by Candace Jordan from Chicago Tribune  July 31, 2016

“The Ravinia Women’s Board hosted its 50th Gala Benefit Evening on July 23 and welcomed the long-awaited return of Metropolitan Opera conductor James Levine to conduct the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus.

Even torrential rains couldn’t dampen the spirits of nearly 700 guests who enjoyed Levine’s return to the Ravinia stage after more than two decades to conduct Gustav Mahler’s Second Symphony (“Resurrection”), the same piece he played at this Ravinia and CSO debuts when he was a last-minute replacement in 1971.

A cocktail reception was held in the gala tent on the North Lawn before the nearly two-hour performance in the pavilion.  Members of Ravinia’s Jazz Scholars, one of the Reach*Teach*Play programs benefiting from the gala, played before dinner.

At the end of the performance, Levine was given a standing ovation and received three curtain calls.  With his hand over his heart, he acknowledged the love from the crowd.

John Anderson, Ravinia board chair, commented, “The ‘Resurrection Symphony’ was a fitting title for the centerpiece of the CSO’s gala concert program because, one the rain stopped, the concert and dinner energized into one of the most dazzling in Ravinia’s long history.”

A surprise presentation to Levine by co-chairs Karen Ettelson and Evey Schweig featured a handcrafted conductor’s baton made of wood from an ash tree grown on the Ravinia grounds.  The inscription read, “May the music of the spheres forever waft through the tree and greens of the park you created by the wave of your magic baton.”

The black-tie event raised over $1 million to support Ravinia’s Reach*Teach* Play outreach programs that provide thousands of people with free music education and community engagement activities, especially those in underserved communities.”