music lovers.
You can reach Brooke at www.blkharp.com.
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Backed by centuries of history and artistry, the harp is entrenched throughout Irish society and culture. After a year studying in Dublin, contributor Brooke Knoll plucks fun facts from the past and present of the Irish harp. -
A scheduling snafu for organist Jan Kraybill started a Kansas City tradition — a Super Bowl Sunday organ concert — that's lasted 26 years. -
Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote the score for the 1948 film “Scott of the Antarctic” – a dramatization of the ill-fated expedition led by Capt. Robert Falcon Scott to be the first humans to the South Pole. Vaughan Williams’ inspiration was such that he expanded the film score into a five-movement symphony that is both compelling and moving. -
Some composers have the gift to paint with sound, to create musical pictures in our minds. We’ll hear cinematic music by Ferde Grofé and Ottorino Respighi in spectacular recordings that more than demonstrate music’s power to communicate. -
Summerfest is the annual series of concerts that brings some of the best chamber musicians in the region to Kansas City to perform together each July. Brooke Knoll speaks with Summerfest musicians and artistic advisors Jane Carl and Evan Halloin about the upcoming season. We'll hear music from Ludwig van Beethoven and Olivier Messiaen. -
The team of Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Symphony set a standard that has rarely been equalled. We’ll hear this dream team in two of Mozart’s most beloved symphonies and a Mozart moment from Reiner’s time in the opera pit. -
Classical KC's Brooke Knoll speaks with outgoing Kansas City Symphony music director Michael Stern about a brand new album for the group called "Brahms Reimagined" that features orchestral arrangements of Brahms' music by Virgil Thompson, Bright Sheng and Arnold Schoenbeg. -
We might think of “pastoral” as being soft music with bird calls, but the word’s roots go back more to rural scenes and shepherds. This week we have two contrasting, self-described “pastoral” works by Emanuel Chabrier and Alexander Glazunov. -
The French horn is expressive. it can be mellow, it can be heroic. It has some of the greatest parts in the orchestral literature, but is also a thrilling solo instrument. We’ll hear it in a chamber music setting and as a soloist partner with a tenor. The full resources of the instrument are on full display. -
When Antonin Dvorak received a state stipend allowing him to compose full-time, music poured from him including his lovely String Serenade Op. 22. We’ll hear the original version of the serenade, contrasted with a compelling arrangement for winds and strings that’s inspired by a prior version of the serenade Dvorak then later scored for strings. It’s a fascinating comparison.
