Hillyer Festival Orchestra to perform at Holiday Pops in Marblehead

The Hillyer Festival Orchestra under the direction of Maestro Dirk Hillyer will perform a full program of magnificent music at Holiday Pops 2024 presented by Marblehead Harbor Rotary on Saturday, December 14, at Abbot Hall.

The featured guest soloist will be Andrew Scoglio, well-known locally as the baritone soloist and section leader for the Old North Festival Chorus in Marblehead, and also as the Lead Teacher for the Performing & Applied Arts at Marblehead High School and Veterans Middle School.

The evening will begin at 7 p.m. with a champagne reception catered by Louise Moore’s Every Little Breeze Catering and beverages by North Shore Bartending Services. The concert will begin at 8 p.m.

Hillyer’s musical life began in his hometown of Portland, Oregon, where he conducted and won awards for productions of "West Side Story," "Music Man,” “Threepenny Opera" and others. He was honored four times with the Oregon Theater Award for best conducting, and in 1996, Massachusetts honored him with its highest award for the arts, the Commonwealth Award.

In his 20s, Hillyer toured Europe performing (horn) in many prominent venues in Ireland, London, Stamford, Florence, and Berlin, and playing concerts throughout the UK, Ireland, Germany, Italy, France, Portugal, and Israel. Upon returning to the States, he performed at Washington’s National Cathedral, and later at New York’s Alice Tully Hall (Lincoln Center). Back in Boston, it was the performing opportunities with Arthur Fiedler at Symphony Hall that planted the seeds of future pops conducting.

He has played with the finest: In 2002 and 2004 Hillyer conducted workshops at Carnegie Hall presided over by Daniel Barenboim and Pierre Boulez.

But not all is classical music for Hillyer. Jazz and rock continue to play a significant part in Hillyer’s make-up; he often plays and records with the Jazz Composers Alliance at Berklee College of Music in Boston. In 2013, he performed with the Prague Jazz Fest, touring throughout the Czech Republic and southern Germany. For two years Hillyer took the baton for Disney-In-Concert engagements featuring classics like “Frozen,” “Lion King,” “Mary Poppins,” and many others.

In 2022, Hillyer performed in the Boston Lyric Opera’s production of "OMAR," which won a Pulitzer Prize that year.

A highly noted figure on Boston’s North Shore who continues to perform nationally in a range of musical roles—conductor, horn player, and mentor—Dirk Hillyer was recently made the conductor of the 70-piece classical ensemble, the Merrimac Valley Philharmonic.

Hillyer has conducted his own orchestra for more than twenty-six years, while continuing his performances as a tenured member of the Boston Lyric Opera for which he has given more than 400 performances under the batons of Keith Lockhart and David Angus, among others, while remaining active in featured concert, pit orchestra, and stage orchestra companies.

Hillyer holds a PhD from Tufts University and two additional academic degrees from the New England Conservatory of Music.

Floor tickets are sold out but balcony tickets are still available at www.RotaryClubofMheadHarbor.org. Just look for the “Click Here” link on the homepage. Balcony tickets are also available at Arnould Gallery and Framery, 111 Washington Street in Marblehead. Balcony tickets are $45. Seating is limited.

Raffle tickets for the chance to win this year’s Holiday Pops signature art, “Abbot Hall” by Ian Sherwin, and notecards featuring the art are also available for purchase through the link and at Arnould Gallery and Framery.

For more information, visit www.RotaryClubofMheadHarbor.org.