Atlanta Symphony Orchestra: May, 2023

Salute to Sir Donald Runnicles

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DEAR FRIENDS,

As you know, May is when things really start to heat up here in Atlanta, both literally and metaphorically. Flowers are blooming, students are graduating, families are celebrating. Change is in the air. It’s a busy month full of change and anticipation here at the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra as well.

First and most important—if you haven’t yet subscribed to the ASO’s 2023/24 season, do not wait! By this time next year, you’ll have heard extraordinary concerts with artists of great depth under the baton of Nathalie Stutzmann, including the tremendous pianists Maria João Pires, Michelle Cann and Daniil Trifonov; soprano Renée Fleming; the return of Robert Spano, now our Music Director Laureate; our brilliant Chorus; and experienced Orff’s Carmina Burana, Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4 and other great favorites. Reserve your seats now.

We open this month with Mahler’s majestic Symphony No. 5, conducted by Sir Donald Runnicles in his final performances as our Principal Guest Conductor after a stunning 22year tenure. Read more about Maestro Runnicles and his love for the ASO as he looks back over his tenure in a profile on page 14. We are all grateful for the extraordinary performances he has conducted in Atlanta and for the indelible mark he has left on this great orchestra.

May 4 is one of our favorite days, both because we will be honoring Maestro Runnicles that evening, and because it’s official “May the Fourth Be with You Day.” May is a big month at the ASO for Star Wars: on May 13 and 14 we have two sold-out showings of Star Wars: The Force Awakens in concert with the score played live by the ASO; and on May 21 we return to Ameris Bank Amphitheatre with “Star Wars and More: The Music of John Williams.” If you haven’t checked out one of our Movies in Concert or concerts at the Amphitheatre yet, I highly recommend it. It’s a wonderful way to introduce young people (and adults) to the ASO.

The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra has developed an international reputation for innovation and new music. Building on this important history, the ASO has partnered with the American Composers Orchestra’s EarShot program, featuring new works by four emerging composers, mentored by ASO musicians, conductors and master composers. Join us on May 10 to hear their works; it’s free and open to the public. More info at aso.org/earshot.

On May 7, we say farewell to our graduating seniors among the brilliant young musicians of the Atlanta Symphony Youth Orchestra at their final performance of the year. The class of 2023 includes young musicians headed to The Juilliard School, Curtis Institute and other top conservatories, as well as Yale, Harvard and the rest. Whatever they choose to pursue in their careers, these young people are headed for success. The future is in good hands!

Thank you for supporting the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra! With gratitude,

Jennifer Barlament, Executive Director

ASO | NATHALIE STUTZMANN

The 2022/23 season marks an exciting new era for the ASO as Maestro Nathalie Stutzmann takes her role as our fifth Music Director, making her the only woman leading a major American orchestra. She has also served as the Principal Guest Conductor of The Philadelphia Orchestra since 2021 and Chief Conductor of the Kristiansand Symphony Orchestra in Norway since 2018.

Nathalie Stutzmann is considered one of the most outstanding musical personalities of our time. Charismatic musicianship combined with unique rigour, energy and fantasy characterize her style. A rich variety of strands form the core of her repertoire: Central European and Russian romanticism is a strong focus—ranging from Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms and Dvořák through to the larger symphonic forces of Tchaikovsky, Wagner, Mahler, Bruckner and Strauss—as well as French 19thcentury repertoire and impressionism.

Highlights as guest conductor in the next seasons include debut performances with the Munich, New York and Helsinki Philharmonics. She will also return to the London Symphony Orchestra and Orchestre de Paris.

Having also established a strong reputation as an opera conductor, Nathalie has led celebrated productions of Wagner’s Tannhäuser in Monte Carlo and Boito’s Mefistofele at the Orange festival. She began the 2022/23 season with a new production of Tchaikovsky’s Pikovaya Dama in The Royal Theater of La Monnaie in Brussels and will make her debut at the Metropolitan Opera this season with two productions of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte reunite with Wagner’s Tannhäuser for a production at the Bayreuth in 2023.

As one of today’s most esteemed contraltos, she has done more than 80 recordings and received the most prestigious awards. Her newest album released in January 2021, Contralto, was awarded the Scherzo’s “Exceptional” seal, Opera Magazine’s Diamant d’Or and radio

RTL’s Classique d’Or. She is an exclusive recording artist of Warner Classics/Erato.

Nathalie was named “Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur,” France’s highest honor, and “Commandeur dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres” by the French government.

ASO | LEADERSHIP | 2022/23 Board of Directors OFFICERS

Patrick Viguerie chair

Janine Brown immediate past chair

Bert Mills treasurer

Angela Evans secretary

DIRECTORS

Phyllis Abramson

Keith Adams

Juliet M. Allan

Susan Antinori

Andrew Bailey

Jennifer Barlament*

Paul Blackney

Rita Bloom

Zachary Boeding*

Janine Brown

Benjamin Q. Brunt

Betsy Camp

S. Wright Caughman, M.D.

Lisa Chang

Susan Clare

Russell Currey

Sheila Lee Davies

Erroll Brown Davis, Jr.

Carlos del Rio, M.D. FIDSA

Lisa DiFrancesco, M.D.

Sloane Drake

Lynn Eden

Yelena Epova

Angela Evans

Craig Frankel

Sally Bogle Gable

Anne Game

Rod Garcia-Escudero

Sally Frost George

Robert Glustrom

Bonnie B. Harris

Charles Harrison

Tad Hutcheson, Jr.

Roya Irvani

Joia Johnson

Chris Kopecky

Susan Antinori vice chair

Lynn Eden vice chair

James Rubright vice chair

Randolph J. Koporc

Carrie Kurlander

James H. Landon

Donna Lee

Sukai Liu

Kevin Lyman

Deborah Marlowe

Shelley McGehee

Arthur Mills IV

Bert Mills

Molly Minnear

Hala Moddelmog*

Terence L. Neal

Galen Lee Oelkers

Dr. John Paddock

Howard D. Palefsky

Barbara N. Paul

Cathleen Quigley

Doug Reid

BOARD OF COUNSELORS

James Rubright

William Schultz

Charles Sharbaugh

Fahim Siddiqui

W. Ross Singletary, II

John Sparrow

Elliott Tapp

Brett Tarver

Maria Todorova

S. Patrick Viguerie

Kathy Waller

Mark D. Wasserman

Chris Webber

John B. White, Jr.

Richard S. White, Jr.

Kevin E. Woods, M.D., M.P.H.

Neil Berman

John W. Cooledge, M.D.

John R. Donnell, Jr.

Jere A. Drummond

Carla Fackler

Charles B. Ginden

John T. Glover

Dona Humphreys

Aaron J. Johnson, Jr.

Ben F. Johnson, III

James F. Kelley

Patricia Leake

Karole F. Lloyd

LIFE DIRECTORS

Howell E. Adams, Jr.

*Ex-Officio Board Member

Connie Calhoun

Meghan H. Magruder

Penelope McPhee

Patricia H. Reid

Joyce Schwob

John A Sibley, III

H. Hamilton Smith

G. Kimbrough Taylor, Jr.

Michael W. Trapp

Ray Uttenhove

Chilton Varner

Adair M. White

Sue Sigmon Williams

C. Merrell Calhoun

Azira G. Hill

ASO | 2022/23 Musician Roster

Nathalie Stutzmann music director

The Robert Reid Topping Chair

FIRST

VIOLIN

David Coucheron concertmaster

The Mr. and Mrs. Howard R. Peevy Chair

Justin Bruns

associate concertmaster

The Charles McKenzie Taylor Chair

Vacant assistant concertmaster

Jun-Ching Lin assistant concertmaster

Anastasia Agapova acting assistant

concertmaster

Kevin Chen

Carolyn Toll Hancock

The Wells Fargo Chair

John Meisner

Christopher Pulgram

Juan R. Ramírez Hernández

Olga Shpitko

Kenn Wagner

Lisa Wiedman Yancich

Sissi Yuqing Zhang

SECTION VIOLIN ‡

Judith Cox

Raymond Leung

The Carolyn McClatchey Chair

Sanford Salzinger

SECOND VIOLIN

Vacant principal

The Atlanta Symphony Associates Chair

Sou-Chun Su acting / associate principal

The Frances Cheney Boggs Chair

Jay Christy acting associate / assistantprincipal

Dae Hee Ahn

Robert Anemone

Noriko Konno Clift

David Dillard

Sheela Iyengar**

Eun Young Jung•

Eleanor Kosek

Yaxin Tan•

Rachel Ostler

VIOLA

Zhenwei Shi principal

The Edus H. and Harriet H. Warren Chair

Paul Murphy associate principal

The Mary and Lawrence Gellerstedt Chair

Catherine Lynn assistant principal

Marian Kent

Yang-Yoon Kim

Yiyin Li

Lachlan McBane

Jessica Oudin

Madeline Sharp

CELLO

Rainer Eudeikis* principal

The Miriam and John Conant Chair

Daniel Laufer acting / associate principal

The Livingston Foundation Chair

Karen Freer acting associate / assistant principal

Thomas Carpenter

Joel Dallow

The UPS Foundation Chair

Peter Garrett•**

Brad Ritchie

Denielle Wilson•**

BASS

Joseph McFadden principal

The Marcia and John Donnell Chair

Gloria Jones Allgood associate principal

The Lucy R. & Gary Lee Jr. Chair

Karl Fenner

Michael Kenady

The Jane Little Chair

Michael Kurth

Nicholas Scholefield•

Daniel Tosky

FLUTE

Christina Smith principal

The Jill Hertz Chair

Robert Cronin associate principal

C. Todd Skitch

Gina Hughes

PICCOLO

Gina Hughes

Players in string sections are listed alphabetically | ‡ Rotates between sections | * Leave of absence |

Sir Donald Runnicles

principal guest conductor; The Neil & Sue Williams Chair

OBOE

Elizabeth Koch Tiscione principal

The George M. and Corrie Hoyt Brown Chair

Zachary Boeding associate principal

The Kendeda Fund Chair

Samuel Nemec

Emily Brebach

ENGLISH HORN

Emily Brebach

CLARINET

Vacant principal

The Robert Shaw Chair

The Mabel Dorn Reeder Honorary Chair

Ted Gurch acting / associate principal

Marci Gurnow

Alcides Rodriguez

E-FLAT CLARINET

Ted Gurch

BASS CLARINET

Alcides Rodriguez

BASSOON

Andrew Brady* principal

The Abraham J. & Phyllis Katz Foundation Chair

Anthony Georgeson acting / associate principal

Laura Najarian

Juan de Gomar

Jerry Hou resident conductor; music director of the atlanta symphony youth orchestra

The Zeist Foundation Chair

CONTRA-BASSOON

Juan de Gomar

HORN

Vacant principal

The Betty Sands Fuller Chair

Susan Welty acting / associate principal

Kimberly Gilman

Bruce Kenney

TRUMPET

Stuart Stephenson* principal

The Madeline and Howell Adams Chair

Michael Tiscione acting / associate principal

Anthony Limoncelli

Mark Maliniak

William Cooper•**

TROMBONE

Vacant principal

The Terence L. Neal Chair, Honoring his dedication and service to the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Nathan Zgonc acting / associate principal

Jason Patrick Robins

BASS TROMBONE

Vacant

The Home Depot Veterans Chair

TUBA

Michael Moore principal

The Delta Air Lines Chair

Norman Mackenzie director of choruses

The Frannie & Bill Graves Chair

TIMPANI

Mark Yancich principal

The Walter H. Bunzl Chair

Michael Stubbart assistant principal

PERCUSSION

Joseph Petrasek principal

The Julie and Arthur Montgomery Chair

Vacant assistant principal

The William A. Schwartz Chair

Michael Stubbart

The Connie and Merrell Calhoun Chair

HARP

Elisabeth Remy Johnson principal

The Sally and Carl Gable Chair

KEYBOARD

The Hugh and Jessie Hodgson Memorial Chair

Peter Marshall †

Sharon Berenson †

LIBRARY

Vacant principal

The Marianna & Solon Patterson Chair

Hannah Davis asyo / assistant librarian

Members of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Advisory Council is a group of passionate and engaged individuals who act as both ambassadors and resources for the ASO Board and staff. The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra extends heartfelt gratitude to the members listed on this page.

