36th Season Opening Concerts
Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man,” Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony, and Lee Hoiby’s dramatic musical setting of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech are the highlights of MSO’s 36th season-opener, a concert entitled “Heroes: Common and Uncommon.” The program also includes Giuseppe Verdi’s powerful overture to “I Vespri Siciliani.”
Led by long-time musical director Rohan Smith, the orchestra welcomes the return of Philip Lima as guest baritone soloist to sing the “I Have a Dream” piece, as well as several spirituals. In addition to his appearance with MSO in 2023, Lima has appeared as soloist with over seventy orchestras, choral societies, and concert series across the United States, and in leading operatic roles in Germany and for regional American opera companies.
Two performances of this program will take place:
- Saturday, October 25 at 7pm in the Franco Center in Lewiston, and
- Sunday, October 26 at 2:30pm in the Orion Performing Arts Center in Topsham.
The related “More with Midcoast" events will include an intermission performance at the Saturday evening concert by members of the Kennebec Valley Youth Symphony, and a pre-concert presentation Sunday entitled “Spirituals in the Concert Hall: A Brief History,” providing a brief overview of how spirituals became a concert hall staple, with audio illustrations from 1916 to the present day.
Link to more information and tickets.