Orchestra to perform 3 free summer concerts

Three free neighborhood concerts will fill out the Philadelphia Orchestra's summer schedule, greeting music lovers in New Jersey, Chestnut Hill and West Philadelphia.

Two venues, Camden's Wiggins Park and University City's Clark Park, are return bookings.

The new site is Chestnut Hill's Pastorius Park, which annually also hosts 10 Wednesday evening summer concerts.

All three 7 p.m. programs will be led by the orchestra's associate conductor, Rossen Milanov, and all are likely to be heavily attended.

The first - on June 2, just before the orchestra's final concert of their American tour in Washington, D.C. - will be held in Wiggins Park, Mickle Boulevard at the Delaware River in Camden.

Milanov will lead Beethoven's "Leonore" Overture No. 3, Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony and "Full of Hope," composed by the Camden Respond Workshop Group and featuring mezzo-soprano Lucia Bradford.

The workshop was a collaboration between the orchestra and the Camden social services organization Respond Inc.

On July 2, just before leaving for their first appearance at the Vail Valley Music Festival in Colorado, the musicians will play at Pastorius Park, at West Abington Avenue and Roanoke Street in Chestnut Hill.

Milanov's program: the Beethoven "Leonore" No. 3 Overture and Tchaikovsky Fifth Symphony, plus Charles Ives' quirky Variations on "America."

In between the final two weeks of programs at the Mann Center for the Performing Arts, the orchestra will return to Clark Park at 43rd Street and Baltimore Avenue on July 21.

This Spanish-themed program - by mostly non-Spanish composers - includes Chabrier's "Espana," Bizet's Suite No. 2 from "Carmen," Rimsky-Korsakov's "Capriccio espagnol," works by Marquez and Samuel Barber, and Ravel's popular "Bolero." *

Send e-mail to dinardt@phillynews.com.

For more information, visit www.philorch.org/neighborhood or call 215-893-1988.