Show celebrates Corbett's contributions

March 28, 2008

The Cincinnati Enquirer

BY JANELLE GELFAND

Cincinnati will thank the late Patricia Corbett for being one of the city's most generous arts patrons in a musical celebration to be held Saturday in Music Hall.
An extraordinary array of the arts organizations touched by Corbett's philanthropy will perform a free public concert in her memory. Corbett died Jan. 28.
Performers will include the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the May Festival Chorus, Cincinnati Opera soprano Jane Jennings and tenor Mark Panuccio, the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music's musical theater senior class, members of Northern Kentucky University's Azmari Quartet and groups from the School for Creative & Performing Arts.
Cincinnati Symphony music director Paavo Järvi, former May Festival music director and Metropolitan Opera conductor Julius Rudel and Cincinnati Ballet music director Carmon DeLeone will share conducting duties. WGUC's Naomi Lewin will host the event. All participants will donate their services.
The idea to hold a free concert and most of the program was initiated by Corbett's son, Thomas R. Corbett, who died March 3 in Dallas.The concert will allow the people of Greater Cincinnati "to celebrate Cincinnati's beloved Patricia Corbett, and the chance to say farewell," says Karen McKim, executive director of the Corbett Foundation. Corbett and her husband, J. Ralph Corbett, who preceded her in death, were champions of the region's performing arts, from Riverbend Music Center to Northern Kentucky University.