Kypros Markou, director of orchestral studies and conductor of Wayne State's Symphony Orchestra, moves with the music department's global venue. Global education is one of President Irvin D. Reid's 10 challenges for the university.
Markou flew to Bucharest, Romania, in early September for an eight-day rehearsal with the National Romanian Radio Orchestra. This was in preparation for its appearances at the 1999 Cypria International Festival in Cyprus.
The festival lasts for six weeks and features international artists in fine arts, cinema, dance, music and theatre. It is designed to develop cultural relations with other countries.
The Cultural Services of the Ministry of Education and Culture invited Markou and the orchestra to perform Friday, Sept. 17, in the Kourion Ancient Theatre and Saturday, Sept. 18, in the Makarios III Amphitheatre, Nicosia.
The Romanian orchestra presented selections by Antonin Dvorak, Savvas Savva,George Enescu and Peter Tchaikovsky on Friday and Carl Maria von Weber, Johannes Brahms, and Ludwig van Beethoven on Saturday.
The orchestra features important conductors, prominent guest artists and participates in special events such as Wagner's opera "The Flying Dutchman" with Placido Domingo.
Besides their concert tour throughout Europe, the orchestra plays a double role in Bucharest. It provides a great part of the musical recording necessary for the national radio. It also plays a substantial role in the region's musical life through live weekly concerts from October to June.
Markou returns in May 2000 to conduct the Romanian orchestra in its regular series and to present a conducting master class at the Bucharest Academy of Music.
The Wayne State professor also travels to other countries for performances. He returns to Poland in June 2000 to conduct the Sinfonietta Cracovia. He performed with that group and the Cracow Philharmonic Orchestra in 1997, 1998 and 1999.
Before the Poland trip, however, in February 2000 he conducts the Israel Chamber Orchestra in Ashdod, Israel, in a program with works by Mozart and Dvorak and others. Later in the summer he travels to Chile to conduct the Orquestra Sinfonica de Concepcion.
Back in the United States, he is the music director of the Westmoreland Symphony Orchestra in Greensburg, Pa., and conductor of the Dearborn Symphony Orchestra. He plans to conduct a concert of the Rochester Philharmonic in Rochester, N.Y. later this month.
Markou, who was born in Nicosia, Cyprus, has been in the United States for 26 years. He is married to Erika, the minister of music at St. James Lutheran Church in Grosse Pointe Farms, and has two sons Matias and Lukas.