2022/23 CHAIRS

Arthur Mills, IV advisory council chair

Justin Im internal connections task force co-chair

Robert Lewis, Jr. internal connections task force co-chair

Frances Root patron experience task force chair

Jane Morrison

diversity & community connection task force co-chair

Eleina Raines

diversity & community connection task force co-chair

Cindy Smith

diversity & community connection task force co-chair

Otis Threatt

diversity & community connection task force co-chair

MEMBERS

Dr. Marshall & Stephanie Abes

Krystal Ahn

Paul Aldo

Kristi & Aadu Allpere

Evelyn Babey

Keith Barnett

Asad & Sakina Bashey

Meredith W. Bell

Jane Blount

Carol Brantley & David Webster

Cristina Briboneria

Tracey Chu

Donald & Barbara Defoe

Paul & Susan Dimmick

Bernadette Drankoski

Diana Einterz

Burt Fealing

Bruce Flower

John Fuller

Tucker Green

Caroline Hofland

Justin Im

Baxter Jones & Jiong Yan

Jon Kamenear

Brian & Ann Kimsey

Jason & Michelle Kroh

Scott Lampert

Dr. Fulton Lewis III & Mr. Neal Rhoney

Robert Lewis, Jr.

Eunice Luke

Pam Martin

Belinda Massafra

Erica McVicker

Arthur Mills IV

Berthe & Shapour

Mobasser

Bert Mobley

Caroline & Phil Moïse

Anne Morgan

Sue Morgan

Jane Morrison

Tatiana Nemo

Gary Noble

Bethani Oppenheimer

Chris Owes

Margie Painter

Ralph Paulk

Regina Olchowski

Eliza Quigley

Eleina Raines

Vicki Riedel

Felicia Rives

Frances A. Root

Tiffany & Rich Rosetti

Thomas & Lynne Saylor

Jim Schroder

Suzanne Shull

Baker Smith

Cindy Smith

Peter & Kristi

Stathopoulos

Tom & Ani Steele

Kimberly Strong

Stephen & Sonia Swartz

George & Amy Taylor

Bob & Dede Thompson

Otis Threatt Jr.

Cathy Toren

Sheila Tschinkel

Roxanne Varzi

Robert & Amy Vassey

Juliana Vincenzino

Robert Walt

Nanette Wenger

Kiki Wilson

Taylor Winn

Camille Yow

For more information about becoming an Advisory Council member, please contact Cheri Snyder at cheri.snyder@atlantasymphony.org or 404.733.4904.

JUN 8/10

MUSSORGSKY: Night on Bald Mountain

HELEN GRIME: Violin Concerto

RACHMANINOV: Symphony No. 3

Andrew Manze, conductor

WAGNER: Tannhäuser

BEETHOVEN: Piano Concerto No. 3

RAVEL: Le tombeau de Couperin

RAVEL: Boléro

Lise de la Salle, piano

Season presented by Programs, dates and artists are subject to change.

Salute to Sir Donald Runnicles

by Holly Hanchey

This month, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra bids Principal Guest Conductor

Sir Donald Runnicles a fond farewell, as the esteemed maestro conducts his last Delta Classical Season concert weekend with the show-stopping Mahler Symphony No. 5.

It is fitting that Runnicles ends his tenure with the ASO with Mahler 5. As a world-renowned conductor of Mahler, it is a piece with which he is deeply familiar. When he conducted it at the ASO in 2015, critics said it was “easily the best performance of the year…The immediate standing ovation at its conclusion was well deserved.” (Arts ATL)

A fan of Mahler’s symphonies since he was a student in Edinburgh, Scotland, Runnicles chose to program this piece on this particular weekend, saying, “In the two decades of music making together there was no more meaningful journey than exploring the symphonies of Gustav Mahler. This repertoire is in the DNA of the ASO, none more so than the epic Fifth Symphony.”

In the past, Runnicles has said that each time he conducts Mahler is a completely different, yet familiar, experience. “They are like tapestries full of beautiful detail—and at the same time, like fathomless wells, where no matter how deep you dig, you never really get to their essence. That is why I enjoy returning to conduct these symphonies. One always notices passages or phrases that one has missed, or discovers where a particular motif develops from.”

Runnicles has served as the Orchestra’s Principal Guest Conductor since 2001 and developed a rapport with orchestra, chorus, and audiences alike. Runnicles said, “The ASO is populated by remarkable soloists who could be having a soloist’s career and it really speaks to the depth, the virtuosity, the talent in this group of players. The most exciting thing for me is my love for this orchestra. It’s just one of the most remarkable relationships I have in my life. I’ve been here decades, and yet I still feel because of this orchestra and what they give, it makes me a better musician and it takes my conducting, my artistry to another level.”

The Maestro has become known for conducting beautiful choral works like the recent performance of Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem just this past January, the same piece he conducted in Berlin with the ASO Chorus in December of 2009 to rave reviews.

“Where every collaboration with this remarkable chorus has always been special, it’s hard to pick out only two or three highlights,” Runnicles said. “Undoubtedly the trip together to the Berlin Philharmonic in 2003 for performances of the Britten War Requiem was extraordinary on so many levels. The immediate alchemy between orchestra and chorus; the communal experience of a work of such shattering and, sadly, ever relevant impact; and of course the subsequent return visits to Berlin in the following years.”

It’s no secret where his love of and dedication to choral music originated. Runnicles grew up the son of a church choirmaster and an amateur pianist in Edinburgh, and started his career as a vocal coach. When asked about his love for repertoire like Brahms and Bruckner, whose Eighth Symphony he conducted earlier this season, Runnicles said, “We are all faced in life with existential questions, fears, and aspirations. It is accorded to very few musical giants such as Brahms and Bruckner to reveal, to explore, perhaps even to answer that which remains so mysterious, so spiritual, so human. In doing so, these works offer a glimpse of the divine.

In addition to his position with the ASO, Runnicles has been Music Director of the Grand Teton Music Festival since 2005, and is General Music Director of Deutsche Oper Berlin, a position he’s held since 2009. This summer, he will reunite with some ASO musicians at the Grand Teton music festival, but says he will miss “The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, the Atlanta community, and the beautiful friendships, both professional and personal, that continue to inform these heady years.

“What a gift. What a privilege.”

ASO | SEASON SPONSORS

We are deeply grateful to the following leadership donors whose generous support has made the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra's season possible.

The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra is grateful to our Symphony Sustainers, a special group of generous donors who make monthly recurring gifts to the Annual Fund. The list below recognizes the donors who have made monthly contributions that create opportunities for us to build and share experiences that have a lasting impact on thousands each year.

A Friend of the Symphony (4)

Mr. Thomas Mark

Adkins

Mr. Alvaro Alonso & Ms. Cari Clark

Mr. Peter Bancheri & Ms. Maureen

McAndrews

Dr. Anne Bartolucci & Mr. Jason Graham

Drs. Jay & Martin

Beard-Coles

Alex Bolton

Ms. Jadonna Brewton

Dr. Rhonda L. Briscoe

Ms. Barbara L. Brown

Shannon Caldwell

Ms. Sophie Chan

Jenene Cherney

Mr. & Mrs. Briston

Chester

Tammy Clark

Paul Colangelo

Mr. Carl Colucci

Dr. Janie I. Cowan

Ms. Amy Cronin

Gray & Marge Crouse

Alexander Crozier

Mr. & Mrs. Deryck

Durston

Mr. & Mrs. Michael Faber

Mr. Brandon Goldberg

Mr. & Mrs. Richard Greensted

Ms. Joy Hambrick

Ms. Denise Hanusek & Ms. Ann-Marie Breaux

Ms. Linda L. Hare & Mr. Gerald A. Barth

Ms. Tamara L. Harper

Ms. Cheryl Heenan & Mr. Thomas Mullally

Ms. Patricia Herndon

Daniel E. Holloway

Ms. Jackie G. Howard

Ms. Joy Huddlestun

Ms. Margaret B.

Hungerford

Mr. Christopher Hurst

Mr. Brian C. Ingram

Mr. & Mrs. David L.

Jennings

Mr. & Mrs. Larry Kistner

Mr. Steven Lindsey

Mr. George Macon

Ms. Janell Martin

Jennifer Mathews

Ms. Elizabeth M.

Newton

Mr. & Mrs. Eric Norman

Lynn & Galen Oelkers

Mr. & Mrs. Paul J.

Owen, Jr.

Dr. William & Reverend

Katherine Pasch

Mrs. Gretchen

Pennybacker

Mr. & Mrs. Rich Piombino

Ms. Graciela Pregnolato

Katie Rattray

Jonathan Seletyn

Mr. Warren Shaw

Mr. Tom Slovak & Mr. Jeffery Jones

Mr. & Mrs. Bruce Strahan

Ms. Candice Thompson

Mr. & Mrs. Jonathan

Throop

Mr. & Mrs. William H. Townsend

Melanie Upshaw

Janice Wolf

Mr. & Mrs. Tom

Wroblewski

Samantha Young & Michael Pietrobon

Katelyn Zeeveld

Concerts of Thursday, May 4, 2023 8:00pm

Saturday, May 6, 2023 8:00pm

SIR DONALD RUNNICLES, conductor

IRENE ROBERTS, mezzo-soprano

This weekend’s concerts are dedicated to

ANN MARIE & JOHN B. WHITE, JR. in honor of their extraordinary support of the 2021/22 Annual Fund.

