22/23 Season Fall Playbill

2022-2023 CONCERT SEASON

MUSIC FOR A CATHEDRAL SPACE

The E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Series

Father Anthony Marques, Rector | Daniel Sañez, Artistic Director

V ox L uminis

Lionel Meunier, Artistic Director

FREE tickets via richmondcathedral.org/concerts

Sacro Monteverdi

Tuesday, October 25, 2022 | 7:30 p.m.

Bruce Stevens, Organist Friday, September 23, 2022 | 7:30 p.m. Dedicatory Organ Recital of the Cathedral’s Juget-Sinclair Organ, Op. 54

Crystal Jonkman, Organ Recital Friday, November 4, 2022 | 7:30 p.m.

Commonwealth Catholic Charities Monday, November 28, 2022 | 7:00 p.m. Christmas Concert Paid tickets via www.cccofva.org featuring the Richmond Symphony Orchestra

Western Noël with Three Notch’d Baroque Monday, December 5, 2022 | 11:00 a.m.

Advent Lessons and Carols Friday, December 16, 2022 | 7:30 p.m. featuring the Musicians of the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart

The VCU Music & Medicine Orchestra Friday, May 5, 2023 | 7:30 p.m.

Joel Kumro, Organ Recital Friday, May 12, 2023 | 7:30 p.m.

Salve Regina: The Music of Renaissance Spain Friday, May 26, 2023 | 7:30 p.m. featuring the Cathedral Schola Cantorum with Forgotten Clefs

Daniel Sañez, Conductor

Daniel Sañez, Organ Recital Friday, June 16, 2023 | 7:30 p.m.

Free concerts are made possible by the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation Cathedral of the Sacred Heart | 823 Cathedral Place | Richmond, VA 23220 | 804-359-5651

Concert Details: richmondcathedral.org/concerts

WELCOME

This season there is so much to discover and enjoy! We hope you find something you love, and discover a little something new.

The year offers the exciting world premiere of Beyond the Years for Chorus & Orchestra, a new orchestration by Richmond’s own Zachary Wadsworth, a co-commission (Juan Pablo Contreras), and six works by living composers. We also welcome interim chorus director, Anthony Blake Clark – an award-winning conductor who will lead the chorus for the 2022-23 season. See him conduct Messiah on December 2.

The Symphony extends a warm welcome to new Composer-In-Residence, Damien Geter – an acclaimed bass-baritone, a celebrated composer and a Chesterfield native. Damien will be a part of the artistic team at the Symphony for the next three years, during which he will compose for the orchestra and the chorus, work with the youth orchestra, and curate programs. In addition to his work with the Symphony, we look forward to working with Damien in collaboration with Virginia Opera for the commissioning of a major new opera of historical significance, Loving V. Virginia set to premiere in 2025.

In October, we are thrilled to bring the magical artistry of special guest artist Yo-Yo Ma to Richmond. He will take the stage with masterful skill and energy alongside your Richmond Symphony. This season also brings amazing guest artists from Grammy Award Winning Jennifer Koh to Menuhin Senior First Prize winner Maria Dueñas, and a collaboration with local band Butcher Brown.

Education and community programs continue to be at the heart of the Symphony’s activities. Join the Companion Class led through the Richmond Symphony School of Music to get insights into the Symphony Series programming and to connect with artists and composers. For more information visit richmondsymphony.com. The Symphony’s youth orchestra programs are back in full force this season and will feature a new work for electric violin, commissioned from composer Roberto Sierra set to premiere in May 2023.

On behalf of everyone at the Symphony, we invite you to explore the season and allow yourself to experience the depth of emotion, the connection and the joy the music has to offer. Thank you for being a powerful part of the experience of a live orchestra!

– Valentina Peleggi, Music Director & Lacey Huszcza, Executive Director

RICHMOND SYMPHONY

VISION: Changing lives through the power of music.

MISSION: The Richmond Symphony performs, teaches and champions music to inspire and unite our communities.

The Richmond Symphony is dedicated to joy, connection, expression, and collaboration through music. Founded in 1957, the Symphony includes an orchestra of 70 professional musicians and 150 volunteer members of the Richmond Symphony Chorus. The Richmond Symphony is overseen by a 35-member Board of Directors and managed by 28 staff members.

Each season, the Richmond Symphony offers more than 200 public performances for approximately 200,000 patrons through concerts and educational programs. The Symphony also maintains an active touring schedule that brings live symphonic performances to rural communities. Through community engagement events, the Symphony makes a significant impact on participating neighborhoods by combining the power of music with community investment. These community engagement events allow for free outdoor musical experiences and serve thousands of people a year, creating unique opportunities for the public to engage with the Richmond Symphony and encouraging community pride through music and collaboration. Additionally, the Symphony joins with Virginia Opera and Richmond Ballet for presentations each season and collaborates with other arts organizations for special projects.

RICHMOND SYMPHONY CHORUS

The Richmond Symphony Chorus is an award-winning ensemble of 150 members from the Richmond region. It performs regularly with the Richmond Symphony, Richmond Ballet, and in stand-alone performances around the community. The chorus members – ages 16 to 85 – are a diverse group of Richmond community members with a shared passion for choral singing.

James Erb founded the Richmond Symphony Chorus in 1971 to perform Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis under the baton of renowned conductor Robert Shaw. Erb, a professor at the University of Richmond and a scholar of Renaissance music, led the group for 36 years.

Anthony Blake Clark has joined the Richmond Symphony Chorus as the Interim Chorus Director for the 2022-2023 Season, where he brings his eclectic experiences and passion for the choral arts to your Richmond community.

Repertoire ranges from classical masterworks to opera to pops favorites. Annual performances of Handel’s Messiah and Let It Snow Christmas Pops are highlights of the Symphony season. In 2018, the Chorus was featured in the Grammy-nominated recording of the premier performance of Children of Adam by American composer Mason Bates and Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem. May of 2019 found the Chorus moving from the Carpenter Theatre stage to backstage to the lobby in a rousing performance of Bizet’s Carmen with soloist Denyce Graves, while fall included performances under the direction of celebrated conductors Marin Alsop and George Manahan. The Chorus is now in its 51st active season, with performances of Dvorak’s Te Deum in September, the Music of Danny Elfman from the Films of Tim Burton in October, and Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 in April.

If you’re interested in auditioning for the Chorus, please visit rschorus.com/auditions.

VALENTINA PELEGGI

Lewis T� Booker Chair

Valentina Peleggi has been Music Director of the Richmond Symphony (Virginia, USA) since the 20/21 season and has already revitalized the orchestra’s artistic output. While focusing on developing the orchestra’s own sound she has also launched new concert formats, joined national co-commission partnerships, started a 3 year composer in residence programme, launched conducting masterclasses in collaboration with the local universities, and championed neglected composers from diverse backgrounds. During the pandemic she sat on the jury of the first virtual Menuhin Competition hosted by the Richmond Symphony. Highlights of the 22/23 season include a ground-breaking augmented reality project, also Mahler’s Resurrection Symphony and a special concert with soloist Yo-Yo Ma.

This season Peleggi debuts with the New World Symphony, Kansas City Symphony, Rochester Philharmonic and at the Grant Park Festival in Chicago, and in Europe with the Residentie Orkest, Liege Philharmonic, Gulbenkian Orchestra, Nuremburg Symphony and the orchestra of Opera North, also conducting the opening concert of the World Economic Forum in Davos. Engagements in recent seasons have included the Colorado and Baltimore symphonies, Royal Philharmonic, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Brussels Philharmonic, Norrkoping Symphony, Orchestra della Toscana, and Pomeriggi Musicali di Milano.

Opera (especially bel canto) is at the core of Peleggi’s activity; in May 2022 she conducts Il Barbiere di Siviglia at Florentine Opera, and last season she returned to the Teatro Verdi di Trieste for Rigoletto, also making her debut in a new production of Piazzola’s Maria de Buenos Aires at the Opéra de Lyon. She conducted an acclaimed Rossini’s Le Comte Ory with the Philharmonia Orchestra at Garsington Opera in 2021 and was a Mackerras Fellow at English National Opera in 2018 and 2019, where she conducted a wide range of repertoire including Carmen and La Bohème. Since 2019 she has been Music Director (responsible for Italian repertoire) of the Theatro Sao Pedro in Sao Paulo where her L’Italiana in Algeri was recognized as “best opera of the year 2019 in Sao Paulo” by the main critic journal Rivista Concerto.

2021 saw the release of her first CD, featuring a cappella works by Villa Lobos in a new critical edition for Naxos guest edited by Ms Peleggi and performed by the Sao Paulo Symphony Chorus, of which she previously served as Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor. She was concurrently Resident Conductor of the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra.

The first Italian woman to enter the conducting programme at the Royal Academy of Music of London, she graduated with distinction and was awarded the DipRAM for an outstanding

final concert as well as numerous other prizes and was recently honoured with the title of Associate. She furthered her studies with David Zinman and Daniele Gatti at the Zurich Tonhalle and at the Royal Concertgebouw masterclasses. She won the 2014 Conducting Prize at the Festival International de Inverno Campos do Jordão, received a Bruno Walter Foundation Scholarship at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in California, and the Taki Concordia Conducting Fellowship 2015-2017 under Marin Alsop.

Peleggi holds a Master in Conducting with honours from the Conservatorio Santa Cecilia in Rome, and in 2013 was awarded the Accademia Chigiana’s highest award, going on to assist Bruno Campanella and Gianluigi Gelmetti at Teatro Regio di Torino, Opera Bastille Paris, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Teatro Regio di Parma and Teatro San Carlo. She also assisted on a live worldwide broadcast and DVD production of Rossini’s Cenerentola with the Orchestra Nazionale della RAI. From 2005 to 2015 she was the Principal Conductor and Music Director of the University Choir in Florence and remains their Honorary Conductor, receiving a special award from the Government in 2011 in recognition of her work there.

Ms Peleggi is passionate about the arts and holds a master in Comparative Literature.

Valentina Peleggi is represented by Intermusica worldwide.

Music Director

CHIA-HSUAN LIN

Associate Conductor

Jack and Mary Ann Frable Associate Conductor Chair

Hailed by the Virginia Gazette as “a rock solid” and “animated” conductor, Chia-Hsuan Lin delights audiences throughout the world with her trademark energy and command.

Appointed Associate Conductor of the Richmond Symphony in 2016, Lin has established herself as a stalwart champion of the RSO through her masterful concerts for all audiences. Clark Bustard wrote of Lin’s Brahms Fourth Symphony with RS, “I’ve never heard a more compelling live performance than this one” (Letter V). Other RS highlights include Handel’s Messiah, Classics Series, Symphony Pops, family concerts, a side-by-side orchestra of 624 musicians and community members in “Come and Play”, and a record crowd exceeding 19,000 for Henrico County’s “Red, White, and Lights” Independence Day celebration in 2018.

Lin enjoys frequent guest appearances, returning in 2022 to conduct the Minnesota Orchestra in family concerts and their Summer Season, the premiere of PaviElle French’s song cycle in the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra’s season finale, the Richmond Symphony in Beethoven Symphony No. 9 at the Shenandoah Valley Music Festival and Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back live with film, and concerts with the Williamsburg Symphony Orchestra and violinist Paul Huang.

In 2019, Lin was praised as a last-minute replacement in Williamsburg’s performance of Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6. Assuming the podium the day of the concert, the Virginia Gazette reported Lin as “leading them through a thoroughly top-drawer performance” in “an exceptionally absorbing interpretation and rendering.” This success catapulted Lin into the Finals of WSO’s Music Director search and multiple guest appearances. Other guest appearances include the Virginia Symphony, Fort Wayne Philharmonic, Richmond Ballet, Peninsula Music Festival Orchestra, Virginia Commonwealth University Symphony Orchestra, Academy of Taiwan Strings and Taipei Philharmonic Chorus. Formerly the Assistant Conductor of the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, Lin punctuated the end of her tenure in 2016 “with the command and energy of a soccer star” before a record FWP subscription crowd. (larryhayes.com)

A champion of the next generation of musical talent, her list of premieres continues to grow with new works by Chris Thile, Stephen Prutsman, Laura Schwendinger, Steve Heitzeg, and Jennifer Jolley; and collaborations with award-winning artists including Paul Huang, Sterling Elliot, Amaryn Olmeda, Kevin Zhu, Inna Faliks, and Eduardo Rojas.

Lin has also been a featured guest in Classical Revolution RVA’s Mozart Festivals, sharing orchestral music in non-traditional venues. She conducted the “Land Dive Project” in cooperation with the Institute for Contemporary Art at the Virginia Commonwealth University, a live art installation including a chamber ensemble and a scuba diving team.

Lin previously served as Music Director of Richmond Symphony Youth Orchestra, University of Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, South Loop Symphony Orchestra (Chicago), Interim Music Director of the Contemporary Youth Orchestra of Cleveland, and Assistant Conductor of Opera at the CCM Spoleto Music Festival in Italy. Fueling her passion for vocal works, Lin conducted a lecture concert as part of the Taiwanese premiere of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, and assisted and led opera performances at Northwestern University and the University of Cincinnati.

Lin began her musical training with piano lessons in Taiwan at age three, and she studied percussion at National Taiwan Normal University while performing with Taipei Percussion Group. Lin studied conducting with Apo Hsu, Mark Gibson, and Victor Yampolsky, and holds a doctorate from Northwestern University.

Lin is married to horn player James Ferree, and she enjoys traveling, gardening, and cooking.

DANIEL MYSSYK

Assistant Conductor & Director of Richmond Symphony Youth Orchestra

Assistant Conductor of the Richmond Symphony, Canadian-American conductor Daniel Myssyk was Music Director of the Montreal based Orchestre de chambre Appassionata from 2000 to 2016.

In recent years, he has made critically acclaimed appearances with Les Grands Ballets Canadiens and the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra, among others. In 2015, Myssyk made his debut in Guanajuato (Mexico) where he has been returning almost every season since. In 2019, return engagements have brought him back to Canada to conduct the Orchestre symphonique de Trois-Rivières and the Orchestre de la Francophonie.

Myssyk’s recordings have received widespread critical acclaim. “Czech Serenades” with works by Suk and Dvořák, was nominated for best recording of the year at the “ADISQ” awards, Quebec’s equivalent of the Grammys and at the Prix Opus from the Conseil québécois de la musique.

Professor Myssyk has been Virginia Commonwealth University’s Director of Orchestral Activities since 2007. Under his leadership, three VCU Opera productions of “The Gondoliers” (2015), “The Old Maid and the Thief” (2012), and “Hansel and Gretel” (2011) won top prizes at the National Opera Association competition. His involvement toward the youth reflects a well-honed passion for music education. In addition to his work at VCU, he is a regular collaborator with Senior Regional Orchestras throughout Virginia, among others. He was appointed conductor of the Richmond Symphony Youth Orchestra in 2018.

In the early 2000s, Myssyk was a conducting fellow at the Aspen Music Festival and School where he spent two summers under the tutelage of David Zinman. A student of Larry Rachleff, he received his Masters Degree in Conducting from the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University in 2006.

Anthony Blake Clark enjoys a reputation as one of the freshest young voices in classical music. He is currently in his sixth season as Music Director of the nationally acclaimed and Emmy Award winning Baltimore Choral Arts Society and is the Director of Choral Activities at George Washington University.

During his tenure with the Baltimore Choral Arts Society, Anthony Blake Clark has consistently received rave reviews, both for work on the podium in his subscription concerts and his preparation of choruses for performances with the Baltimore Symphony and other regional orchestras. Winner of the 2019-2020 American Prize in choral conducting and recipient of the 2020 Chorus America Alice Parker Award, Clark’s leadership of Baltimore Choral Arts has also been acknowledged with a nomination for the American Prize for best choral performance. He annually conducts and produces the celebrated “Christmas with Choral Arts,” televised on ABC2 which was recently nominated for an Emmy Award. The premiere choral organization in the Baltimore region, BCAS reaches more than 100,000 people each year and is an integral part of the fabric of Baltimore’s performing arts scene. In 2022 he and Choral Arts will make their Berlin debut at the Philharmonie with the Frei Universität Orchester, then will continue to Vienna where his choirs will perform with the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra under Marin Alsop.

Mr. Clark is passionate about teaching and is the Director of Choral Activities at George Washington University. His university choirs have performed at the Kennedy Center and Washington National Cathedral. Recently he was Guest Conductor/Lecturer for the Westminster Choir College.

Clark has prepared choruses for legends like Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Simon Halsey, Marin Alsop, Fabio Luisi, and Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla for ensembles including the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Berliner Philharmoniker, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (UK), Dallas Symphony Orchestra, and Rundfunk Chor Berlin. He has conducted in projects from Lincoln Center’s “Mostly Mozart Festival” to the London Symphony Chorus’s “Come and Sing” days. Clark is equally adept in the orchestral field and made his Baltimore Symphony debut in 2021. He has also appeared as cover conductor for the National Symphony Orchestra and has assisted Marin Alsop at the Baltimore Symphony.

In 2021 he began his graduate studies in Orchestral Conducting at the Peabody Institute where he is a student of Marin Alsop. Mr. Clark completed a Master’s Degree in Choral Conducting under Simon Halsey at the United Kingdom’s University of Birmingham.

ANTHONY BLAKE CLARK

Interim Chorus Director James Erb Choral Chair

2022

2022 2023 season

SELECT ANY 5 FOR THE PRICE OF ONLY 4!

AND THE MORE YOU CHOOSE, THE MORE YOU SAVE.

B RAHMS X RADIOHEAD

B RAHMS X RADIOHEAD

Saturday, Sept. 24, 2022 @ 8:00pm

Saturday, Sept. 24, 2022 @ 8:00pm

DANNY ELFMAN’S

DANNY ELFMAN’S

MUSIC FROM THE FILMS OF TIM BURTON

Saturday, Oct. 29, 2022 @ 8:00pm

MUSIC FROM THE FILMS OF TIM BURTON

Be a member who supports the Richmond Symphony through fundraising, education and community involvement.

Celebrate music and enjoy events.

Save the date!

September 11, 2023

The Richmond Symphony League is proud to announce our 19th Designer House Taylor Estate, located on Monument Avenue

Please visit:

LET IT SNOW!

Saturday, Oct. 29, 2022 @ 8:00pm

Saturday, Nov. 26, 2022 @ 8:00pm

LET IT SNOW!

Sunday, Nov. 27 @ 3:00pm SEE PAGE ??

Saturday, Nov. 26, 2022 @ 8:00pm

richmondsymphonyleague.org often for additional information. Event sponsorships are available.

BUTCHER BROWN WITH THE RICHMOND SYMPHONY

Sunday, Nov. 27 @ 3:00pm SEE PAGE ??

Saturday, Jan. 14, 2023 @ 8:00pm

BUTCHER BROWN WITH THE RICHMOND SYMPHONY

CLASSIC HOLLYWOOD LOVE SONGS

Saturday, Jan. 14, 2023 @ 8:00pm

Saturday, Feb. 4, 2023 @ 8:00pm

CLASSIC HOLLYWOOD LOVE SONGS

ETERNAL TANGO

Saturday, April 15, 2023 @ 8:00pm

Saturday, Feb. 4, 2023 @ 8:00pm

ETERNAL TANGO

STAR WARS: THE RETURN OF THE JEDI

Sunday, October 9, 2022 • 5 pm – 9 pm

Saturday, April 15, 2023 @ 8:00pm

Saturday, May 6, 2023 @ 8:00pm

COMPOSE

N’KENGE: LEGENDS

Saturday, May 13, 2023 @ 8:00pm

STAR WARS: THE RETURN OF THE JEDI

Saturday, May 6, 2023 @ 8:00pm

YOUR OWN ON SALE NOW! All tickets August 1! ORDER NOW! RichmondSymphony.com

N’KENGE: LEGENDS

please

RichmondSymphony.com • 804.788.1212 x2

2022/23 MUSICIAN ROSTER

VIOLIN

Daisuke Yamamoto, Concertmaster

Tom & Elizabeth

Allen Chair

Adrian Pintea, Associate Concertmaster

Ellen Cockerham Riccio, Principal Second Violin

Vacant–Associate Principal

Second Violin

The Bob & Nancy Hill Chair

Alana Carithers

Catherine Cary

Jill Foster

Treesa Gold+

Justin Gopal*

Alison Hall

Jeannette Jang

Timothy Judd

Susanna Klein

Stacy Matthews

Emily Monroe

Ashley Odom

Anna Rogers

Susan Spafford

Delaney Turner

Jocelyn Adelman Vorenberg

Susy Yim

VIOLA

Molly Sharp, Principal

The Mary Anne Rennolds

Chair

Hyo Joo Uh, Associate Principal

Zsuzsanna Emödi

Wayne Graham

Stephen Schmidt

Derek Smith

Jocelyn Smith

CELLO

Neal Cary, Principal

Jason McComb, Associate Principal

RSL Chair

Schuyler Slack

Kenneth & Bettie

Christopher Perry

Foundation Chair

Barbara Gaden

Adrienne Gifford-Yang

Ismar Gomes

Peter Greydanus

Ryan Lannan

BASS

Andrew Sommer, Principal

Rumano Solano, Associate Principal

Kelly Ali

Peter Spaar

FLUTE

Mary Boodell, Principal

Jennifer Debiec Lawson, Associate Principal

Catherine Broyles

PICCOLO

Catherine Broyles

OBOE

Victoria Chung, Principal

Shawn Welk, Associate Principal*

Lauren Williams, + Acting Associate

ENGLISH HORN

Shawn Welk, Principal*

Lauren Williams, + Acting Associate

CLARINET

David Lemelin, Principal

Edward Sundra, Associate Principal

Sara Reese

E-FLAT CLARINET

Edward Sundra, Principal

BASS CLARINET

Sara Reese

BASSOON

Thomas Schneider, Principal

Felix Ren, Associate Principal

HORN

Dominic Rotella, Principal

Erin Lano, Associate Principal

Devin Gossett, Second Horn

The Luzi Wheeler Leisinger & George Wheeler Chair

Roger Novak

TRUMPET

Samuel Huss, Principal

Brian Strawley, Associate Principal

Mary Bowden*

TROMBONE

Evan Williams, Principal

Scott Winger

Scott Cochran

BASS TROMBONE

Scott Cochran

TUBA

Conrad Shaw, + Acting Principal

TIMPANI

James Jacobson, Principal

PERCUSSION

Clifton Hardison, Principal

Robert Jenkins*

David Foster

HARP

Lynette Wardle, Principal

PIANO & CELESTE

Russel Wilson, Principal

Quincy & Anne Owen Cole Chair

+ acting * leave of absence

Anthony Blake Clark, Interim Chorus Director

James Erb Choral Chair

Christopher Pennington, Chorus Manager

Ingrid Keller, Rehearsal Pianist

Kevin L. Barger, Assistant Rehearsal Pianist

Melva Carle, Rehearsal Assistant

Carl Eng, Rehearsal Assistant

Lisa Fusco, Rehearsal Assistant

SOPRANO

Lauren Lexa Crapanzano, Music Section Leader

Faith A. Alejandro

Gabrielle Francesca

Bergeret

Keely Borland

Leslie Brewer

Brittany Brooks

Hailey Broyles

Olivia Carlton

Ann Whitfield Carter

Leigh Anne Clary

Shirley B. Diggs

Courtnei A. Fleming

Claire Foley

Sharon B. Freude

Lisa C. Fusco

Catrina J. Garland

Sarah George

Carrie Gregory

Jennifer Hagen

Amanda Halverson

Cathern Hazelwood

Anna Hess

Cynthia Hickman

Tara Ingersoll

Ella Nelson Johnson

Sophia Ali Kadi

Amanda Khalil

Nina Lankin

Ashley Larson

Ashley M. Love

Gail A. Lyddane

Leslie Maloney

Morgan Merkel

Eve Minter

Ariel Mitchell

Lucy Wagner Mitzner

Terry Moffett

Stephanie Poxon

Samantha P. Sawyer

Jacquelynn A. Seaward

Allison Elliott Schutzer

Johanna Scogin

Margaret Duncan Storti

Ann Voss

Mary Ellen Wadsworth

Madeline Wagner

Darlene Walker Temple

Emily Anderson Walls

Michele Wittig

Ally Yablonski

ALTO

Kristen Melzer, Music Section Leader

Andrea Johnson Almoite

Jan Altman

Barbara Baker

Caroline Bass

Barbara C. Batson

Kerry Blum

Lida Bourhill

Elaina F. Brennan

Ayana Butler

Sarah Capehart

Melva Carle

Laura Altman Carr

Linda H. Castle

Charlene Nash Christie

Erin Clapp

Pamela Cross

Erin Dixon

Mary Butler Eggleston

Aimee Ellington

Kathryn Rawley Erhardt

Maria J. K. Everett

Rachel Foster Fish

Elizabeth Goodwin

Annaka Grismer

Caroline Guske

Elizabeth C. Harper

Abigail Hauschild

Shannon Hooker

Cecilia Hughes

Lauren Maho

Liz Manning

Julia Martin

Janna Maxey

Sarah McGrath

Melisse Menchel

Charity Myers

Kyndal Owens

Kenna Payne

Lynne H. Read

Patricia Reddington

Jane Pulliam Riddle

Meaghan Rymer

Faith D. Sartoris*

Katherine Shenk

Jayne Sneed

Mary Lou P. Sommardahl

Wyna Taggart

Jane Koenig Terry

Janet Tice

Alexandria Vandervall

Casey Vandervall

Becca Wethered

TENOR

Aaron Todd, Music Section Leader

Benjamin T. Almoite

Ric Anderson

Rick Axtell

Kevin L. Barger

Matt Barger

David Carter

Erik DeMario

Joshua Ellis

Carl J. Eng

Enrico Gagarin

Ed Galloway

Jody Gordon

Roy A. Hoagland

Zachary James

David Lynch

William N. Marshall

William Miller

Christopher Nixon

Charles H. O’Neal*

Jim Rakes

Henry P. Robb

Craig E. Ross

Rick Sample

Steve Travers

Ethan White

Roger Wooldridge

BASS

James V. Romanik, Music Section Leader

Jack Anderson

Matt Benko

Mike Champlin

David C. Cooley

Don Creach

Frankie Davis Daniels

Andrew J. Dolson

Daniel Douglas

Johnny Geth

William Cloud Hicklin

David Hoover

Don Irwin

Marc Kealhofer

Daniel Kobb

John Luther

Martin McFadden

Douglass Moyers

W. Hunter Old

Val Puster

Stephen G. Read

William Bradley Roberts

Alyx Staruk

Richard Szucs

Jon A. Teates

Matt Triplett

Paul C. Tuttle

Hunter Williamson

*Active membership since the Chorus’s first performance in 1971. The Chorus thanks Epiphany Lutheran Church for the use of its facilities for rehearsals and auditions.

RICHMOND SYMPHONY BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Elizabeth Cabell Jennings, Chair

Elisabeth Wollan, Vice Chair

George Mahoney, Immediate Past Chair

Lacey Huszcza, Executive Director

Brandon Taylor, Treasurer

John Walker, Secretary

DIRECTORS

Joshua Bennett

Phil Bennett

Julie Brantley

John Braymer

Priscilla Burbank

Gary Flowers

Cheryl Goddard

Rebecca Horner

Brennen Keene

RICHMOND SYMPHONY STAFF

Christopher Lindbloom

Ted Linhart

William Mears

Patrick Murtaugh

Roger Neathawk

Valentina Peleggi

Kamran Raika

Leon Roday

Rick Sample

Maura Scott

Richard Szucs

Marcia Thalhimer

Ludi Webber

Mark Wickersham

Mark Wolfram

Bucci Zeugner

RICHMOND SYMPHONY FOUNDATION TRUSTEES

The Richmond Symphony Foundation is organized and established for cultural and charitable purposes benefiting the Richmond Symphony through its endowment. Gifts, planned gifts, and/or bequests may be made to the Foundation; if you choose to notify us, please contact Trish Poupore, c/o Richmond Symphony, 612 East Grace St, Suite 401, Richmond, Virginia 23219 or tpoupore@richmondsymphony.com. For additional information, call Trish at 804.788.4717, ext. 115.

George Y. Wheeler, III, President

David M. Carter, Immediate Past President

Ann T. Burks, Vice President

James B. Hartough, Treasurer

Lacey Huszcza, Secretary

TRUSTEES

Thomas N. Allen

David B. Bradley

J. Alfred Broaddus, Jr.

Robert L. Chewning

Wendell B. Fuller

Carolyn H. Garner

Krissy Gathright

Elizabeth Cabell Jennings

Marlene D. Jones

Helen Lewis Kemp, Esq.

Nicomedes de León

George Mahoney

Tara H. Matthews

Wallace B. Millner, III

Richard L. Morrill

Randall S. Parks

Ernesto Sampson

Anne Marie Whittemore

ADMINISTRATION

Lacey Huszcza, Executive Director

Valentina Peleggi, Music Director

Gail Henshaw, Director of Finance & Administration

Shacoya Henley, Accounting & Human Resources Manager

Aleeyah Frye, Executive & Finance Assistant

ADVANCEMENT & PATRON COMMUNICATIONS

Frances Sterling, Director of Advancement & Patron Communications

Trich Poupore, Donor Relations Director, Richmond Symphony Foundation

Amy Buhrman, Assistant Director of Marketing & Sales

Judith Warrington, Interim Grants Manager

Kiaya Lynn, Donor Relations Manager

Sarah Yount, Stewardship & Special Events Manager

Kira Gay Hiller, Senior Manager of Patron Services & Sales

Geneva Knight, Patron Services Coordinator

Lucy Frend, Graphics & Digital Marketing Coordinator

Jake Nurney, Office & Communications Assistant

EDUCATION & COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT

Walter Bitner, Director of Education & Community Engagement

Jennifer Tobin, Assistant Director of Education & Youth Orchestra Manager

Daniel Myssyk, Assistant Conductor & Director of Richmond Symphony Youth Orchestra

Marcey Leonard, RSSoM Program Manager & Community Partnerships Manager

Jonathan Sanford, Education Coordinator

Anita Williams, Education Assistant

ARTISTIC & OPERATIONS

Jennifer Arnold, Director of Artistic Planning & Orchestral Operations

Chia-Hsuan Lin, Associate Conductor

Anthony Blake Clark, Interim Chorus Director

Brent Bowden, Assistant Director of Operations & Production

Kelly Ali, Personnel Manager

Matthew Gold, Orchestra Librarian

Brent Klettke, Special Events & Assistant Production Manager

Chris Pennington, Artistic Assistant

TCHAIKOVSKY’S FOURTH

Valentina Peleggi, conductor

Alexis Seminario, soprano

Dashon Burton, baritone

Richmond Symphony Chorus

Saturday, Sept. 17, 2022 @ 8:00pm

Sunday, Sept. 18, 2022 @ 3:00pm

Carpenter Theatre at Dominion Energy Center

STILL Festive Overture

ANTONIN DVOŘÁK Te Deum

I. Te deum laudamus: Allegro moderato maestoso

II. Tu Rex gloriae: Lento maestoso

III. Aeterna fac cum Sanctis: Vivace

IV. Dignare Domine: Lento

Richmond Symphony Chorus

YO-YO MA

ZACHARY WADSWORTH Beyond the Years

Cello

Commissioned orchestration by Richmond Symphony Chorus

INTERMISSION

TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No. 4 in F minor, Op. 36

I. Andante sostenuto

II. Andantino in modo di canzona

III. Scherzo: Pizzicato ostinato

IV. Finale: Allegro con fuoco

The Richmond Symphony is partially funded by the Virginia Commission for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts and CultureWorks and the Arts and Cultural Funding Consortium – supported by City of Richmond and the Counties of Hanover and Henrico.

WILLIAM GRANT STILL: FESTIVE OVERTURE

Born in the rural Deep South and raised in Little Rock, William Grant Still won international fame when his debut as a symphonist, the Afro-American Symphony, was premiered in 1931. Not only was this the first symphony by an African American to be performed by a major orchestra: its success led to many subsequent performances across the U.S. and Europe over the next two decades.

Still had come of age as a contributor to the creative flourishing known as the Harlem Renaissance in 1920s New York City. While working as a commercial arranger of theater and radio music, he studied classical composition and began attracting important commissions. Along with his breakthrough in 1931, Still became in 1949 the first African American to write an opera produced by a major company (New York City Opera). His prolific legacy, which ranged from the concert hall and opera house to film, attests to his remarkable versatility.

The Festive Overture originated as Still’s entry in a nationwide competition for “best overture” to mark the 50th anniversary of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra in 1944. This rousing, vividly orchestrated music, radiating optimism, was selected unanimously as the winner. Eugene Goossens, the orchestra’s music director, praised it as expressing “the pride of the composer in his native land, the warmth of the American people, and the grandeur of scenic America.”

ANTONÍN DVOŘÁK: TE DEUM

The Czech composer Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) would explore the issue of what qualities distinguished American music during his years directing the new, progressive National Conservatory of Music in New York. During his time in the U.S., from 1892 to 1895, he championed the centrality of African American and Native American musical sources in forging an authentically American art.

The Conservatory’s founder, the arts philanthropist Jeannette Thurber, had persuaded Dvořák to take over its leadership. To coincide with his arrival, she commissioned him to write a choral-symphonic work to commemorate the 400th anniversary of what (at the time) was celebrated as Christopher Columbus’s “discovery” of the New World, promising to send him the text she would like him to set. But the text reached Dvořák late. In the meantime, to ensure that he could fulfill Thurber’s request in time for a big-scale piece to introduce himself to New York, he at once set to work using another text that calls for celebratory music. Dvořák’s choice of the Te Deum, an early Christian hymn that became part of the Roman Catholic worship tradition, is unsurprising, for the composer was not only deeply devout but had experienced a milestone success when his setting of another Christian hymn, the Stabat Mater, was introduced to English audiences. Dvořák wrote the new Te Deum within a month in the summer of 1892, before sailing for New York. (Only then did he turn his attention to the Columbus anniversary project, titled The American Flag, which he completed after the occasion, in early 1893, and which was not performed until after he had returned to Prague.)

Drums beat out a call to attention, ushering in the joyful fanfare that frames the Te Deum, at its core a prayer of praise for the Creator. Dvořák draws on the vitality of Czech folk music, in melody and rhythm, but his orchestration also underscores moments of mystery

PROGRAM NOTES

and majesty. The contrasting soprano and bass solo parts meanwhile remind us that Dvořák was also a gifted opera composer and individualize the spirit of wonder expressed by the community.

ZACHARY WADSWORTH: BEYOND THE YEARS

The Richmond Symphony has played an enormous role in native son Zachary Wadsworth’s musical life. Born in 1983, he recalls his parents taking him in the 1990s to a concert of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony that ignited his love of live performance and the orchestra. It started a long relationship with the Richmond Symphony – first as an audience member and, eventually, as himself a composer featured on their programs. In 2015, the Richmond Symphony performed his 2007 work Point – Line – Plane, a geometry-inspired exploration of how narrative evolves. His vocal music has also been sung by the Richmond Symphony Chorus, of which his mother was a member for years.

Beyond the Years is a new commission from the Richmond Symphony. It originated in 2017 as a composition for chorus and organ, from which Wadsworth has created a new version calling for full orchestra and chorus; the composer dedicates it to Music Director Valentina Peleggi.

Wadsworth chose a text by the poet and novelist Paul Laurence Dunbar. (As it happens, William Grant Still was also inspired by this poet when composing his Afro-American Symphony, each movement of which he prefaced with excerpts from a Dunbar poem.) Published posthumously in 1913, Beyond the Years is a short poem that, Wadsworth explains, attracted him “because it seems, certainly over the last many years, that so much of life has been based around fear, worry, pain, and conflict. This poem doesn’t promise easy paths out of our personal and societal problems, but it positions them as part of a cycle that ends in resolution, peace, comfort, and rest. Choral music often seems to be the medium where we bat around these huge unanswerable questions, so it seemed perfect to set this poem for choir.”

In musical terms, Wadsworth points out that he depicts the darker images involving fear and sorrow “with leaping melodies and rootless, unsettled harmony (like the first melody in the sopranos and altos).” Where the poet “promises peace and resolution in a time ‘beyond the years,’ the music resolves to simpler, smoother, and more-grounded harmonies and melodies.”

PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY: SYMPHONY NO. 4 IN F MINOR, OP. 36

For about a month in the spring of 1891, the year before Dvořák arrived in New York, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky undertook his first and only visit to the United States as part of a conducting tour and to participate in the newly built Carnegie Hall’s opening week. The American premiere of his Fourth Symphony had been given the previous season in New York. Tchaikovsky tended to be highly self-critical, but he remained especially fond of the Fourth, which he composed during an especially turbulent period in his personal life in 1877-78.

And, as with Dvořák’s Te Deum, a powerful arts patroness was associated with the genesis of the Fourth Symphony. Tchaikovsky dedicated the score to Nadezhda von Meck, a wealthy widow who became his confidante and patron – with the condition that they never meet in person. The Fourth Symphony marked the first large-scale work Tchaikovsky created after being taken under her wing. He responded to von Meck’s questions about the music he was composing with a detailed explanation, describing the fanfare of horns and brass that resound like Judgment Day at the outset as “the fateful force which prevents the impulse to happiness from attaining its goal.”

The first movement traces an exhaustive emotional journey. Following the opening unison blast from horns and trumpets (often nicknamed the “Fate motto,” which recurs at climactic points), the main theme is stated by the strings, at times taking on the guise of a ghostly, despairing dance. Tchaikovsky allows some relaxation in the inner two movements, which resemble dreamlike interludes. The Andantino’s main melody (first played by the oboe) is notable for the melodic interest Tchaikovsky sustains using nothing but simple eighth notes. Unison strings introduce an archaic atmosphere evoking memories of Old Russia. The Scherzo exploits the soundscape of plucked strings en masse, with colorful, balletic contrasts from chirping woodwinds and crisp brass.

The finale, with its descending scales, crashes on the scene with an exuberant outburst. Tchaikovsky develops a Russian folk tune whose simplicity makes it highly versatile. He embroiders it with festive, high-speed scales and cymbal crashes, but flashes of anxiety at times darken the picture, and, for the first time since the end of the opening movement, the Fate motto comes back in full force. This time, however, the orchestra simply sets it aside and carries on to a conclusion of overwhelming jubilation.

Program notes (c)2022 Thomas May

ALEXIS SEMINARIO

Soprano

Italian American soprano Alexis Seminario is dedicated to sharing stories that empower people and inspire vulnerability to create a more inclusive and empathetic society. In summer 2022, Alexis was an apprentice artist at Des Moines Metro Opera, covering the role of Rose in their world premiere of A Thousand Acres. In 2021, Alexis was an apprentice in Bard SummerScape’s apprenticeship program where she appeared as a page in their production of Leroi Arthus (King Arthur). Her other operatic role experience includes Monica in The Medium, Frau Fluth in Lustigen Weiber von Windsor (scene), Lusya in Moscow Cheryomushki, Atalanta in Xerxes and Helena in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Alexis is an alumni of the Houston Grand Opera Young Artists Vocal Academy.

Other recent engagements include performing the soprano solo in Brahms’ German Requiem with The Orchestra Now at Bard and appearing as a soloist in two programs for Bard Music Festival’s Nadia Boulanger and Her World.

Alexis holds degrees from Bard College Conservatory of Music and Manhattan School of Music (MSM). In 2018, she performed as a soloist in Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy for MSM’s centennial concert celebrating the opening of Neidorff Karpati Hall. In 2020 and 2021, she had the honor of being awarded the Shirley Rabb Winston Voice Scholarship. She won second place in the 2021 ENY/NATS Virtual Art Song Festival.

DASHON BURTON

Bass-Baritone

Dashon Burton has established a vibrant career appearing regularly throughout the US and Europe in favorite pieces, including Bach’s St. John and St. Matthew Passions and the Mass in B Minor, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Beethoven’s Symphony no. 9, Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem, Handel’s Messiah, and Mozart’s Requiem.

He opened the 2021–22 season with the Handel & Haydn Society of Boston led by Marin Alsop for Beethoven’s Symphony no. 9 which he will repeat later this season with the Nashville Symphony and Giancarlo Guerrero. Throughout the season he makes several notable orchestral debuts, including with the Chicago Symphony in Handel’s Messiah led by Nicholas McGegan, with the Los Angeles Philharmonic with Michael Tilson Thomas for the maestro’s new song cycle Meditations on Rilke, with the Pittsburgh Symphony performing Dvořák’s Te Deum as led by Manfred Honeck, and Verdi’s Requiem with the Seattle Symphony and Thomas Dausgaard.

He continues his relationship with San Francisco Performances as an Artist-in-Residence with appearances at venues and educational institutions throughout the Bay Area and makes a debut with Celebrity Series of Boston in recital. Operatic engagements in recent seasons have included Strauss’ Salome at the Salzburg Festival led by Franz Welser-Möst, Peter Sellars’ production of Claude Vivier’s Kopernikus throughout France and Germany, Sarastro in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, and Jupiter in Rameau’s Castor et Pollux with Les Talens Lyriques. A multiple award winning singer, Mr. Burton won his second Grammy Award in March 2021 for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album with his performance featured in Dame Ethyl Smyth’s masterwork The Prison with The Experiential Orchestra (Chandos). He also received top prizes in the ARD International Music Competition, the Oratorio Society of New York’s Vocal Competition, and Bach Bethlehem Vocal Competition. As an original member of the groundbreaking vocal ensemble Roomful of Teeth, he won his first Grammy Award for their inaugural recording of all new commissions, including Caroline Shaw’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Partita for 8 Voices.

His other recordings include Songs of Struggle & Redemption: We Shall Overcome (Acis), the Grammy-nominated recording of Paul Moravec’s Sanctuary Road (Naxos); Holocaust, 1944 by Lori Laitman (Acis); and Caroline Shaw’s The Listeners with the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra.

Mr. Burton received a Bachelor of Music degree from Oberlin College and Conservatory, and a Master of Music degree from Yale University’s Institute of Sacred Music. He is an assistant professor of voice at Vanderbilt University’s Blair School of Music.

YO-YO MA WITH THE RICHMOND SYMPHONY

PROGRAM NOTES

GABRIELA ORTIZ: KAUYUMARI

“One of the most talented composers in the world: not only in Mexico, not only in our continent – in the world,” is how Gustavo Dudamel once introduced Gabriela Ortiz, who was born in 1964 in Mexico City. Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic commissioned Kauyumari to celebrate the return to live performance after the pandemic shutdown.

Valentina Peleggi, conductor Yo-Yo Ma, cello

Tuesday, Oct. 4, 2022 @ 7:30pm Carpenter Theatre at Dominion Energy Center

ORTIZ Kauyumari

DE FALLA Suite No. 2 From the Three-Cornered Hat (Three Dances)

I. The Neighbor’s Dance

II. The Miller’s Dance (Farruca) III. Final Dance

STRAUSS On the Beautiful Blue Danube, Waltzes, Op. 314

RAVEL La Valse

INTERMISSION ELGAR

Concerto in E minor for Cello and Orchestra, Op. 85

I. Adagio

II. Lento

III. Adagio

IV. Allegro

Kauyumari means “blue deer” among Mexico’s indigenous Huichol people. Ortiz explains: “The blue deer represents a spiritual guide, one that is transformed through an extended pilgrimage into a hallucinogenic cactus called peyote. It allows the Huichol to communicate with their ancestors, do their bidding, and take on their role as guardians of the planet. Each year, these Native Mexicans embark on a symbolic journey to ‘hunt’ the blue deer, making offerings in gratitude for having been granted access to the invisible world, through which they also are able to heal the wounds of the soul.”

Drawing and elaborating on an original Huichol melody, Ortiz describes how she transformed it “into an orchestral texture which gradually evolves into a complex rhythm pattern – to such a degree that the melody itself becomes unrecognizable (the imaginary effect of peyote and our awareness of the invisible realm), giving rise to a choral wind section while maintaining an incisive rhythmic accompaniment as a form of reassurance that the world will naturally follow its course.”

MANUEL DE FALLA: SUITE NO. 2 FROM THE THREE-CORNERED HAT

A native of the port city of Cádiz in Andalusian Spain, Manuel de Falla wrote some of his best-known works while the First World War was paralyzing the rest of Europe outside his neutral homeland. Among these was a ballet based on the Don Quixote-flavored short fiction El sombrero de tres picos (“The Three-Cornered Hat”), which Pedro Antonio de Alarcón published in 1874.

The story has a folktale-like simplicity. Set at a mill in Andalusia, it involves an unnamed, jealous Miller, his attractive young wife, and the tricks both play to get the better of the pompous and lecherous local Magistrate, identified by the three-cornered hat he proudly wears to broadcast his rank. Falla was invited by the influential, Paris-based impresario Sergei Diaghilev to adapt the two-scene pantomime he had initially composed a based on this source into a full-length ballet. Diaghilev had made young Stravinsky an international celebrity, and the premiere of the expanded ballet in London right after the war, in 1919, similarly enhanced the Spanish composer’s reputation. The production boasted sets and costumes by Pablo Picasso.

Falla derived a pair of orchestral concert suites from the ballet, one for each of its two acts. Suite No. 2 presents a sequence of dances, beginning with the Roma-inspired seguidilla danced by the villagers to celebrate a starlit Midsummer’s Eve. The Miller is given a passionate flamenco solo, and the suite concludes with a castanet-accented jota dance associated with the music of Aragon. Its frenzied abandon signals the Magistrate’s humiliation as the neighbors gather around and toss him in a blanket.

The Richmond Symphony is partially funded by the Virginia Commission for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts and CultureWorks and the Arts and Cultural Funding Consortium – supported by City of Richmond and the Counties of Hanover and Henrico.

Sponsored by a local donor in support of the beloved Richmond Symphony and its programs.

PROGRAM NOTES

JOHANN STRAUSS II: ON THE BEAUTIFUL BLUE DANUBE, OP. 314

If you need a reminder of how closely classical music is bound up with the impulse to dance, look no further than the Strauss family, who established one of the most popular waves of musical fashion in the 19th century by concentrating on the waltz. There’s something about the relentless pattern one-two-three, repeated measure after measure, that seems to correspond to our biology.

Johann Strauss I had helped initiate the waltz craze in his native Vienna, but Johann II – one of his three composer sons – eventually eclipsed his father in popularity, earning the nickname “the Waltz King.” Among his hundreds of orchestral waltzes, the most immediately recognizable is On the Beautiful Blue Danube – which, as it happens, was premiered, without much success, as a choral piece in 1867 for the Vienna Men’s Choral Association.

Strauss retrofit what he had composed to set an ode to the famous river (which actually does not run through the city’s historic center and is not blue). But when it was introduced in its purely instrumental guise at the Paris World’s Fair later that year, The Blue Danube triumphed and became an international sensation. Strauss presents not just one but five contrasting waltz ideas, framed by a prelude and a coda, that unfold rather like a fantasy, one after the other – with seemingly magical inevitability.

MAURICE RAVEL: LA VALSE

In La Valse, Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) radically reimagines the associations conjured by this popular dance. The piece originated in an idea he had considered back in 1906 involving an homage to Johann Strauss II. But it remained on the back burner until Sergei Diaghilev, for whose company Ravel had composed Daphnis et Chloé (1912), requested a second ballet in 1919.

The intervening experience of the First World War left an unmistakable mark on the Frenchman’s original concept, though Ravel himself denied that he intended La Valse to express the decay and collapse of a society. When he introduced his “choreographic poem” (as he called the work) to Diaghilev, the Russian impresario rejected it on the grounds that it sounded more like “the portrait of a ballet” than an actual ballet. La Valse was therefore premiered as a concert work before it appeared on the stage.

Ravel described La Valse as “a sort of apotheosis of the Viennese waltz, mingled with … the impression of a fantastic, fatal whirling….” He envisioned a scenario as follows: “Swirling clouds afford glimpses, through rifts, of waltzing couples. The clouds scatter little by little; one can distinguish an immense hall with a whirling crowd. The scene grows progressively brighter. The light of the chandeliers bursts forth at the fortissimo. An imperial court, about 1855.”

Opening with the mysterious, indeterminate sound of muted double basses, La Valse also calls to mind the suddenly varying perspectives of cinema. Strains of various waltzes shift in and out of focus. What we might have expected as a reprise filters all that has gone before

through a strange new lens, until the circling momentum of the waltz collapses in on itself and ecstasy morphs into violent chaos.

EDWARD ELGAR: CONCERTO FOR CELLO AND ORCHESTRA IN E MINOR OP. 85

Also a product of the period just after the First World War, the Cello Concerto was Edward Elgar’s (1857-1934) last completed orchestral composition and is imbued with an elegiac sense of Romanticism facing its final demise. The premiere in 1919 was a failure, and nearly a half-century passed before its unique beauty was recognized, but the concerto is now recognized as one of the most eloquent works in the cello literature.

The cello takes the spotlight at the very start of the four-movement concerto in a passage that establishes the vivid presence the soloist will maintain throughout the four-movement work – whether the mood tends toward resigned contemplation or passionate expression.

The autumnal main theme proceeds in lilting, wavelike motion, while still another brand of melancholy appears with the second theme.

The second movement, beginning slowly on low, plucked notes, takes off as a light-hearted scherzo, pulsating with rapid-fire repetitions. The Adagio exudes a tragic but serene sensibility, as if distilling the unspeakable grief of a farewell. The finale, the longest of the four movements, is also introduced by a transitional recitative-like cadenza for the cellist. This highly varied movement springs to life with a rhythmically lively main theme.

The finale encompasses much drama as it steers a path between confident assertion and introspection. Flashbacks to music heard earlier in the concerto cast a shadow against the music’s dying glow as the tempo slows down to a still stasis. Elgar brings back the solo music from the beginning and then suddenly accelerates the pace to usher the concerto to a close.

Program notes (c)2022 Thomas May

YO-YO MA

Yo-Yo Ma’s multi-faceted career is testament to his enduring belief in culture’s power to generate trust and understanding. Whether performing new or familiar works from the cello repertoire, collaborating with communities and institutions to explore culture’s role in society, or engaging unexpected musical forms, Yo-Yo strives to foster connections that stimulate the imagination and reinforce our humanity.

In 2018, Yo-Yo set out to perform Johann Sebastian Bach’s six suites for solo cello in one sitting in 36 locations around the world that encompass our cultural heritage, our current creativity, and the challenges of peace and understanding that will shape our future. And last year, he began a new journey to explore the many ways in which culture connects us to the natural world. Over the next several years, Yo-Yo will visit places that epitomize nature’s potential to move the human soul, creating collaborative works of art and convening conversations that seek to strengthen our relationship to our planet and to each other.

Both endeavors continue Yo-Yo’s lifelong commitment to stretching the boundaries of genre and tradition to explore how music not only expresses and creates meaning, but also helps us to imagine and build a stronger society and a better future.

It was this belief that inspired Yo-Yo to establish Silkroad, a collective of artists from around the world who create music that engages their many traditions. Through his work with Silkroad, as well as throughout his career, Yo-Yo Ma has sought to expand the classical cello repertoire, premiering works by composers including Osvaldo Golijov, Leon Kirchner, Zhao Lin, Christopher Rouse, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Giovanni Sollima, Bright Sheng, Tan Dun, and John Williams.

In addition to his work as a performing artist, Yo-Yo has partnered with communities and institutions from Chicago to Guangzhou to develop programs that advocate for a more human-centered world. Among his many roles, Yo-Yo is a UN Messenger of Peace, the first artist ever appointed to the World Economic Forum’s board of trustees, and a member of the board of Nia Tero, the US-based nonprofit working in solidarity with Indigenous peoples and movements worldwide.

Yo-Yo’s discography of more than 100 albums (including 19 Grammy Award winners) reflects his wide-ranging interests. In addition to his many iconic renditions of the Western classical canon, he has made recordings that defy categorization, among them “Appalachia Waltz” and “Appalachian Journey” with Mark O’Connor and Edgar Meyer and two Grammy-winning tributes to the music of Brazil. Yo-Yo’s recent recordings include: “Sing Me Home,” with the Silkroad Ensemble, which won the 2016 Grammy for Best World Music Album; “Six Evolutions – Bach: Cello Suites;” and “Songs of Comfort and Hope,” created and recorded with pianist Kathryn Stott in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Yo-Yo’s latest album is “Beethoven for Three: Symphonies Nos. 2 and 5,” with pianist Emanuel Ax and violinist Leonidas Kavakos.

Yo-Yo was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris. He began to study the cello with his father at age four and three years later moved with his family to New York City, where he continued his cello studies at the Juilliard School before pursuing a liberal arts education at Harvard. He has received numerous awards, including the Avery Fisher Prize (1978), the National Medal of the Arts (2001), the Presidential Medal of Freedom (2010), Kennedy Center Honors (2011), and the Polar Music Prize (2012). He has performed for nine American presidents, most recently on the occasion of President Biden’s inauguration.

Yo-Yo and his wife have two children. He plays three instruments: a 2003 instrument made by Moes & Moes, a 1733 Montagnana cello from Venice, and the 1712 Davidoff Stradivarius.

Cello

JENNIFER KOH PLAYS TCHAIKOVSKY

Valentina Peleggi, conductor

Jennifer Koh, violin

Saturday, Oct. 22, 2022 @ 8:00pm

Sunday, Oct. 23, 2022 @ 3:00pm

Carpenter Theatre at Dominion Energy Center

SIMON The Block

TCHAIKOVSKY Concerto for Violin in D major, Op. 35

I. Allegro moderato

II. Canzonetta: Andante

III. Finale: Allegro vivacissimo

Jennifer Koh, violin

INTERMISSION

VAUGHN WILLIAMS Symphony No. 6

I. Allegro

II. Moderato

III. Scherzo: Allegro vivace

IV. Epilogue: Moderato

The Richmond Symphony is partially funded by the Virginia Commission for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts and CultureWorks and the Arts and Cultural Funding Consortium – supported by City of Richmond and the Counties of Hanover and Henrico.

CARLOS SIMON: THE BLOCK

Carlos Simon likes to compare his mission as a composer to the preaching career his father hoped he would follow: “Music is my pulpit. That’s where I preach,” he says. His multi-genre album Requiem for the Enslaved (2022), for example, demonstrates his passion for topics relating to social justice. It tackles the unsettling history of the exploitation of enslaved people during the early years of Georgetown University, where Simon is currently a professor.

Born in 1986 and raised in Atlanta, Simon grew up in a family that made music together as an expression of worship. His father founded an African-American Pentecostal church, enlisting the talents of family members to sing and play. A frequent source of inspiration is the work of visual artists. He composed The Block in 2018 in response to the multidisciplinary artist (and semi-professional baseball player) Romare Howard Bearden (1911-88), who celebrated African American life as it was expressed in urban and rural environments alike. Bearden was born in Charlotte, North Carolina, but moved to Harlem with his family at a young age as part of the Great Migration.

“This piece aims to highlight the rich energy and joyous sceneries that Harlem expressed as it was the hotbed for African American culture,” writes Simon. The title refers to a single Harlem city block on which were located a variety of spaces making up the texture of daily life, including a church, a barbershop, and a nightclub.

Simon refers to six of Bearden’s paintings, each highlighting a different building where these activities unfold. The painter’s works, he notes, “incorporate various mediums including watercolors, graphite, and metallic papers. In the same way, this musical piece explores various musical textures which highlight the vibrant scenery and energy that a block on Harlem or any urban city exhibits.”

TCHAIKOVSKY: CONCERTO FOR VIOLIN IN D MAJOR, OP. 35

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-93) wrote his only violin concerto at a rapid pace in the spring of 1878. He was living in Switzerland at the time, in retreat from his problems back home in Russia. The concerto’s irresistible blend of lyricism, epic breadth, and festive energy has made it one of Tchaikovsky’s most beloved scores and a cornerstone of the violin repertory.

The previous year had been emotionally turbulent, since the composer had undertaken a smokescreen marriage to a lovesick former student to offset gossip about his sexuality. The marriage rapidly disintegrated, and Tchaikovsky sought to recover from what he described as his “brief insanity.” He composed the Violin Concerto during the following spring in a whirlwind of inspiration.

The Violin Concerto fully exploits the violin’s expressive flexibility, ranging from elevated lyricism to rhythmic vivacity, and celebrates an extroverted theatricality. Tchaikovsky dedicated the Concerto to the celebrity violinist Leopold Auer. Though he later became a passionate advocate for the piece, Auer initially rejected the score as “unviolinistic” and declined to perform the premiere.

ARTIST SPONSOR

PROGRAM NOTES

Tchaikovsky integrates an impressive arsenal of technical challenges for the soloist with an unhurried lyricism. Although darker undercurrents occasionally intrude, the cliche of the hyper-emotive, crisis-ridden Tchaikovsky has no place in this sound world. The first theme cleverly emerges from what seems to be a free-flight improvisation, while all three themes in the first movement play up various aspects of the violin’s personality. Tchaikovsky positions the cadenza earlier than usual. Its music intriguingly combines thematic splicing and “showy” technical challenges.

As a contrast to the “Mediterranean” character of the opening, the other two movements seem suddenly to inject the composer’s “Russian voice,” according to the biographer David Brown. The Canzonetta was actually a replacement (composed in a single day!) for an earlier slow movement Tchaikovsky rejected. In this simple, light song, the soloist takes on the personality of a singer delivering a gently muted, melancholy aria.

Because it is directly linked, the finale comes as even more of a surprise, rapidly disrupting the Canzonetta’s spell. The soulful soloist is now recast as an earthy fiddler who plays with joyful abandon. In his notoriously vicious review of the world premiere (given in Vienna, in the composer’s absence), the city’s top critic Eduard Hanslick wrote disparagingly of the scene of “vulgar and savage faces,” “crude curses,” and the smell of cheap booze the finale conjured for him. But most audiences have been more than delighted to be invited to this village party.

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS: SYMPHONY NO. 6

Born 150 years ago, the English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams experienced his breakthrough in 1910 with Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis. That year also brought the premiere of the first of his nine symphonies. Work on the Symphony No. 6 began during the Second World War, in 1944, and was completed in 1947, when the composer was 75; he made further revisions in 1950. Sir Adrian Boult, Vaughan Williams’s staunch champion, led the BBC Symphony in the premiere in London on April 21, 1948. The work struck such a powerful chord with audiences and critics alike that it was performed more than 100 times over the next year and recorded twice.

Many felt that the Sixth expressed nihilistic despair for a world that had so irrevocably entered the atomic age with the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In 1935, the aggressive dissonance of the Fourth Symphony had shocked Vaughan Williams’s admirers, who similarly interpreted it as his response to the ominous events leading up to the Second World War. The composer scorned such connections, declaring: “It never seems to occur to people that a man might just want to write a piece of music.”

What is undeniable is that Vaughan Williams proved himself to be open to new and daring ideas in his music even as he aged – he remained productive into his mid-80s. The Sixth Symphony, whose four movements are liked without pause, presents an especially compelling example of this. It begins with a jarring conflict between E minor and F minor –keys that, though only a half-step apart, generate frightening dissonance when they collide, as Vaughan Williams has them do in the agitated opening passage.

On top of this, the mood shifts dramatically. Vaughan Williams juxtaposes the violent beginning with wildly different musical ideas, including an elusive, almost sardonically jaunty theme and a poignantly lyrical idea that recalls the “pastoral” style for which he had been typecast in earlier years. The movement ends at the deep end of the orchestra, after which comes an ominously march-like movement marked by a short-short-long rhythmic tic. Contrasts are especially powerful in the furiously churning scherzo, where Vaughan Williams gives solo prominence to a tenor saxophone.

The extraordinary finale, marked “Epilogue,” calls for very soft playing of its drifting material, “without expression,” throughout the duration of this longest of the four movements. Is this the soundscape of a world at its end? One critic found it more relentlessly pessimistic than the despairing finale of Tchaikovsky’s last symphony, the Pathétique. Despite his disdain for programmatic connections, Vaughan Williams later cited Prospero’s speech at the end of Shakespeare’s The Tempest as touching on what he had in mind: “We are such stuff as dreams are made on; and our little life is rounded with a sleep.”

Program notes (c)2022 Thomas May

Violinist Jennifer Koh is recognized for her intense, commanding performances, delivered with dazzling virtuosity and technical assurance. A forward-thinking artist, she is dedicated to exploring a broad and eclectic repertoire, while promoting equity and inclusivity in classical music. She has expanded the contemporary violin repertoire through a wide range of commissioning projects, and has premiered more than 100 works written especially for her.

Ms. Koh’s series include Alone Together, a commissioning project and performances series in support of composers during the coronavirus crisis; The New American Concerto, which invites a diverse collective of composers to examine socio-cultural topics relevant to American life today through the form of the violin concerto; and Bach and Beyond, which traces the history of the solo violin repertoire from Bach’s sonatas and partitas to pieces by 20th-and 21st-century composers.

She has appeared with orchestras worldwide, among them the New York, Los Angeles, and Helsinki Philharmonics; Cleveland, Mariinsky, Minnesota, Philadelphia, and Philharmonia (London) Orchestras; and Atlanta, Baltimore, BBC, Chicago, Cincinnati, National, New World, NHK, RAI (Torino), and Singapore Symphonies. Named Musical America’s2016 Instrumentalist of the Year, she has won the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow, Concert Artists Guild Competition, and an Avery Fisher Career Grant.

She has a BA in English literature from Oberlin College and studied at the Curtis Institute, where she worked extensively with Jaime Laredo and Felix Galimir. She is an active lecturer, teacher, and recording artist for Cedille Records; and is the Artistic Director and Founder of the non-profitarco collaborative.

ROMEO & JULIET

Valentina Peleggi, conductor

Alexandra Dariescu, piano

Saturday, Nov. 12, 2022 @ 8:00pm

Sunday, Nov. 13, 2022 @ 3:00pm Carpenter Theatre at Dominion Energy Center

PUCCINI Preludio Sinfonico, in A major

GRIEG Concerto in A minor for Piano and Orchestra, Op. 16

I. Allegro molto moderato

II. Adagio

III. Allegro moderato molto e marcato

Alexandra Dariescu, piano

INTERMISSION

PROKOFIEV Selections from Romeo & Juliet

Montagues and Capulets (suite 2)

Juliet – The Young Girl (suite 2)

Masks (suite 1)

Death of Tybalt (suite 1)

Friar Laurence (suite 2)

At the Grave of Juliet (suite 2)

The Death of Juliet

(suite 3)

PUCCINI: PRELUDIO SINFONICO, IN A MAJOR

Could anyone have guessed from the early Preludio sinfonico that Giacomo Puccini (1858-1924) would develop into one of the world’s best-loved opera composers? Certainly the piece already shows a remarkable confidence in painting with instrumental colors – a gift would serve Puccini well in his future opera career, when he combined melodic invention with symphonic sophistication.

Preludio sinfonico originated to fulfill requirements during young Puccini’s student years at the Conservatory in Milan. He wrote it in 1882, a year before a kind of companion work, Capriccio sinfonico, was premiered by the Conservatory orchestra and began to put the composer’s name on the radar of influential critics looking for an heir to the now-elderly Giuseppe Verdi.

Puccini had been rapidly assimilating influences from Wagnerian music drama and French opera, and you can hear evidence of both in the Preludio sinfonico. This brief but concentrated piece echoes the exalted atmosphere (and even dramatic arc) of Wagner’s Prelude to Lohengrin but builds on a characteristically Puccinian melodic sensibility. The composer later incorporated some of its material into his first two operas, Le villi and Edgar.

GRIEG: CONCERTO IN A MINOR, FOR PIANO AND ORCHESTRA, OP. 16

Edvard Grieg achieved international fame as the most prominent composer from Norway. But the work that initially put him on the map, the early Piano Concerto, blends inspiration from the German Romanticism he admired with Norwegian folk idioms. Born in Bergen to a music-loving family, the budding composer was sent at the age of 15 to the recently founded Leipzig Conservatory. The rigid discipline of German conservatory training turned out to be unsuited to his temperament. Still, he absorbed formative impressions during this period. An especially important one was the chance to hear Clara Wieck Schumann perform her late husband Robert Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor.

The Richmond Symphony is partially funded by the Virginia Commission for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts and CultureWorks and the Arts and Cultural Funding Consortium – supported by City of Richmond and the Counties of Hanover and Henrico.

The longest piece by a composer largely known for his miniatures, the Piano Concerto is Grieg’s only completed work in the genre but has established itself as one of the best-loved examples of that repertoire. He completed the score in 1868 while on holiday in Denmark. Grieg was also a celebrated concert pianist, but because he was constrained by prior obligations, a fellow Norwegian composer-pianist, Edmund Neupert, performed as the soloist at the Concerto’s premiere by the Royal Danish Orchestra in Copenhagen on April 3, 1869. Despite its success – Liszt and Tchaikovsky proclaimed their admiration –Grieg remained unsatisfied and made multiple revisions throughout the rest of his life.

Like Schumann’s, Grieg chooses the key of A minor for his Piano Concerto. Grieg also emulates Schumann’s striking call-to-attention gesture to start the piece: a powerful orchestral chord gives way to a cascade of escaping chords on the keyboard, which is then answered by the woodwinds introducing the first theme.

But Grieg’s work is by no means merely derivative: it radiates an individual expression all its own. To take that opening again as an example: unlike Schumann, Grieg prefaces the

The pre-concert discussion is hosted by Mike Goldberg from VPM Music.

Photo by Maksym Harbar on Unsplash

PROGRAM NOTES

orchestral outburst with rolling thunder on the timpani, while the piano’s dramatic chords trace a pattern rooted in Norwegian folk music. A thrilling cadenza rounds out the opening movement. We hear a miracle of touching simplicity in the gently muted slow movement. It leads without interruption into the finale, where the first theme echoes the energetic Norwegian dance type (halling) associated with wedding celebrations.

PROKOFIEV: SELECTIONS FROM ROMEO AND JULIET

Born in present-day Ukraine – part of the Russian Empire at the time – Sergei Prokofiev spent nearly two decades in exile following the Bolshevik Revolution. But nostalgia for his homeland, plus the special privileges that the Soviet authorities offered as bait to lure this now-acclaimed prodigal son back, made Prokofiev decide to return in the mid-1930s.

As his first major work specifically intended for the Soviet stage, the Shakespeare-based ballet Romeo and Juliet was an especially important undertaking. The composer had already begun to turn away from his earlier, more aggressively Modernist style toward what he called a “new simplicity” – an attempt to be more accessible that was more in accordance with official Soviet dictates. Prokofiev collaborated with the director Sergei Radlov and the dramaturg Adrian Piotrovsky to distill Shakespeare’s play into a ballet of 52 mostly brief scenes.

The scenario they initially devised led to a “happy ending” simply by altering the timing of Romeo’s return in the tomb scene – possibly a politically cautious bow to the Soviet doctrine of “Socialist Realism,” with its insistence on conveying an upbeat, optimistic message. Especially in those years, artists lived with great anxiety trying to second-guess what might offend Stalin. But Prokofiev realized that the music he had imagined contradicted such a false happy ending – how could the moving “Romeo at the Grave of Juliet” do otherwise? – so they restored Shakespeare’s tragic conclusion.

Still, both of the main Soviet ballet companies declined to produce the new ballet – the Bolshoi dancers, for example, complained about the challenges posed by the complex meters. Even though Romeo and Juliet would become recognized as a defining classic of the Soviet era – indeed, of the 20th century overall – it was first staged in 1938 in an abridged version in what was then Czechoslovakia. Meanwhile, Prokofiev extracted a pair of orchestral suites so as to present his music to the Russian public in the concert hall. The Soviet premiere of the full ballet did not take place until 1940 and actually won a Stalin Prize. Prokofiev introduced a third suite in 1946 as well.

The complete ballet score runs some two-and-a-half hours. Many conductors opt to sample from its abundance of riches by devising their own selection from among the three suites. For this performance, music director Valentina Peleggi has chosen eight numbers.

“Montagues and Capulets” centers on the prideful strutting of the “Dance of the Knights” from the first act, which establishes the violent context of the warring clans amid which this young love so improbably, yet so inevitably, blossoms. “Young Juliet” paints a touching portrait of youthful, innocent energy but also hints at her capacity for deep feeling.

“Masks” offers a contrasting view of Romeo cavorting with his friends Mercutio and Benvolio as they prepare to crash the Capulets’ ball. In “Friar Laurence,” Prokofiev introduces the kind-hearted, trustworthy Franciscan who hopes to make lasting peace between the families by joining Romeo and Juliet in marriage. “Dance” is an episode from a holiday street celebration that follows the fateful meeting of the lovers. A playfully scored interlude, it presents five couples dancing; Prokofiev’s music imitates the technique of cinematic cross-cutting as a brass band intrudes but, just as suddenly, fades away. The music takes a dark turn that anticipates West Side Story in the scene in which Romeo turns to violence and avenges the death of his friend Mercutio by slaying the Capulet Tybalt.

The two concluding numbers of this suite depict the deaths of the star-crossed lovers. Romeo had not received the message from Friar Laurence in time to warn him of the plan to fake Juliet’s death and thus save her from forced marriage to her suitor Paris. He finds his beloved’s apparently lifeless body at the family crypt in “Juliet’s Grave” and, after slaying Paris, commits suicide. As Juliet regains consciousness, she discovers Romeo’s corpse and in turn kills herself. Prokofiev elicits the culmination of the tragedy in music of inconsolable sadness and, at the end, quiet despair.

Program notes (c)2022 Thomas May

ALEXANDRA DARIESCU Piano

Alexandra Dariescu, the creator of “The Nutcracker and I”, is a pianist for the 21st century, standing out as an original voice whose fundamental values are shining a light on gender equality in both her concerto and recital programs, championing and premiering lesser-known works. In demand as a soloist worldwide, she has performed with eminent orchestras such as the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestre National de France, Oslo Philharmonic and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, whilst the list of conductors she has worked with includes Adam Fischer, Cristian Măcelaru, Fabien Gabel, Jun Märkl, Vasily Petrenko, Ryan Bancroft, James Gaffigan, Jonathon Heyward, JoAnn Falletta and Michael Francis.

In the 2022/23 season, Dariescu makes her debut with Orchestre Symphonique de la Monnaie under Alain Altinoglu on La Monnaie’s 250th anniversary. Throughout the season, Dariescu holds three Artist-in-Residence titles, starting at Pfalztheater-Kaiserslautern Germany, where she explores fascinating juxtapositions between male and female composers, illuminating an inclusive picture of various historic artistic movements. In anada, she returns to Orchestre Symphonique de Québec and Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, whilst in the US she debuts with the Richmond Symphony Orchestra as their Artist-in-Residence, followed by the Florida Orchestra. For her third Residency this season she returns to Iserlohn’s Internationale Herbsttage für Musik. Further highlights include debuts with the George Enescu Philharmonic Orchestra and Real Filharmonía de Galicia, a tour of “The Nutcracker and I” in the UK, Germany and Greece, and recitals in the U.S. with Angela Gheorghiu. Most recently, Dariescu made the world premiere recording of the newly discovered piano concerto by Leokadiya Kashperova with the BBC Symphony Orchestra for BBC Radio 3, and has been appointed Professor of Piano at the Royal Northern College of Music.

In 2017, Dariescu took the world by storm with her successful piano recital production “The Nutcracker and I”, an original ground-breaking multimedia performance for piano solo with dance and digital animation, which has since enjoyed international acclaim and has drawn thousands of young audiences into concert halls across Europe, Australia, China, the Emirates and the US, realizing Dariescu’s vision of building bridges and making classical music more accessible to the wider public.

Dariescu has released eight CDs to critical acclaim, the latest disc being her Decca recording with Angela Gheorghiu. The discography includes a Trilogy of Preludes series on Champs Hill Records, as well as Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra/Darrell Ang (Signum Records), in addition to “The Nutcracker and I” audio book.

Dariescu has been mentored by Sir András Schiff and Dame Imogen Cooper. A Laureate at the Verbier Festival Academy, she received the UK’s Women of the Future Award in the Arts and Culture category. In 2017, Dariescu was appointed patron of Music in Lyddington and Cultural Ambassador of Romania. In spring 2018, Dariescu received the ‘Officer of the Romanian Crown’ from the Royal Family and was selected as a Young European Leader by Friends of Europe. In 2020, Dariescu received the Order ‘Cultural Merit’ in the rank of Knight by the Romanian President and became an Associated Member of the RNCM.

Highlights of Dariescu’s 2021/22 season include the US premiere of the newly discovered piano concerto by George Enescu for her debut with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, followed by the US premiere of Nadia Boulanger’s Fantaisie Variée for her Houston Symphony debut. Further debuts included Basel Chamber Orchestra for her return to the Enescu Festival, Lapland Chamber Orchestra under John Storgårds and Turku Philharmonic Orchestra for the Finnish premiere of Boulanger’s Fantaisie under Tianyi Lu. In May 2022 Dariescu gave her Irish debut with the National Symphony Orchestra. visit

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This list reflects unrestricted gifts to the annual fund, gifts given during special events, and concert tickets donated back to the Richmond Symphony between July 1, 2021 and September 9, 2022. We have made every effort to list names correctly. If we have made an error, please contact Kiaya Lynn at 804.788.4717 ext. 102. Contributions made after September 9, 2022 will be reflected in the spring playbill. * Deceased

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Dr. and Mrs. Barbu A. Demian

Chip Dicks

David and Lisa Dickson

Dr. Edward C. Dillon

Mr. and Mrs. Michael A. Dimitriou

Mr. and Mrs. John Dowling

Mr. Robert Duntley

Aimee Ellington

Joyce & Douglas Ellington

Jon W Elvert

Mr. Christopher English and Ms. Meda S. Lane

Marilyn Erickson

Mr. and Mrs. William J. Ernst III

Dr. J. Mark Evans

Mr. and Mrs. Leavenworth M. Ferrell II

Friends of Richmond Symphony Chorus

Dr. and Mrs. David F. Gardner

Kathleen and Ronald Garstka

Mr. and Mrs. William Childs Gay

Susan Scharpf Gentry

Dr. Shirley Gibson

Michael Bartolf and Melanie Haimes-Bartolf

Bodil H. Hanneman

Pam and Dale Hartough

Laura and Mike Hinton

Roy and Loral Hoagland

Jean and David Holman

Lowrey and Beth Holthaus

David Hoover

Karen C. Howard

Mr. A. Cecil Jacobs

Mr. and Mrs. William F. Jacobs Jr.

Dr. and Mrs. Robison B. James

David and Lori Johnson

Mr. and Mrs. Douglas S. Jones

Dennis Jones

Leslie Anne Kay

Patricia Kinser

Catharine C. Kirby

Dr. and Mrs. Warren W. Koontz

Fred and Terry Laine

Dr. and Mrs. John Thomas Lanning

Mr. and Mrs. Jim Lano

Le Lew

Constance M. Lewis

John and Sue Anne Lewis

Maia Linask & Grant Rissler

Mr. and Mrs. Michael Lott

Mary Frances and Fletcher Lowe

John F. and Deborah A. Luther

Dr. Lynn McClintock

Bernie and Jamie McDonald

Mr. and Mrs. R. Wheatley McDowell

Michael Messonnier Jr

Mrs. Lavern P. Moffat

Dr. Dawn G. Mueller

Catherine T. Neale

Trudy Norfleet

Cedric and Lisa Overton

Mr. and Mrs. Grayson Page

Greg and Kitsa Panos

Ms. Sheryl Phillips

Ms. Alice Pool

Dennis H. Rainear

Mr. and Mrs. Mark I. Raper

Ann Reavey and Peter Gilbert

Mr. and Mrs. Newton Rector

Dr. and Mrs. P. Larus Reed III

Dr. and Mrs. James F. Robinson

Joseph P. Rotella

Mary and Joe Rotella

Millicent Ruddy

Barbara Null and Dan Rusnak

Ernesto and Savon Sampson

Mr. and Mrs. Russell W. Scott

Lawson and Joanne Sherman

Karen Shulzitski

Michael Simpson

Barbara A Slayden

Jim and Boo Smythe

Mr. and Mrs. John H. Sniffin

Ray and Connie Sorrell

Dr. I. Norman Sporn

Mr. James H. Starkey III

Mr. and Mrs. R and F Sterling

Ms. Elise Switz

Andrew M. Thalhimer

Griff and Amy Thomas

Tad and Sue Thompson

Ms. Judith Watson Tidd

Terry & Sharon Troxell

Mr. and Mrs. Howard M. Twilley

Robert and Mary Ellen Wadsworth

Jerry and Mary Walker

Gary and Sara Wallace

Michele and John Walter

Harriette Will

Ann L. Williams

Mr. William D. Wittorff

Anne Woodard

Ms. Susy Yim and Mr. Ryan Lannan

RENNOLDS SOCIETY

Edmund A. Rennolds, Jr. (affectionately known as “Ned”) and his wife, Mary Anne, were founders of the Richmond Symphony with Brigadier General Vincent Meyer and Emma Gray Trigg. Ned and Mary Anne were synonymous with the Richmond Symphony. They worked tirelessly to help establish the orchestra – volunteering in many capacities, housing musicians, holding meetings and receptions in their home, supporting the orchestra financially, and giving valued guidance. They agreed to lend their name to the Rennolds Society hoping membership would grow and help sustain the future of the Richmond Symphony.

It’s easy to join the Rennolds Society – enjoy special events for members and help secure the future of the orchestra! Members have an interest in the Symphony and have made provisions for the orchestra in their will or other estate planning vehicle. *Deceased

Tom and Elizabeth Allen

Dr. Virginia A. Arnold *

Joanne Barreca and Vic Bouril *

Mr. Matthew T. Blackwood *

Nancy * and Lewis T. * Booker

Laura E. McBride Box and Richard E. Box

Mrs. Caroline Y. Brandt

Drs. Meta and John Braymer

Dr.* and Mrs. O. Christian Bredrup, Jr.

Miss Goldie H. Burkholder *

Ann Turner Burks

Mrs. Royal E. Cabell, Jr. *

Stephen and Claire Capel

Miss Phyllis Cartwright *

Neal Cary

The Rev. Dr. Vienna Cobb-Anderson

Miss Hannah Lide Coker *

Waverly M. Cole *

Lucille B.* and Robert O.* Cole

Dr. John R. Cook *

Janet C. Coon

Don Creach and Karen Raschke

Charles “Chuck” Dabney *

Elizabeth R. and Ellis M.* Dunkum

Emma Gray Emory * and Howard McCue, Jr. *

Ruth and James* Erb

Marilyn Lipsitz Flax and Robert L. Flax

Mark Flynn and Sue Rowland

Mrs. Suzanne Franke

Lisa C. Fusco

The Honorable Barbara J. Gaden

Martin and Kathleen Gary

Charitable Fund

Mrs. Ross S. Gibson Sr. *

Ross S. Gibson Jr. *

Jane and Jim Hartough

Mr. and Mrs. Robert E. Hill

Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Jefferson III

Lawrence Ryan Jones and Mary Lynn Jones

Glen and Marlene Jones

Frank and Elinor Kuhn

Celia K. Luxmoore and David J. Baker

Jane S. and James T. * Lyon

Dr. Edgar E. MacDonald *

John B. Mann

Bob * and Mary Coleman * Martin

Ms. Sarah Maxwell *

Mrs. John H. McDowell *

David A. and Charlotte A. McGoye

Mr. Dana E. McKnight

Lynn and Pierce * McMartin

Mr. * and Mrs. * William Read Miller

Virginia B. and A. Scott Moncure

Gerald Morgan, Jr. *

J. Dabney and Betty Booker Morriss

Mr. * and Mrs. * Johnson C. Moss, Jr.

Margaret I. * and Walter J. * O’Brien, Jr.

James M.* and Lucia M. O’Connell

Mrs. Hunter R. K. Pettus (Patsy)

G. V. Puster, Jr.

Mrs. Gordon C. Raab *

June and Chuck Rayfield

Mr. and Mrs. Charles L. Reed, Jr.

Edmund A. Rennolds, Jr. *

Mr. and Mrs. W. Taylor Reveley III

Robert E. Rigsby

David B. Robinson, CPA

Lisa and Leon Roday

T. Raysor Salley, Jr. *

Rick Sample

Eric L. Schellenberger and Joan M. Spyhalski

Mrs. Elizabeth G. Schneider *

Mr. Brian C. Lansing and Ms. Maura L. Scott

Lawson and Joanne Sherman

Mr. and Mrs. Donald E. * Steeber

Marcia and Harry Thalhimer

Mr. * and Mrs. Charles G. Thalhimer Sr.

Mrs. Nancy White Thomas *

ENDOWMENT GIFTS

Rebecca R. Trader

Dr. E. Randolph Trice *

Dr. John R. Warkentin

Butch and Ludi Webber

Robert H. Welch *

Perry A. Weyner *

Cary Leigh Williams

Dr. Elisabeth M. Wollan

Cheryl G. and Henry A.* Yancey, Jr., M.D.

John and Bucci Zeugner

Anonymous (6)

The Richmond Symphony Foundation Endowment ensures music-making at the highest level for future generations. Through the generosity of our community, the endowment provides substantial support each year to Richmond Symphony operations. Gifts meet the symphony’s greatest needs today and in perpetuity. We are grateful for these gifts made July 1, 2021 through June 30, 2022:

$50,000+

Mrs. Elizabeth Moncure Bredrup

Cecil R. and Edna S. Hopkins Family Foundation

James L. * and Lucia M. O’Connell

George Wheeler and Luzi Wheeler Leisinger

$10,000–$49,999

Anonymous

Mrs. Elizabeth R. Dunkum

Mr. and Mrs. Stephen M. Goddard

Tilghman Family Foundation

$5,000–$9,999

Anonymous

Mary Lloyd and Randy Parks

June and Chuck Rayfield

Anne Marie Whittemore

$2,500–$4,999

Nicomedes de León

Read F. and Virginia W. McGehee

Taylor and Helen Reveley

$1,000–$2,499

Anonymous

Mr. Stu W. Blain

Mr. and Mrs. David B. Bradley

Mr. J. Alfred Broaddus Jr.

Mr. and Mrs. Robert L. Chewning

Glen and Marlene Jones

Mr. and Mrs. D. Brennen Keene

Mr. David Robinson

Mrs. Charles G. Thalhimer Sr.

Mark W. and Kristin P. Wickersham

Up to $999

Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin C. Ackerly Jr.

Mr. and Mrs. Arthur S. Brinkley III

Mr. and Mrs. David H. Crighton

David Fisk and Anne O’Byrne

Dr. and Mrs. David F. Gardner

Krissy and Jay Gathright

Mr. and Mrs. Ryan Lannan

Dr. and Mrs. Richard L. Morrill

Anna Rogers and Patricia O’Neill

Mr. Thomas Schneider

Schuyler Slack

Mrs. Christine E. Szabo

Mrs. Susy Yim

Frances Zehmer

TRIBUTE GIFTS IN HONOR

This list reflects annual fund contributions received between January 1, 2022 and August 1, 2022. We have made every effort to list names correctly. If we have made an error, please contact Kiaya Lynn at 804.788.4717 ext. 102. Gifts made after August 1, 2022 will be reflected in the spring playbill.

IN HONOR OF JEN ARNOLD

Kirsten E. Franke

IN HONOR OF KEVIN BARGER

Ms. Barbara L. Baker

IN HONOR OF MASON BATES

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF MARY BOODELL

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF MARGARET AND J. ALFRED BROADDUS, JR.

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF PRISCILLA BURBANK

Mr. and Mrs. Gregory B. Robertson

IN HONOR OF ALANA CARITHERS

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF CATHERINE CARY

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF NEAL CARY

David and Kimberly Terzian

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF POLLY KITTRELL CHRISTIAN

Sandra and John Christian

IN HONOR OF VICTORIA CHUNG

Kristen E. Franke

IN HONOR OF AMIE ERWIN

Pollie Barden

IN HONOR OF ALYSSA EVANS

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF DAVID FISK

Ms. Maureen A. Neal

IN HONOR OF DAVID FISK AND ANNE O’BYRNE

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF DR. ERIN FREEMAN

Anonymous

Martin McFadden

Don Irwin and Stoner Winslett

Mr. and Mrs. Zachary W. James

Mr. and Mrs. Dustin Love

Pamela Cross

Cynthia Hickman

Gail and James Lyddane

Hailey Broyles

Jayne Sneed

Reverend and Mrs. William L. Miller

Jon and Pam Teates

Ms. Lauren Crapanzano

Mr. and Mrs. Daniel L. Riddle

William N. Marshall

Amanda Halverson

Ms. Erin Clapp

Lynne and Steve Read

Ms. Nina Lankin

Darlene Walker Temple

Sarah George

Ruth and Richard Szucs

Craig and Patty Ross

Aaron Todd

Ed Galloway

Mr. and Mrs. James L. Rakes

Kathryn Rawley Erhardt

Lynne and Steve Read

Mr. and Mrs. Michael J. Storti

Melisse Menchel

Mr. and Mrs. William Harper

Jane Kornegay Eng and Carl J. Eng

Jim Bennett

Roy and Jane Terry

Ms. Rachel E. Fish

Charlotte Rowe

Mr. Stephen Wright

Harley and James Romanik-Jones

Lisa C. Fusco

Henry and Cliona Robb

Charles H. O’Neal

Ms. Barbara L. Baker

Jan Altman

Allison and Matthew Schutzer

Roy and Loral Hoagland

Kenna and John Payne

Mr. Scott Poxon

Ann and Dave Voss

Lucy Wagner Mitzner

Shirley Diggs

Mr. and Mrs. Paul C. Tuttle

Janet E. Tice

Sharon B. Freude

Richard Axtell

Mrs. Leslie Maloney

Mr. and Mrs. Robert B. Moffett, Jr.

JD and Donna Finney

Colby and Emily Anderson Walls

Aimee Ellington

Judy Mawyer

Linda and Blake Castle

Mr. and Mrs. Robert A. Carle

Mr. and Mrs. Robert B. Moffett, Jr.

Christopher Hinkle

Jake Barger

Ashley Larson

Mr. Donald L. Creach and Ms. Karen A. Raschke

Charles Kelly Zbinden

Robert and Mary Ellen Wadsworth

Mr. and Mrs. Laurens Sartoris

Dr. G. V. Puster Jr. and Dr. Martha Schulman

Ed Alexander

Ms. Leigh Anne Clary

Allison Yablonski

Ben and Andrea Almoite

Daniel Kobb

David Cooley and Jessica Jordan

Elaina Brennan

Dr. William B. Roberts and Mr. David W. Hoover

Patricia Reddington

Mr. Rick Sample and Ms. Celia Rafalko

Mr. and Mrs. David Carter

Michele Wittig

Kevin and Beth Barger

Ms. Samantha P. Sawyer

Mr. Chris E. Nixon and Ms. Faith A. Alejandro

Victoria Cottrell

Alexei Staruk

IN HONOR OF ISA C. FUSCO

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF BARBARA GADEN

Mrs. Maggie Georgiadis

IN HONOR OF CHERYL GODDARD

Jennifer and Jack McCarthy

IN HONOR OF DEVIN GOSSETT

Kirsten E. Franke

IN HONOR OF SUSANNA KLEIN

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF SUE ANNE KLINEFELTER

Anonymous

IN HONOR OF JOANNE KONG

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF FRANK AND ELINOR KUHN

Maria Elena Gallegos

IN HONOR OF RYAN LANNAN

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF JENNIFER LAWSON

Kirsten E. Franke

IN HONOR OF DAVID LEMELIN

Kirsten E. Franke

IN HONOR OF GEORGE MAHONEY

Mr. Rick Sample and Ms. Celia Rafalko

TRIBUTE GIFTS IN HONOR

IN HONOR OF JUDY MAWYER

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF JASON MCCOMB

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF ASHLEY MOORE

Mr. and Mrs. J. Alfred Broaddus Jr.

IN HONOR OF VALENTINA PELEGGI

Anonymous

Mr. and Mrs. Richard Kowalski

David Fisk and Anne O’Byrne

Mr. and Mrs. John L. Walker III

Mr. Henry Ayon and Ms. Paula Desel

John Warkentin and Courtney Mackey

Mrs. Henry A. Yancey, Jr.

Kirsten E. Franke

IN HONOR OF TRISH POUPORE

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF FELIX REN

Kirsten E. Franke

IN HONOR OF THE RICHMOND SYMPHONY CHORUS

Maria Elena Gallegos

IN HONOR OF THE SINGERS OF THE RICHMOND SYMPHONY CHORUS

Andrew J. Dolson and Elizabeth C. Manning

TRIBUTE GIFTS IN MEMORY

IN MEMORY OF TED BENNETT

Mrs. Myra T. Bennett

IN MEMORY OF NANCY B. BOOKER

Miss Eugenia H. Borum

IN HONOR OF RICK SAMPLE

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF STEVEN SCHMIDT

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF MOLLY SHARP

Maria Elena Gallegos

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF SCHUYLER SLACK

Regina and Jim Derzon

IN HONOR OF THE SYMPHONY MUSICIANS AND STAFF

Ms. Sharon Fuller

IN HONOR OF RUSSELL WILSON

Angela and André Basmajian

IN HONOR OF MARY DENNY WRAY

George Scott

IN HONOR OF SUSY YIM

Angela and André Basmajian

TRIBUTE GIFTS IN MEMORY

IN MEMORY OF DR. BREDRUP

Sally M. Maynard

IN MEMORY OF MRS. FAITH SUSAN CROKER

Colin McLetchie

Sean Collins

Kate Powell

IN MEMORY OF DR. JAMES B. ERB

Lynne and Steve Read

Angela and André Basmajian

Jon and Pam Teates

IN MEMORY OF SAM HOLLAND

Roy T. