The Whiting Park Festival Orchestra has a vibrant Americana program for the Labor Day weekend.
“To Thee I Sing!” will deliver patriotic fare, Broadway tunes and pop hits Sunday at the Whiting Park Pavilion.
The offerings will vary from “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” to a Burt Bacharach medley, and then on to pop standards from George Gershwin and Jerome Kern.
Formed in 2000, the Whiting Park Festival Orchestra is a 44-member body that has increasingly gained the experience to ably perform classical and popular-music selections in front of thousands of people.
“This is our 16th season,” said Marty Dybel, the orchestra’s general manager.
He also noted concert attendance this summer has gone “very well.”
Dybel said the annual Sunday before Labor Day concert usually attracts about 5,000 people.
“Traditionally, it’s been our largest concert of the season,” said Dybel, who co-founded the orchestra with Robert Vodnoy, its conductor and music director.
An “Armed Forces Salute” will help set the Yankee Doodle tone that largely defines the Labor Day-weekend concert along the Lake Michigan shoreline, where the public can watch from the comfort of blankets and lawn chairs.
“Armed Forces Salute” is part of a choral trilogy that will be sung by the Whiting Park Festival Choir.
The trilogy — which recognizes the American spirit — will kick off the performances.
“People love patriotic, Americana music,” Dybel said.
Admission to the 7:30 p.m. event is free. The concert will end with fireworks accompanied by orchestral, flag-waving music.
“We always finish with ‘The Stars and Stripes Forever’ — it’s a traditional close,” said Vodnoy, alluding to the 19th century work by John Philip Sousa.
Vodnoy indicated that a 2014 concert of Disney-movie pieces was responsible for helping to fuel interest in the performances by the Whiting Park Festival Orchestra.
“It’s a combination of content and marketing,” Vodnoy said.
The intriguing program for Sunday makes sure to dish some great American songbook nuggets, including Gershwin songs and Kern’s “The Way You Look Tonight.”
Guest vocalist Diane Penning will sing a “’60s Girl Medley” that showcases slices of hits from notable female stars such as Lesley Gore and Petula Clark.
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Penning is a coloratura soprano who has performed with various orchestras in the United States. She also has performed opera roles and made professional recordings.
Penning will display her vocal range during her rendition of “Think of Me” — a notable piece from “The Phantom of the Opera,” Andrew Lloyd Webber’s hit musical.
“It gives me a chance to sing in my upper range, my coloratura range,” Penning said. “My voice is a lighter lyric soprano.”
Her singing partner, Paul Langford, also will perform at the concert. Langford, an Illinois resident, wrote many of the arrangements that will be presented.
Penning’s contributions will include a medley of songs written by Bacharach.
“I love it; he was so prolific,” said Penning, a Michigan resident.
The evening is offering a bevy of other familiar songs, including “Love is an Open Door” from “Frozen,” the Disney animated movie.
Vodnoy, a musician and teacher with a stellar career, served as conductor and music director of the Northwest Indiana Symphony Orchestra for two decades. He now is orchestra director and professor of strings at Northern State University in Aberdeen, S.D.
Bob Kostanczuk is a freelance reporter.
Whiting Park Festival Orchestra
When: 7:30 p.m. Sunday
Where: Whiting Lakefront Park, 119th and Front streets
Admission: Free; parking inside the park is $5
Information: www.whitingindiana.com or 219-659-0292