ALBAN BERG (1885–1935)

Three Excerpts from Wozzeck, Op. 7 (1922) 18 MINS

I. Langsam — March tempo

II. Theme and Variations

II. Langsam

Irene Roberts, mezzo-soprano

INTERMISSION

GUSTAV MAHLER (1860–1911)

Symphony No. 5 (1902)

Part I

The use of cameras or recording devices during the concert is strictly prohibited. Please be kind to those around you and silence your mobile phone and other hand-held devices.

20 MINS

72 MINS

1. Trauermarsch. In gemessenem Schritt. Streng. Wie ein Kondukt (Funeral March. With measured pace. Strict. Like a cortège)

2. Stürmisch bewegt. Mit grösster Vehemenz (Violently agitated. With the greatest vehemence)

Part II

3. Scherzo. Kräftig, nicht zu schnell (Vigorously, not too fast)

Part III

4. Adagietto. Sehr langsam

5. Rondo-Finale. Allegro

by Noel Morris Program Annotator

Three Excerpts from Wozzeck, Op. 7

In addition to a solo soprano, these excerpts are scored for four flutes (two doubling piccolo), four oboes (one doubling English horn), four clarinets (two doubling E-flat clarinet) bass clarinet, three bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, four trumpets, four trombones, tuba, two timpani, percussion, harp, celeste and strings.

“Man screams from the depths of his soul; the whole era becomes a single, piercing shriek. Art also screams, into the deep darkness, screams for help, screams for the spirit. This is Expressionism.”

Austrian critic Hermann Bahr

It’s the “20th Century’s Most Influential Opera,” wrote the  New York Times.  It’s “degenerate art,” declared the Nazis. Together, these statements say a lot about the currency of Berg’s psychodrama  Wozzeck, composed during a disorienting and tumultuous age.  Wozzeck  trains a lens on the underbelly of society, that stubborn condition that exists alongside wealth, power and national pride. It shows the trauma of poverty and human exploitation, and post-traumatic stress. In interwar Europe, it was an opera with teeth, exposing the wounds of a disillusioned and shell-shocked generation. But it still chews at our social values today.

On the eve of World War I, composer Alban Berg walked into a Viennese theater to see  Woyzeck, a play by Georg B about a mentally distressed soldier who goes into a jealous rage and murders his girlfriend. (Based on a true story, the historic Woyzeck pleaded insanity but was found guilty and executed.) Although Büchner died before he could finish his play, he did provide enough material to inspire Berg’s opera just as civilization was beginning to disintegrate. Within months of that theatrical production, a generation of fresh-faced men gleefully crammed into trains to test their valor on the battlefields of Europe. “It’ll be over by Christmas,” went their conventional wisdom. Four years later, there would be an estimated 40 million casualties.

As a youth, Alban Berg had mainly been self-taught in music though he enjoyed the culture, music, and society of fin-de-siècle Vienna. At 19, he started lessons with Arnold Schoenberg, a watershed moment for music. Together with Anton Webern, the three came to be known as the Second Viennese School (assuming Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert were the First). The Second

These are the first ASO performances.

JOSEPH MULLER NYPL

Viennese School exploded the boundaries of tonality, liberating the composer from conventions that had governed Western music for centuries.

Given the crumbling political landscape, work on  Wozzeck  would have to wait. The composer received his draft notice in 1915 and entered the Austro-Hungarian army. Prone to asthma and poor health, he suffered a collapse just two months into his service and was declared unfit for combat. He spent the rest of the War behind a desk and began work on Wozzeck in 1917.

Berg found in Büchner’s Woyzeck a vehicle for social commentary, one that dovetailed with a popular artistic trend called Expressionism. In it, composers, writers and visual artists applied their craft to explore the darkest recesses of the human psyche—it was a perfect marriage for Berg’s expanded tonal language.

By 1923, he had finished the opera and was shopping it around to conductors and impresarios. As a sample, he extracted three excerpts. Alma Mahler, the widow of Gustav Mahler, paid for the printing of the score. Berg dedicated the opera to her, and the full opera debuted in 1925. In the three excerpts, the soprano sings the role of the ill-fated Marie, Wozzeck’s common-law wife and the mother of his child.

Alma Mahler

Alma Mahler, née Schindler, was the beautiful daughter of Austrian landscape painter Emil J. Schindler. She grew up around artists and thinkers and proved to be a gifted composer, though history remembers her for her impressive cadre of lovers. She was 20 years old when she began a relationship with the composer and conductor Alexander Zemlinsky, a man she once described as a “hideous gnome.”

Artistic genius and achievement rocked her world. After Zemlinsky, she married the prestigious conductor Gustav Mahler, a man 19 years her senior. They had two daughters together, but only one survived to adulthood. While still married to Mahler, she had an affair with the future Bauhaus architect Walter Gropius. After Mahler died, she entered a three-year relationship with the artist Oskar Kokoschka. Meanwhile, Gropius came into his own as an architect. He and Alma reconnected and married in 1915. Together, they had a daughter. Alma then fell for the writer Franz Werfel and bore him a son. In 1918, she divorced Gropius and eventually married Werfel. After Hitler annexed Austria, Alma and Franz Werfel settled in America.

First ASO performances: January 17–19, 1974

Michael

Donald

Symphony No. 5

Palmer, conductor

Most recent ASO performances: March 5-6, 2015

Runnicles, conductor

Symphony No. 5 is scored for four flutes (two doubling piccolo), three oboes (one doubling English horn), 3 clarinets (one doubling E-flat clarinet and bass clarinet), 3 bassoons (one doubling contrabassoon), six horns, four trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp and strings.

According to Mahler’s friend and confidante Natalie BauerLechner, Gustav Mahler wrote his first composition at the age of 6. It was a polka that used a funeral march as an introduction. Now, you might be thinking:  a funeral march? From a 6-year-old? But if you know Mahler, it’s not so surprising. First of all, he was a sponge for the music and sounds around his hometown of Iglau. Secondly, he wrote lots of music about death; thirdly, death seemed to follow him.

Mahler was one of 14 children born to Marie Hermann and Bernhardt Mahler. Six died in infancy. Gustav was the oldest surviving child and grew very close to his little brother, Ernst, who died tragically of a heart condition. The composer was just 15. There would be more loss over his lifetime, and the music that we think of as the funeral march (slow, stately minor-key music in duple meter) became a common feature in his works. In his First Symphony, Mahler drew inspiration from a picture of a funeral procession to set the tune “Frère Jacques” in a minor key. His Third Symphony opens with an expansive trombone solo over a heavy dirge. The Fourth closes with a portrait of a child’s view of Heaven.

When he wrote Symphony No. 5 at the dawn of the 20th century, Mahler crafted a seismic opening heralded by a military-style trumpet call. Immediately, the music feeds into a massive funeral march, one that works itself out over two movements. Death is a recurring theme in Mahler’s music, although it’s important to see it as one among many.

Polyphony

Mahler biographer Jens Malte Fischer recalls a conversation between the composer and Natalie Bauer-Lechner. They were strolling through a fair in the resort town of Wörthersee, and “Mahler was so taken by the combined sounds of the shooting galleries, and Punch and Judy show, the military band music and the singing of a male-voice choir, that he exclaimed: ‘You hear? That’s polyphony,

ROB PHIPPS

and that’s where I get it from! Just in this way—from quite different directions—must the themes appear; and they must be just as different in rhythm and melodic character.’”

That “polyphony,” as Mahler called it, this piling on of sounds, delighted him as a child. Iglau was home to a military garrison that filled the air with trumpet calls (note the opening of the Fifth Symphony) and band music. At the same time, the village was alive with different folk traditions, sacred music, dance music and tunes from operettas that all became threads in Mahler’s musical tapestry. And repeatedly, he used them to create something like the cacophonous atmosphere of the fair in Wörthersee.

Midway through his symphonic output, he introduced another yarn. He fell under the spell of J.S. Bach and began intensively studying his music. With Bach on the brain, Mahler developed a more contrapuntal style for his Fifth Symphony—that is, a polyphony of individual melodies sounding simultaneously.

“It is hard to believe that at the time I could have written again like a beginner,” he wrote, “as though I had completely forgotten the routine of the first four symphonies.”

Mahler the conductor

By the time he wrote the Fifth, Mahler was a major presence in the music world—but not as a composer. At 21, he landed his first conducting job at a Slovenian opera house and gradually worked his way up through larger and larger companies—Kassel, Leipzig, Prague, Budapest, Hamburg—until he reached the pinnacle: the Vienna Court Opera. And his schedule was dizzying. In August 1886, he conducted 10 different operas. In the spring of 1887, he conducted 57 performances.

At the time, the world was wary of Mahler the composer. So demanding was his performance schedule that composition became a summertime occupation, typically in a pristine Alpine setting where he could step outdoors and hike into the mountains.

In February of 1901, Mahler suffered a health scare. He had conducted a matinee of Bruckner’s Fifth Symphony and an evening production of Mozart’s  The Magic Flute.  That night, he returned home and collapsed. His sister Justine found him lying in a pool of blood caused by intestinal hemorrhaging.

In a recent article in  Interlude, music journalist Georg Predota wrote: “Almost immediately, Mahler’s music underwent a profound change.” Where his first four symphonies used poetry, flowery

descriptions, and liberal use of the human voice, Mahler adopted “a purely instrumental conception,” primarily inspired by Bach. Rejecting programs, “Mahler was no longer willing to share written explanations of his works with the public.” This is not to say his music isn’t personal.

Alma

Mahler wrote three movements of the Fifth Symphony over the summer of 1901. In November, Mahler, who had had his share of love affairs, met Alma Schindler.

She was just 21 years old and often called the most beautiful girl in Vienna. From her diaries, we know she had a hearty libido and a penchant for older men—especially those with big careers in the arts. A few weeks after their meeting, Mahler asked for her hand, and they married the following March. Uncomprehending, the composer’s friend Bruno Walter wrote: “Mahler is 41 and she 22, she is a celebrated beauty, used to a glamorous social life, while he is so unworldly and fond of being alone.” Nevertheless, Alma entered the Fifth Symphony via the fourth movement, the Adagietto.

“This Adagietto was Gustav Mahler’s declaration of love for Alma,” wrote conductor Willem Mengelberg. “Instead of a letter, he sent her this in manuscript form; no other words accompanied it. She understood and wrote to him: He should come!!! (both of them told me this!).” Indeed. One could hardly imagine music of greater longing, tenderness, or vulnerability.

Mahler finished the initial draft of the Fifth Symphony over the summer of 1902 and, through his newfound love, crafted a hefty symphonic journey that begins with a funeral march and moves through an impish scherzo to a tender love song and jubilant finale. For Mahler, this is a picture of life, with its hopes and despairs intermingled and wrapped inside a vivid world of sound. Happily, in the Fifth Symphony, hope wins.

SIR DONALD RUNNICLES, CONDUCTOR

Sir Donald Runnicles is the General Music Director of the Deutsche Oper Berlin and Music Director of the Grand Teton Music Festival, as well as Principal Guest Conductor of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. In 2019 Runnicles also took up post as the Sydney Symphony Orchestra’s first-ever Principal Guest Conductor. He additionally holds the title of Conductor Emeritus of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, having served as Chief Conductor from 2009-2016. Runnicles enjoys close and enduring relationships with many of the leading opera companies and symphony orchestras, and he is especially celebrated for his interpretations of Romantic and post-Romantic repertoire, which are core to his musical identity.

Sir Donald Runnicles was born and raised in Edinburgh. He was appointed OBE in 2004, and was made a Knight Bachelor in 2020. He holds honorary degrees from the University of Edinburgh, the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama, and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

IRENE ROBERTS, MEZZO-SOPRANO

Mezzo-soprano Irene Roberts began the 2022-23 season with her house debut at Opéra National de Lyon as Venus in a new production of Tannhäuser by David Hermann, led by conductor Daniele Rustioni. Immediately following her debut in Lyon she returns to Berlin to debut as Brangäne in Tristan und Isolde under the baton of Sir Donald Runnicles. She also makes her debut in Japan at the New National Theater of Tokyo as Amneris in Aida under the baton of Carlo Rizzi, followed by her debut with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra singing Marie in Wozzeck conducted by Sir Donald Runnicles. Her other performances at the Deutsche Oper Berlin include the Rätselstimmung in Antikrist, the title role in Carmen, and Fenena in Nabucco.

She recently made her debuts at the Opéra National de Lorraine and Opéra de Dijon as the title role in Julie by Philippe Boesmans, Stadttheater Klagenfurt as Venus in Tannhäuser, the Dutch National Opera as Nicklausse, Teatro la Fenice in Venice as Amneris in Aida, and the Macerata Opera Festival in Carmen

Roberts studied classical piano for over 20 years and pursued her education as a vocal performance major at the University of the Pacific and the Cleveland Institute of Music. She is a graduate of the young artist program at Palm Beach Opera and won 2nd prize in the Advanced Division at the 41st Annual Palm Beach Opera Vocal Competition.

SIMON PAULY ANDREW BOGARD

Concerts of Thursday, May 18, 2023

8:00 PM

Saturday, May 20, 2023

8:00 PM

PETR POPELKA, conductor

CHRISTINA NAUGHTON, piano

MICHELLE NAUGHTON, piano

VÍTĚZSLAVA KAPRÁLOVÁ (1915–1940)

Military Sinfonietta, Op. 11 (1937) 18 MINS

BOHUSLAV MARTINŮ (1890–1959)

Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra (1943) 23 MINS

I. Allegro non troppo

II. Adagio

III. Allegro

Christina Naughton, piano

Michelle Naughton, piano

INTERMISSION 20 MINS

ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK (1841–1904)

Symphony No. 8 in G Major, Op. 88 (1889) 36 MINS

I. Allegro con brio

II. Adagio

III. Scherzo: Allegretto grazioso

IV. Allegro, ma non troppo

Saturday’s Atlanta Symphony Orchestra concert honors JOHN W. COOLEDGE for his very generous and deeply appreciated support of the Orchestra’s 2021-2022 Annual Fund campaign.

The use of cameras or recording devices during the concert is strictly prohibited. Please be kind to those around you and silence your mobile phone and other hand-held devices.

by Noel Morris Program Annotator

Military Sinfonietta, Op. 11

Military Sinfonietta is scored for three flutes (one doubling piccolo), two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, E-flat clarinet, bass clarinet, two bassoons, contrabassoon, six horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp, piano, celeste and strings.

“I seldom had the chance to meet anyone so gifted, so conscious of the task she had and wanted to fulfill. And this is one of the things I cannot explain, why fate took her, why fate gave her such gifts, so precious and unique, only to take them away.” —Bohuslav

Martinů

It is difficult to ponder the 25 years that Vítězslava Kaprálová spent on this earth without wondering what might have been—what career might have blossomed, what glass ceilings might have fallen. Even today, few conductors have stood before a major orchestra before the age of 25. She did it in 1938 when one could count female conductors on one hand.

Both of her parents were musicians. Her mother was a respected voice teacher. Her father was a choirmaster, composer and music editor. He founded a music school and was one half of a popular piano duo with Ludvík Kundera, father of the novelist Milan Kundera. It was the ideal environment for children with extraordinary talent.

At 15, Kaprálová enrolled in the conducting and composition programs at the Brno Conservatory and became the first female graduate. During that time, she wrote a number of works, including the Piano Concerto she conducted as her graduation piece. From there, she spent two years at the Prague Conservatory, studying composition with Vítězslav Novák (a pupil of Dvořák) and Václav Talich, chief conductor of the Czech Philharmonic. In Prague, she continued to crank out compositions and then took off for Paris in the fall of 1937. There, she studied conducting with Charles Munch and composition with Bohuslav Martinů.

Born in 1915, Kaprálová was a child of interwar Europe. Under the First Czechoslovak Republic, the people of Prague and Brno tasted self-rule for the first time since the 16th century. Kaprálová flourished within a great flowering of Czech culture. Sadly, it was but the eye of the storm. In 1938, Adolph Hitler rolled his war machine into Czech territory. Almost overnight, Kaprálová went from being a music student in Paris to a student in exile.

These are the first ASO performances.

WIKIMEDIA

Kaprálová completed her Military Sinfonietta in February of 1937 while still studying in Prague. She offered an explanation.

“The composer uses the language of music to express her emotional relationship toward the questions of national existence,” she wrote, “…a subject permeating the consciousness of the nation at the time… The composition does not represent a battle cry, but it depicts the psychological need to defend that which is most sacred to the nation.”

She dedicated the piece to the president of the Republic and returned to Prague to conduct the premiere in November of 1937. It was a hit. So enthusiastic were the reviews the young composer was invited to the International Society of Contemporary Music Festival in London during the summer of 1938. At 23, she traveled from Paris to London to lead the BBC Orchestra in a performance of her Military Sinfonietta CBS radio broadcast the concert in the United States A week later, Time magazine wrote:

“In its 16 years of existence, the society has now and then turned up a really golden egg. At the festival’s opening concert last week, seven strictly fresh compositions were chipped open, sniffed at. Four attracted considerable critical attention… [including] a Military Symphonietta in one movement by 22-year-old Vítĕzslava Kapralová, a good-looking Czechoslovakian girl. To Composer Kaprálová, who conducted her own lusty, sprawling composition, went the afternoon’s biggest hand.”

At some point, the intense outpouring of creativity and mutual admiration between Kaprálová and her teacher Martinů crossed into romantic entanglement—an unlikely pairing, given that he was married and 24 years her senior. In 1938, he offered to leave his wife, but the march of history (and perhaps some cold feet) loomed over the affair like Rick and Ilsa (Casablanca). In June of 1940, Hitler invaded France. Martinů, who was associated with the Czech resistance, fled with his wife to America. In April of that year, Kaprálová married the Czech writer Jiří Mucha. She fell sick in May and died on June 16.

First and most recent ASO performances:

April 2-4, 1992

George Hanson, conductor

Katia Labèque & Marielle Labèque, pianos

Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra

In addition to two solo pianos, this concerto is scored for two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, percussion and strings.

Bohuslav Martinů was born in a church tower overlooking the Czech-Moravian highlands. His father was a shoemaker who set the clock in the tower, kept watch for fires and sounded the Angelus (daily prayers signaled by the tolling of the

bell). Bohuslav was a talented music student whose lack of discipline got him thrown out of the Prague Conservatory. Nevertheless, his promise as a composer delivered him into the care of excellent teachers. In 1923, he moved to Paris to study with Albert Roussel and worked as an international correspondent for Czech newspapers. At the same time, he absorbed the mélange of music that Paris had to offer—jazz, modernism, neoclassicism, the avant-garde—melding it with the influence of Czech and Moravian folksongs. Although he had formerly worked as a professional violinist, he favored the piano in his compositions and included it in many of his orchestral textures.

From afar, Martinů maintained ties to his homeland, producing works for the Czech Theater in Prague. But the rise of fascism and communism began to threaten that relationship. He returned to Prague for the last time in 1938 for the premiere of his surrealist opera  Julietta.  With the signing of the Munich Agreement later that year, which ceded the Sudetenland to Germany, the façade of an independent Czech Republic crumbled. Martinů attempted to enlist in the Czech Resistance in France but was declined based on age. Needing to channel his patriotic fervor, he wrote a cantata called Field Mass in tribute to the London-based Czech government-in-exile. After a famous international radio broadcast of the piece, the Gestapo, now in control of Czech lands, blacklisted the composer. In the summer of 1940, as the German army rolled into France, Martinů and his wife fled to America. He left most of his music behind.

Working in exile, Martinů taught at the Berkshire Music Center (Tanglewood Festival), Princeton and Mannes College of Music. At the same time, compositions poured out of him. Homesickness aside, America proved to be a fertile and welcoming place. With Serge Koussevitzky leading the charge, American orchestras embraced Martinů and gave him greater currency in the music world.

Over the summer of 1942, he taught composition at the Tanglewood Festival in western Massachusetts, where he met fellow exiles Pierre Luboschutz and Genia Nemenoff, a husband-and-wife piano duo. As it happened, they’d all lived in Paris before the War and had lots to discuss. Eager to expand the repertoire for piano duo, the couple asked Martinů to write for them a concerto for two pianos, which he did in January and February of 1943.

“I have used the pianos for the first time in the purely ‘solo’ sense,” wrote the composer, “with the orchestra as accompaniment. The form is free; it leans rather toward the Concerto grosso. It demands

virtuosity, brilliant piano technique, and the timbre of the same two instruments calls forth new colours and new sonorities.”

Martinů dedicated the piece to the pianists Pierre Luboschutz and Genia Nemenoff. On November 5, 1943, they took the stage with Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra for the world premiere.

First ASO performance:

October 30, 1951

Henry Sopkin, conductor

Most recent ASO performances:

April 27–29, 2017

Vasily Petrenko, conductor

Symphony No. 8 in G Major, Op. 88

This symphony is scored for two flutes (one doubling piccolo), two oboes (one doubling English horn), two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani and strings.

If not quite a story of rags to riches, the life of Antonín Dvořák comes close. He was a butcher’s son, born in a rural Czech village—a hamlet of “foreign” nationals living under the thumb of the Austrian empire—about as low on the social ladder as one could get.

Schooled as a tradesman, he learned music through a combination of charity, artful maneuvering (away from the butcher’s trade) and grit. By the time Antonín was 16, his father had given up on sharing the family business with his son and sent him to an organ school in Prague. For the next 16 years, Dvořák lived mainly with family, moving from one home to another. His was a humble existence with meager income earned from playing viola in an opera orchestra. Outgrowing his teachers, he continued to develop by borrowing study scores, writing music and performing works by established composers in that theater orchestra.

The political climate in Prague was tense. Owing to a forced “Germanization” of the Bohemian capital, pockets of Czech nationalism spread among the lower-middle class. Nationalists worked to gain majorities in various trade guilds. Some people criticized Dvořák for writing music that didn’t sound Czech. In fact, through his twenties he was a sponge for works by the German masters: Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Wagner. In the book  Dvořák and His World, Michael Beckerman quotes the composer:

“I had just heard  Die Meistersinger, and not long before Richard Wagner himself had been in Prague. I was perfectly crazy about him, and recollect following him as he walked along the streets to get a chance now and again of seeing the great little man’s face.”

For more than half his life, hardship was Dvořák’s constant companion. In 1873, with a baby on the way, he married the 19-year-old Anna

Čermáková and made a living as a church organist and piano teacher. By 1875, they had a son, a daughter and another on the way. Then the unthinkable happened. Daughter Josefa died just two days after birth. Heartbroken, the composer poured his grief into the masterful Stabat mater. Two years later, little Růžena died from an accidental poisoning. A month after that, little Otakar succumbed to smallpox. Surely, with the loss of his three children, 1877 was his darkest year. Incredibly, it was also the turning point.

Johannes Brahms took an interest in Dvořák and gave his own publisher a nudge. Early in 1878, Nikolaus Simrock published Dvořák’s  Moravian Duets, which turned a tidy profit (to the Viennese, the  Duets sounded delightfully exotic). Next, Simrock asked Dvořák to write the  Slavonic Dances (more exotic music). Dvořák never again worried about money. Curiously, the composer wrote both the  Dances and the  Duets at the suggestion of others, but that’s all it took— along with some artful marketing on Simrock’s part—Dvořák became known as a Czech nationalist.

With  Slavonic Dances, the composer’s popularity spread to England, and he began making trips there to present his music. An 1883 performance of his Stabat mater secured his reputation among the U.K.’s vaunted choral festivals, and the commissions began to flow. The composer now had the finances in place to make choices about his life, and he chose the Czech countryside—his anchor and his inspiration. In 1884, he built a rural getaway in the village of Vyosoká, where he could retreat from his hectic schedule to spend time with family, write music and take hikes through the thick woods (notice the bird call in the opening of the Eighth Symphony).

The 1880s was a decade of abundance: he wrote a number of works, and his family grew. By 1888, Anna and Antonín had a brood of six children, all of whom survived into adulthood. The Royal Philharmonic Society commissioned the Seventh Symphony in 1884; Simrock paid Dvořák 3,000 marks for the publication rights.

With the Eighth, the publisher overplayed his hand. With an eye on his purse, Simrock urged Dvořák to write music that could be sold to amateurs to play in the home. But in the summer and fall of 1888, between work in the garden, nature hikes, and card games at the pub, Dvořák wrote his Eighth Symphony. Simrock offered him only 1,000 marks, but by then, the composer had options. He took his new symphony across the English Channel and made a deal with Novello. With his

English publisher serving as a distribution arm, performances of the new symphony popped up across the orchestral world, including a New York premiere in 1892. Dvořák made nine trips to the U.K. and received an honorary degree from Cambridge University. After the success of the Eighth, he reconciled with Simrock and sold him publishing rights to his Ninth and final symphony.

PETR POPELKA, CONDUCTOR

Within just a few seasons, Petr Popelka has established himself as one of the most inspiring young conductors. He is Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra, beginning in September 2022, and has been Chief Conductor of the Norwegian Radio Orchestra (KORK) since August 2020.

As a guest conductor, in the 2022/2023 season, Popelka is making debuts with orchestras such as the Gewandhausorchester, Staatskapelle Berlin, Bamberger Symphoniker, SWR Symphonieorchester, WDR Sinfonieorchester, RundfunkSinfonieorchester Berlin, Orchestra sinfonica nazionale della RAI, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg and Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. He will return to the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, Wiener Symphoniker (TV concert “Spring in Vienna”), Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra. Operatic engagements will take him to Den Norske Opera, Oslo, for a new production of Strauss’s Elektra, and to Semperoper Dresden for Shostakovich’s The Nose. Together with his orchestras from Prague and Oslo, he will perform Schönberg’s monumental Gurre-Lieder Previous debuts include the Czech Philharmonic, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, hrSinfonieorchester, Deutsche Radio Philharmonie and Mozarteumorchester Salzburg. In the 2019/2020 season, Popelka was the first ever Conductor Fellow of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester. Having devoted himself increasingly to conducting since 2016, his new career path was particularly encouraged and nurtured by Vladimir Kiradjiev and Alan Gilbert. He acquired his music education both in his hometown of Prague as well as in Freiburg. Between 2010 and 2019 he held the position of deputy principal double bass of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden. Next to conducting, his work as a composer plays another important role within Popelka’s artistic range.

SIMON PAULY

CHRISTINA & MICHELLE NAUGHTON, PIANO

Christina and Michelle Naughton’s career was launched with a recital debut at Kennedy Center; and an orchestral debut at the Mann Center with the Philadelphia Orchestra, which led the Philadelphia Inquirer to characterize their playing as “paired to perfection”. Subsequently, they began their careers in Europe and Asia; at Munich’s Herkulesaal and with the Hong Kong Philharmonic respectively.

Christina and Michelle have played as soloists with orchestras such as the Boston Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, Atlanta, Baltimore, Detroit, Hawaii, Houston, Milwaukee, Minnesota, Nashville, New Jersey, North Carolina, San Diego, St. Louis, Virginia, Pacific Symphonies; the Buffalo and Naples Philharmonics, as well as The Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Royal Flemish Philharmonic (Belgium), l’Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg, the Frankfurter Opernand Museumsorchester, Hamburg Chorus, Kiel Philharmonic, Norddeutsche Philharmonic Rostock, the Netherlands Philharmonic at the Royal Concertgebouw, The Hong Kong Philharmonic, and New Zealand Symphony. Past and future seasons feature collaborations under the batons of conductors such as Stéphane Denève, Edo deWaart, JoAnn Falletta, Giancarlo Guerrero, Emmanuel Krivine, Cristian Macelaru, Andris Nelsons, Andres Orozco-Estrada, Leonard Slatkin, and Thomas Sondergaard.

Born in Princeton, New Jersey to parents of European and Chinese descent, Steinway artists Christina and Michelle are graduates of the Juilliard School and the Curtis Institute of Music, where they were each awarded the Festorazzi Prize.

Donors make it happen!

The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra would not be where it is today without the generosity of our community. Meet three of our amazing donors who are making things happen at Symphony Hall:

Janie Cowan, Ph.D.

Janie Cowan clearly remembers the time she first heard the ASO: she was 9 years old and her school class came by bus to a youth concert early in the Robert Shaw era. “I felt I’d arrived! I was home.” She was unable to return for years, but “the experience remained in my heart. I had started my journey.”

That journey led her to The University of Georgia, where she majored in Music Education and studied clarinet with Judy Moore (who played in the ASO), and then to a career as a band and choral director. She later became a Media Specialist because “as a single mother of four, I needed regular hours.” She got her Ph.D. and now works at Duluth High School, and maintains a close relationship to the music program there, often giving ASO tickets to promising students. Two Duluth High School Orchestra students are currently in the Atlanta Symphony Youth Orchestra, as well as some Talent Development musicians.

Janie was ultimately able to become an ASO regular. “I became a subscriber, starting on the first row of the balcony, then downstairs,” she said, “and then I noticed the ushers and realized this was a way to attend all the performances.” She became an usher about 12 years ago, and was soon offered a job as part-time Front-of-House Supervisor on the ASO staff, a job she clearly loves “It’s an absolute pinch-me dream come true that I work here now, and that I’m at all the performances.” Beloved by ushers and staff, she is always there to greet patrons as they walk into the hall.

Janie was an inaugural member of the Symphony Sustainers, who make monthly recurring gifts to the ASO. “The ASO means so much, and being a Sustainer makes it easy to give,” she explained. “The orchestra has been integral to my growth; it was formative in my choosing a major and a career, and in becoming a lifelong music advocate. I can’t imagine the day I can’t be here at the symphony.”

In addition to supporting the Annual Fund as a Sustainer, Janie is in the process of setting up a planned gift, making her a member of the Henry Sopkin Circle.

“The ASO means so much! Being a Symphony Sustainer makes it easy to give.”

Arietha Lockhart

Arietha Lockhart joined the ASO Chorus soon after moving here from Alabama in 1983 to start her career as a music teacher. 30 years later, she retired from teaching but she remains in the Chorus, where she is an icon and inspiration.

Meanwhile, her career as a soloist blossomed under the tutelage of Florence Kopleff and Elizabeth Colson, two of Atlanta’s legendary singing teachers. A soprano, she has sung opera, including the Queen of the Night from Mozart's The Magic Flute, but she is best known as a concert soloist. She sang at the 1996 Olympics Opening Ceremony and created the role of Mama King at the premiere of the opera I Dream by Douglas Tappan. Her recital work has championed contemporary Atlanta composers. With the ASO Chorus, she has soloed in the Mozart Requiem and Bach’s B-minor Mass, among other works.

The arrival of Nathalie Stutzmann has been especially pivotal for the Chorus. Lockhart, who has sung under every music director except Henry Sopkin, compared Stutzmann to Robert Shaw. “Their temperament was quite different” she observed. But, like Shaw, “She wants us to get to the text, the emotions, and the drama.” She added that Stutzmann is “a force of nature with charisma that washes over you – you look at them and you’ll do whatever it takes to get what they want.”

Lockhart has been a donor to the Annual Fund every year for 30 years. “I probably gave when I didn’t have anything to give, but that’s part of my upbringing. If something is nourishing to you, you try to help.” She has donated her soloist fees to the Talent Development Program, and she’s made memorial contributions to the ASO. “Of course, being in the Chorus is also a donation,” she added. She is passionate about singing in the Chorus and said, “I hope to sing on as long as I can make a positive contribution to the sound, and if my knees will allow me to get down the steps to the rehearsal hall and up the stage to perform.”

ARIETHA LOCKHART “If something is nourishing to you, you try to help.”

GINARIFFEY

Gina Riffey and her husband Doug attend almost every ASO Delta Classical Series concert. “I can’t imagine my life without the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra,” Gina said.

Gina is a nurse who spent most of her career at Grady Medical Center and as an Air Force Reserve Flight Nurse. The latter role is how she met her husband, Doug, who became a pilot with Delta Airlines. Both retired nearly 20 years ago.

Soon after retiring, Gina was elected to the McDonough City Council, where she served from 2006-2010. She was then appointed to the McDonough Housing Authority, where she continues to serve. She’s also active in the McDonough American Legion. She and Doug have two children: Their daughter is a drone pilot with the Air Force, and their son is a railroad engineer.

When Gina was 8 or 9, her father was stationed at Hunter Air Force Base, which had a program for taking children to classical music concerts. Those experiences along with piano lessons, were her introduction to classical music. When the family moved to Marietta, she became a fan of classical programming on WABE radio.

Years later, after she married Doug, they began coming to ASO concerts. “We would get a FlexPass, where you could select 10 concerts, but then we got serious about it and bought the full season. I knew if Doug was away, I could get a friend to go with me.” That was 20 years ago, and they continue to buy full season packages.

“It’s such a wonderful orchestra, and there is nothing like hearing that orchestra play the National Anthem at the beginning of every season. This season is wonderful. Watching Nathalie is breathtaking, how she uses her whole body to communicate.”

“I support the symphony because I know it’s expensive, and the price of tickets doesn’t cover everything. The survival of the ASO is important to me.”

Join these donors. Your Annual Fund support makes it possible for the ASO to transform lives through the power of our music. For more information or to make a gift: visit aso.org/give or call the Development Team at 404.733.5079.

“I support the symphony because the survival of the ASO is important to me.”

ASO | SUPPORT

TheAtlanta Symphony Orchestra continues to prosper thanks to the support of our generous patrons. The list below recognizes the donors who have made contributions since June 1, 2021. Their extraordinary generosity provides the foundation for this world-class institution.

$1,000,000+ A Friend of the Symphony∞

$100,000+

1180 Peachtree

The Antinori Foundation

The Molly Blank Fund of The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation∞

The Coca-Cola Company

Sheila L. & Jonathan J. Davies

Delta Air Lines

Lettie Pate Evans Foundation

Barney M. Franklin & Hugh W. Burke Charitable Fund

Georgia Power Company

The Home Depot Foundation

Invesco QQQ

Abraham J. & Phyllis Katz Foundation∞

Charles Loridans Foundation, Inc.

Amy W. Norman Charitable Foundation

Ann Marie & John B. White, Jr.°∞

The Zeist Foundation, Inc.

Alston & Bird LLP

$50,000+

$75,000+ Accenture LLP

The John & Rosemary Brown Family Foundation

Cadence Bank

Thalia & Michael C. Carlos Advised Fund

$35,000+

Sally & Larry Davis

The Roy & Janet Dorsey Foundation

EY, Partners & Employees

John D. Fuller∞

$25,000+

Aadu & Kristi Allpere°

Jennifer Barlament & Kenneth Potsic

Paul & Linnea Bert

Mr. & Mrs. Paul J. Blackney

Janine Brown & Alex J. Simmons, Jr.

Connie & Merrell Calhoun

Chick-fil-A

John W. Cooledge

The Jim Cox, Jr. Foundation

Mr. & Mrs. Erroll B. Davis, Jr.∞

Mr. Richard H. Delay & Dr. Francine D. Dykes∞

Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation

PNC Slumgullion Charitable Fund

Thalia & Michael C. Carlos Foundation

City of Atlanta

Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs

Ms. Lynn Eden

Emerald Gate Charitable Trust

Ms. Angela L. Evans∞

The Gable Foundation

Fulton County Arts & Culture

Google

Donna Lee & Howard Ehni

National Endowment for the Arts

John R. Paddock, Ph.D. & Karen M. Schwartz, Ph.D.

Marina Fahim°

Betty Sands Fuller*

Dick & Anne Game°

Sally & Walter George

Jeannette Guarner, MD & Carlos del Rio, MD

The Halle Foundation

Bonnie & Jay Harris

League of American Orchestras

The Marcus Foundation, Inc.∞

Massey Charitable Trust

John & Linda Matthews∞

Moore Colson, CPAs & Bert & Carmen Mills

Anne Morgan & Jim Kelley

Georgia Council for the Arts

Graphic Packaging International, Inc.

The Graves Foundation

Gary Lee, Jr.

Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP

Truist

David, Helen & Marian Woodward Fund, Atlanta

Sally & Pete Parsonson∞

Patty & Doug Reid

Mary & Jim Rubright

Patrick & Susie Viguerie

Mr.* & Mrs. Edus H. Warren, Jr.

Northside Hospital

Novelis

Victoria & Howard Palefsky

Mr. Tyler Perry

Publix Super Markets Charities, Inc.

Bill & Rachel Schultz°

June & John Scott∞

Ross & Sally Singletary

Mr. G. Kimbrough Taylor & Ms. Triska Drake

Troutman Pepper

Kathy Waller & Kenneth Goggins

WarnerMedia

Mrs. Sue S. Williams

$17,500+

A Friend of the Symphony

Mr. Keith Adams & Ms. Kerry Heyward°

John & Juliet Allan

Mr. & Mrs. Andrew Bailey

Benjamin Q. Brunt

Wright & Alison Caughman

Choate Bridges Foundation

Russell Currey & Amy Durrell

Cari K. Dawson & John M. Sparrow

Maria & Rodrigo Garcia-Escudero

Mr. Max M. Gilstrap∞

Mr. & Mrs. Charles B. Harrison

The Estate of John H. Head

The Hertz Family Foundation, Inc.

Azira G. Hill

James H. Landon

The Ray M. & Mary Elizabeth Lee Foundation, Inc.

Mr. Kevin Lyman & Dr. Jennifer Lyman

Ms. Deborah A. Marlowe & Dr. Clint Lawrence

Terence L. & Jeanne Perrine Neal°

Lynn & Galen Oelkers

Ms. Margaret Painter∞

Martha M. Pentecost

The Hellen Ingram Plummer

Charitable Foundation, Inc.

Ms. Cathleen Quigley

Regions

Joyce & Henry Schwob

Mr. Fahim Siddiqui & Ms. Shazia Fahim

Dr. Steven & Lynne Steindel°

Ms. Brett A. Tarver

Carolyn C. Thorsen∞

The Mark & Evelyn Trammell Foundation

John & Ray Uttenhove

$15,000+

Phyllis Abramson, Ph. D.

Madeline* & Howell E. Adams, Jr.

Mr. David Boatwright

Ms. Elizabeth W. Camp

Ms. Lisa V. Chang

Mr. & Mrs. Benjamin Clare°

Lisa DiFrancesco, MD & Darlene Nicosia

Eleanor & Charles Edmondson

Fifth Third Bank

Craig Frankel & Jana Eplan

Georgia-Pacific

Pam & Robert Glustrom

Roya & Bahman Irvani

Joia M. Johnson

Mr. Sukai Liu & Dr. Ginger J. Chen

John F. & Marilyn M. McMullan

Ms. Molly Minnear

New Music, USA

North Highland Company

Barbara & Andrew Paul

Mr. Edward Potter & Ms. Regina Olchowski°

Charlie & Donna Sharbaugh

Beverly & Milton Shlapak

Mr. John A. Sibley, III

Elliott & Elaine Tapp

Carol & Ramon Tomé Family Fund

Adair & Dick White

Drs. Kevin & Kalinda Woods

$10,000+

A Friend of the Symphony (2)

AAA Parking

Paul & Melody Aldo∞

Mr. & Mrs. Calvin R. Allen

Paul & Marian Anderson*

Farideh & Al Azadi Foundation∞

Julie & Jim* Balloun

Keith Barnett

Bell Family Foundation for Hope Inc

Mr. & Mrs. Gerald R. Benjamin

Kelley O. & Neil H. Berman

Bloomberg Philanthropies

The Boston Consulting Group

The Breman Foundation, Inc.

Lisa & Russ Butner∞

CBRE

Colliers International

Donald & Barbara Defoe°

Peter & Vivian de Kok

Marcia & John Donnell

Ms. Diane Durgin

Eversheds Sutherland

Dr. & Mrs. Leroy Fass

The Robert Hall Gunn, Jr., Fund

Deedee & Marc Hamburger*°

Hamilton Capital Partners

Clay & Jane Jackson

JBS Foundation

Ann A. & Ben F. Johnson III

James Kieffer

Stephen & Carolyn Knight

The Sartain Lanier Family Foundation

Pat & Nolan Leake

Meghan & Clarke Magruder

Mr. Nicholas Marrone

Belinda & Gino Massafra

Merrill Lynch

The Monasse Family Foundation∞

Moore, Colson & Company, P.C.

Mr. & Mrs. James F. Nellis , Jr.

The Norfolk Southern Corporation

Ms. Gail O'Neill & Mr. Paul Viera

Kathryn Petralia & Diane Bartlett

Leonard Reed°

David F. & Maxine A.* Rock

Thomas & Lynne Saylor

Peter James Stelling*

John & Yee-Wan Stevens

George & Amy Taylor

Judith & Mark K. Taylor

Dr. & Mrs. James O. Wells, Jr.

°We are grateful to these donors for taking the extra time to acquire matching gifts from their employers. *Deceased

ASO | SUPPORT (cont.)

Rita & Herschel Bloom

$7,500+

Jack & Helga Beam∞

Karen & Rod Bunn

Patricia & William Buss∞

Mark Coan & Family

Sally W. Hawkins

Grace Ihrig*

Ann & Brian Kimsey

Jason & Michelle Kroh

Dr. Fulton D. Lewis III & S. Neal Rhoney

Mr. Robert M. Lewis, Jr.

Mr. & Mrs. Arthur Mills IV

Berthe & Shapour Mobasser

Mr. Bert Mobley

Hala & Steve Moddelmog

Caroline & Phil Moïse

Jane Morrison∞

Gretchen Nagy & Allan Sandlin

Margaret H. Petersen

Ms. Felicia Rives

Hamilton & Mason Smith

Tom & Ani Steele

Mr. & Mrs. Edward W. Stroetz, Jr.

Stephen & Sonia Swartz

Drs. Jonne & Paul Walter

Kiki Wilson

Mr. David J. Worley & Ms. Bernadette Drankoski

Camille W. Yow

$5,000+ A Friend of the Symphony

Dr. Marshall & Stephanie Abes

Mrs. Kay Adams* &

Mr. Ralph Paulk

Judy & Dick Allison

Dr. Evelyn R. Babey

Lisa & Joe Bankoff

Juanita & Gregory Baranco

Asad Bashey

Mr. Herschel V. Beazley

Meredith Bell

Bennett Thrasher LLP

Natalie & Matthew

Bernstein

Jane & Gregory Blount

Dr. & Mrs. Jerome B. Blumenthal

Mrs. Sidney W. Boozer

Carol Brantley & David Webster

Mrs. Cristina Briboneria

Margo Brinton & Eldon Park

Jacqueline A. & Joseph E. Brown, Jr.

Judith D. Bullock

CBH International, Inc

John Champion & Penelope Malone

Ms. Tena Clark & Ms. Michelle LeClair

Dr. & Mrs. Richard W. Compans

Carol Comstock & Jim Davis

Ralph & Rita Connell

William & Patricia Cook

Janet & John Costello

Dillon Production Services, Inc.

Mr. & Mrs. Paul H. Dimmick

Dorsey Alston Realtors

Xavier Duralde & Mary Barrett

Mr. & Mrs. John Dyer

Paulette Eastman & Becky Pryor Anderson∞

Diana Einterz

Dieter Elsner & Othene Munson

Robert S. Elster

Foundation

Dr. & Mrs. Carl D. Fackler

Ellen & Howard Feinsand

Bruce W. & Avery C.

Flower

David L. Forbes

Mary* & Charles Ginden

Mr. & Mrs. Richard Goodsell∞

Melanie & Tucker Green

William Randolph Hearst

Foundations

Tad & Janin Hutcheson

Mr. Justin Im & Dr. Nakyoung Nam

Mr. & Mrs. Baxter Jones

Paul* & Rosthema Kastin

Ms. Carrie L. Kirk

Mr. Charles R. Kowal

Mrs. Heidi LaMarca

Dr. & Mrs. Scott I. Lampert

Peg & Jim Lowman

Ms. Eunice Luke

Dr. & Mrs. Ellis L. Malone

Elvira & Jay Mannelly

Mr. & Mrs. Christopher D. Martin

Mr. Robert S. Mathews

Mary Ruth McDonald

The Fred & Sue McGehee

Family Charitable Fund

Ed & Linda McGinn°

Ms. Erica McVicker

Ms. Sue L. Morgan∞

Music Matters

Gary R. Noble, MD

Ms. Bethani Oppenheimer

Mr. & Mrs. Edmund F.

Pearce, Jr.°

Ms. Eliza Quigley

John H. Rains

Mr. & Mrs. Joel F. Reeves

Margaret & Bob Reiser

Cammie & John Rice

Vicki & Joe Riedel

Betsy & Lee Robinson

Mrs. Nita Robinson

Ms. Frances A. Root

Mr. Joseph A.

Roseborough

Tiffany & Rich Rosetti∞

John T. Ruff

Katherine Scott

Suzanne Shull

Gerald & Nancy

Silverboard

Baker & Debby Smith

Ms. Cynthia Smith

Dr. K. Douglas Smith

In memory of Elizabeth

B. Stephens by Powell, Preston & Sally∞

Richard M. Stormont & Sally C. Jobe

Ms. Kimberly Strong

Dr. Nossi Taheri &

Ms. Hope Vaziri

Dede & Bob Thompson

Mr. & Mrs. Peter Toren

Trapp Family

Burton Trimble

Chilton & Morgan* Varner

Mr. & Mrs. Benny Varzi

Amy & Robert Vassey

Ms. Juliana T. Vincenzino

Mr. Robert Walt & Mr. Daniel J. Hess

Alan & Marcia Watt

Ruthie Watts

Dr. Nanette K. Wenger

Suzanne B. Wilner

$3,500+

Mr. John Blatz

Mr. & Mrs. Dennis M. Chorba

Jean & Jerry Cooper

The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc.

Nadeen Green & Ned Cone

Phil & Lisa Hartley

Martha Reaves Head

Barbara M. Hund

Cameron H. Jackson°

Wolfgang* & Mariana Laufer

Fara & Ari Levine°

Deborah & William Liss°

Martha & Reynolds

McClatchey

Judy Zaban-Miller & Lester Miller

Donald S. Orr & Marcia K. Knight

In Memory of Dr. Frank S. Pittman III

Dr. & Mrs. John P. Pooler

Ms. Kathy Powell

Mrs. Susan H. Reinach

S.A. Robinson

Dr. & Mrs. Rein Saral

Donna Schwartz

Ms. Martha Solano

Angela Spivey

Beth & Edward Sugarman

Mrs. Dale L. Thompson

Mr. & Mrs. Robert L. Welch

David & Martha West

Mr. & Mrs. M. Beattie Wood

$2,000+

A Friend of the Symphony (4)

2492 Fund

Dr. & Mrs. Joel M. Adler, D.D.S.

Kent & Diane Alexander

Mr. & Mrs. Ivan Allen IV

Mr. & Mrs. Walker Anderson

The Hisham & Nawal Araim Family Foundation

Anthony Barbagallo & Kristen Fowks

Drs. Jay & Martin

Beard-Coles

Susan & Jack Bertram

Catherine Binns & Jim Honkisz*

Shirley Blaine*

Leon & Joy Borchers

Mr. & Mrs. Andrew J. Bower°

Martha S. Brewer

Harriet Evans Brock

Dr. Aubrey Bush & Dr. Carol Bush

Mr. & Mrs. Walter K. Canipe

Mrs. Betty Case

Julie & Jerry Chautin

Mr. James Cobb

Coenen-Johnson Foundation

Susan S. Cofer

Liz & Charlie Cohn°

Malcolm & Ann Cole

Mr. & Mrs. R. Barksdale

Collins°

Mrs. Nancy Cooke

Mary Carole Cooney & Henry R. Bauer, Jr.

R. Carter & Marjorie A.

Crittenden Foundation

Dr. & Mrs. F. Thomas

Daly, Jr.

Mr. John C. Dancu

Mrs. Anna F. Dancu

Mary & Mahlon Delong

Delta Community

Credit Union

Mr. & Mrs. Graham Dorian

Gregory & Debra Durden

Mr. & Mrs. Robert G. Edge

Erica Endicott & Chris Heisel

Mr. Ramsey Fahs°

Mr. & Mrs. Paul G. Farnham

Ken Felts & A. Richard Bunn

Mr. & Mrs. William A. Flinn

Dr. Karen A. Foster

Ms. Elizabeth C. French

Gaby Family Foundation

Mr. & Mrs. Sebastien Galtier

Raj & Jyoti Gandhi Family

Foundation

Marty & John Gillin°

Sandra & John Glover

Mrs. Janet D. Goldstein

Mary C. Gramling

Connie & Danny Griffin

Richard & Debbie Griffiths

Louis & Mary Gump

Mr. & Mrs. George Gunderson

Linda & Hank Harris

Mr. & Mrs. Steve Hauser

Mr. & Mrs. John Hellriegel

Ms. Elizabeth Hendrick

Mr. Kenneth & Ms. Colleen Hey

Sarah & Harvey Hill, Jr.°

Laurie House Hopkins & John D. Hopkins

James & Bridget Horgan

Mrs. Sally Horntvedt

Ms. & Mr. Carli Huband

Richard & Linda Hubert

Dona & Bill Humphreys

Mary & Wayne James*

Nancy & John Janet

Ms. Rebecca Jarvis

Patron Leadership (PAL) Committee

Mrs. Gail Johnson

Mr. W. F. & Dr. Janice Johnston

Cecile M. Jones

Mr. & Mrs. David T. Jones

Lana M. Jordan

William L. & Sally S. Jorden

Teresa M. Joyce, Ph.D

Mr. & Ms. Josh Kamin

Mona & Gilbert Kelly°

Mr. & Mrs. Todd E. Kessler

Mr. Lewis King

Mr. & Mrs. Theodore J.

Lavallee, Sr.

Lillian Balentine Law

Mr. & Mrs. Chris Le

Grace & Josh Lembeck

Elizabeth J. Levine

Mr. & Mrs. J. David Lifsey

Dr. Marcus Marr

Dr. & Mrs. David H. Mason

In Memory of

Pam McAllister

Mr. & Mrs. James

McClatchey

Birgit & David McQueen

Dr. & Mrs. John D. Merlino

Anna & Hays Mershon

Mr. & Mrs. Thomas B.

Mimms, Jr.

Laura & Craig Mullins

Janice & Tom

Munsterman∞

Michael & Carol Murphy

Melanie & Allan Nelkin

Dr. & Mrs. John Nelson

Mr. and Mrs. Solon P.

Patterson

The Piedmont National Family Foundation

We give special thanks to this dedicated group of Atlanta Symphony Orchestra donor-volunteers for their commitment to each year’s annual support initiatives:

Ponce de Leon Music Store

Sharon & David Schachter°

Mrs. Dianna A. Scherer

Drs. Bess Schoen & Andrew Muir

Drs. Lawrence & Rachel Schonberger

Nick & Annie Shreiber

Helga Hazelrig Siegel

Diana Silverman

Jeanne & Jim Simpson

Mr. Matthew Sitler

The Alex & Betty

Smith Donor-Advised Endowment Fund

Anne-Marie Sparrow

Peggy & Jerry Stapleton

Candace Steele

James & Shari Steinberg

Dr. & Mrs. John P. Straetmans

Kay R Summers

Ms. Linda F. Terry

Ms. Lara C. Tumeh°

Dr. Brenda G. Turner

Wayne & Lee Harper

Vason

Vogel Family Foundation

Ron & Susan Whitaker

Russell F. Winch & Mark B. Elberfeld

Mrs. Lynne M. Winship

Ms. Sonia Witkowski

Zaban Foundation, Inc.

Herbert* & Grace Zwerner

Linda Matthews chair

Kristi Allpere

Helga Beam

Bill Buss

Pat Buss

Kristen Fowks

Deedee Hamburger

Judy Hellriegel

Nancy Janet

Belinda Massafra

Sally Parsonson

June Scott

Milt Shlapak

Sheila Tschinkel

Jonne Walter

Marcia Watt

°We are grateful to these donors for taking the extra time to acquire matching gifts from their employers. *Deceased

HENRY SOPKIN CIRCLE

Named for the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s founding Music Director, the HENRY SOPKIN CIRCLE celebrates cherished individuals and families who have made a planned gift to the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. These special donors preserve the Orchestra’s foundation and ensure success for future generations.

A Friend of the Symphony (22)

Madeline* & Howell E. Adams, Jr.

Mr.* & Mrs.* John E. Aderhold

Mr. & Mrs. Paul Aldo

Mr. & Mrs. Ronald R. Antinori

Dr. & Mrs. William Bauer

Helga Beam

Mr. Charles D. Belcher *

Neil H. Berman

Susan & Jack Bertram

Mr.* & Mrs.* Karl A. Bevins

The Estate of Donald S. & Joyce Bickers

Ms. Page Bishop*

Mr.* & Mrs.* Sol Blaine

John Blatz

Rita & Herschel Bloom

The Estate of Mrs.

Gilbert H. Boggs, Jr.

W. Moses Bond

Mr.* & Mrs. Robert C. Boozer

Elinor A. Breman*

Carol J. Brown

James C. Buggs*

Mr. & Mrs.* Richard H. Burgin

Hugh W. Burke*

Mr. & Mrs. William Buss

Wilber W. Caldwell

Mr. & Mrs. C. Merrell Calhoun

Cynthia & Donald Carson

Mrs. Jane Celler*

Lenore Cicchese*

Margie & Pierce Cline

Dr. & Mrs. Grady S. Clinkscales, Jr.

Suzanne W. Cole Sullivan

Robert Boston Colgin

Mrs. Mary Frances

Evans Comstock*

Miriam* & John A.* Conant

Dr. John W. Cooledge

Mr. & Mrs. William R. Cummickel

Bob* & Verdery* Cunningham

Mr. Richard H. Delay & Dr. Francine D. Dykes

John R. Donnell

Dixon W. Driggs*

Pamela Johnson Drummond

Mrs. Kathryn E. Duggleby

Catherine Warren Dukehart*

Ms. Diane Durgin

Arnold & Sylvia Eaves

Mr. & Mrs. Robert G. Edge

Geoffrey G. Eichholz*

Elizabeth Etoll

Mr. Doyle Faler

Brien P. Faucett

Dr. Emile T. Fisher*

Moniqua N Fladger

Mr. & Mrs. Bruce W. Flower

A. D. Frazier, Jr.

Nola Frink*

Betty & Drew* Fuller

Sally & Carl Gable

William & Carolyn Gaik

Dr. John W. Gamwell*

Mr.* & Mrs.* L.L. Gellerstedt, Jr.

Ruth Gershon & Sandy Cohn

Micheline & Bob Gerson

Max Gilstrap

Mr. & Mrs. John T. Glover

Mrs. David Goldwasser

Robert Hall Gunn, Jr. Fund

Billie & Sig Guthman

Betty G.* & Joseph* F. Haas

James & Virginia Hale

Ms. Alice Ann Hamilton

Dr. Charles H. Hamilton*

Sally & Paul* Hawkins

John* & Martha Head

Ms. Jeannie Hearn*

Barbara & John Henigbaum

Jill* & Jennings* Hertz

Mr. Albert L. Hibbard

Richard E. Hodges

Mr.* & Mrs. Charles K.

Holmes, Jr.

Mr.* & Mrs.* Fred A. Hoyt, Jr.

Jim* & Barbara Hund

Clayton F. Jackson

Mary B. James

Nancy Janet

Mr. Calvert Johnson & Mr. Kenneth Dutter

deForest F. Jurkiewicz*

Herb* & Hazel Karp

Anne Morgan & Jim Kelley

Bob Kinsey

James W.* & Mary Ellen*

Kitchell

Paul Kniepkamp, Jr.

Vivian & Peter de Kok

Miss Florence Kopleff*

Mr. Robert Lamy

James H. Landon

Ouida Hayes Lanier

Lucy Russell Lee* & Gary Lee, Jr.

Ione & John Lee

Mr. Larry M. LeMaster

Mr.* & Mrs.* William C. Lester

Liz & Jay* Levine

Robert M. Lewis, Jr.

Carroll & Ruth Liller

Ms. Joanne Lincoln*

Jane Little*

Mrs. J. Erskine Love, Jr.*

Nell Galt & Will D. Magruder

K Maier

John W. Markham*

Mrs. Ann B. Martin

Linda & John Matthews

Mr. Michael A. McDowell, Jr.

Dr. Michael S. McGarry

Richard & Shirley McGinnis

John & Clodagh Miller

Ms. Vera Milner

Mrs. Gene Morse*

Ms. Janice Murphy*

Mr. & Mrs. Bertil D. Nordin

Mrs. Amy W. Norman*

Galen Oelkers

Roger B. Orloff

Barbara D. Orloff

Dr. Bernard* & Sandra Palay

Sally & Pete Parsonson

James L. Paulk

Ralph & Kay* Paulk

Dan R. Payne

Bill Perkins

Mrs. Lela May Perry*

Mr.* & Mrs. Rezin E. Pidgeon, Jr.

Janet M. Pierce*

Reverend Neal P. Ponder, Jr.

William L.* & Lucia Fairlie*

Pulgram

Ms. Judy L. Reed*

Carl J. Reith*

Mr. Philip A. Rhodes

Vicki J. & Joe A. Riedel

Helen & John Rieser

Dr. Shirley E. Rivers*

David F. & Maxine A.* Rock

Glen Rogerson*

Tiffany & Richard Rosetti

Mr.* & Mrs.* Martin H. Sauser

Bob & Mary Martha Scarr

Mr. Paul S. Scharff & Ms. Polly G. Fraser

Dr. Barbara S. Schlefman

Bill & Rachel Schultz

Mrs. Joan C. Schweitzer

June & John Scott

Edward G. Scruggs*

Dr. & Mrs. George P. Sessions

Mr. W. G. Shaefer, Jr.

Charles H. Siegel*

Mr. & Mrs. H. Hamilton Smith

Mrs. Lessie B. Smithgall*

Ms. Margo Sommers

Elliott Sopkin

Elizabeth Morgan Spiegel

Mr. Daniel D. Stanley

Gail & Loren Starr

Peter James Stelling*

Ms. Barbara Stewart

Beth & Edward Sugarman

C. Mack* & Mary Rose* Taylor

Isabel Thomson*

Jennings Thompson IV

Margaret* & Randolph* Thrower

Kenneth & Kathleen Tice

Mr. H. Burton Trimble, Jr.

Mr. Steven R. Tunnell

Mr. & Mrs. John B. Uttenhove

Mary E. Van Valkenburgh

Mrs. Anise C. Wallace

Mr. Robert Wardle, Jr.

Mr. & Mrs. John B. White, Jr.

Adair & Dick White

Mr. Hubert H. Whitlow, Jr.*

Sue & Neil* Williams

Mrs. Frank L. Wilson, Jr.

Mrs. Elin M. Winn

Ms. Joni Winston

George & Camille Wright

Mr.* & Mrs.* Charles R. Yates

*Deceased

EXECUTIVE

Jennifer Barlament executive director

Alvinetta Cooksey executive & finance assistant

Emily Fritz-Endres executive management

fellow

Dautri Erwin executive assistant

ARTISTIC

Gaetan Le Divelec vice president, artistic planning

Jeffrey Baxter

choral administrator

RaSheed Lemon aso artist liaison

Ebner Sobalvarro artistic administrator

EDUCATION & COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

Sarah Grant

senior director of education

Ryan Walks

talent development program manager

Elena Gagon

coordinator of education & community engagement

OPERATIONS

Paul Barrett

senior production stage manager

Richard Carvlin

stage manager

Hannah Davis, assistant librarian

Elizabeth Graiser

manager of operations & asyo

Renee Hagelberg

manager of orchestra personnel

Victoria Moore

director of orchestra personnel

MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS

Ashley Mirakian

vice president, marketing & communications

Delle Beganie content & production manager

Leah Branstetter director of digital content

Meredith Chapple marketing coordinator

Adam Fenton director of multimedia technology

Will Strawn associate director of marketing, live

Caitlin Buckers marketing manager, live

Lisa Eng

multimedia creative manager, live

Mia Jones-Walker marketing manager

Camille McClain director of marketing & communications

Rob Phipps

director of creative services

Bob Scarr

archivist & research coordinator

Madisyn Willis marketing manager

SALES & REVENUE

MANAGEMENT

Russell Wheeler vice president, sales & revenue management

Nancy James

front of house supervisor

Erin Jones director of sales

Jesse Pace

senior manager of ticketing & patron experience

Dennis Quinlan

data analyst

Robin Smith

patron services & season ticket associate

Jake Van Valkenburg sales coordinator

Milo McGehee guest services coordinator

Anna Caldwell guest services associate

ATLANTA SYMPHONY HALL LIVE

Nicole Panunti

vice president, atlanta symphony hall live

Christine Lawrence associate director of guest services

Michael Tamucci

associate director of performance management, atlanta symphony hall live

Dan Nesspor

ticketing manager, atlanta symphony hall live

FINANCE & ADMINISTRATION

Susan Ambo chief financial officer & vice president, business operations

Kimberly Hielsberg

vice president of finance

Brandi Hoyos

director of diversity, equity & inclusion

April Satterfield controller

Brandi Reed staff accountant

DEVELOPMENT

Grace Sipusic vice president of development

Cheri Snyder

senior director of development

Julia Filson

director of corporate relations

William Keene

director of annual giving

James Paulk

senior annual giving officer

Renee Contreras associate director, development communications

Dana Parness

manager of individual giving and prospect research

Catherine MacGregor manager of donor engagement

Sharveace Cameron senior development associate

Robert Cushing development associate, major gifts

Sarah Wilson development operations associate

ASO

CORPORATE & GOVERNMENT SUPPORT

THE WOODRUFF CIRCLE

Woodruff Circle members have contributed more than $250,000 annually to support the arts and education work of the Alliance Theatre, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and High Museum of Art. We are deeply grateful to these partners who lead our efforts to help create opportunities for enhanced access to the work.

$1MILLION+

A Friend of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

$500,000+

The Antinori Foundation

Bank of America

A Friend of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

$250,000+

Accenture

AT&T Foundation

Farideh & Al Azadi Foundation

The Molly Blank Fund

Helen Gurley Brown Foundation

Chick-fil-A Foundation | Rhonda & Dan Cathy

The Goizueta Foundation

Invesco QQQ

Novelis

PNC

Mr. & Mrs. Shouky Shaheen

The Home Depot Foundation

Sarah and Jim Kennedy

The Rich Foundation, Inc.

Alfred A. Thornton Venable Trust

Truist Trusteed Foundations:

Florence C. and Harry L. English Memorial Fund

Thomas Guy Woolford Charitable Trust

UPS

WestRock

The Zeist Foundation, Inc.

THE LEADERSHIP CIRCLE

Leadership Circle corporations have committed to a contribution of $1,000,000 over one or more years to support the arts and education work of the Alliance Theatre, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and High Museum of Art.

Accenture

The Coca-Cola Company

Chick-fil-A

Delta Air Lines

Georgia Power

Graphic Packaging

Novelis

UPS

WestRock

THE BENEFACTOR CIRCLE

Benefactor Circle members have contributed more than $100,000 annually to support the arts and education work of the Alliance Theatre, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and High Museum of Art. We are deeply grateful to these partners who lead our efforts to help create opportunities for enhanced access to the work.

$100,000+

Alston & Bird

Atlantic Station

John Auerbach

Sandra & Dan Baldwin

BlackRock

The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation

City of Atlanta Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs

The Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta

Melinda & Brian Corbett

Sheila L. & Jonathan J. Davies

Barney M. Franklin & Hugh W. Burke Charitable Fund

Georgia-Pacific

Google

Graphic Packaging

Mr. and Mrs. James S. Grien

Louise S. Sams and Jerome Grilhot

The John H. & Wilhelmina D. Harland Charitable Foundation

The Hertz Family Foundation, Inc.

Mr. & Mrs. Hilton H. Howell, Jr.

The Imlay Foundation Institute of Museum & Library Services

Jones Day Foundation & Employees

Kaiser Permanente

Abraham J. and Phyllis Katz Foundation

King & Spalding, Partners & Employees

The Sartain Lanier Family Foundation

Charles Loridans Foundation, Inc.

The Henry Luce Foundation, Inc.

The Marcus Foundation, Inc.

John W. Markham III*

Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

Morris Manning & Martin LLP

National Endowment for the Arts

Newell Brands

Norfolk Southern Foundation

Amy W. Norman Charitable Foundation

Northside Hospital

Victoria & Howard Palefsky

Patty and Doug Reid

The Shubert Foundation

Carol & Ramon Tomé Family Fund

Dr. Joan H. Weens

Kelly and Rod Westmoreland

Ann Marie and John B. White, Jr. wish Foundation

The David, Helen & Marian Woodward Fund

1180 Peachtree ACT Foundation, Inc.

*notates deceased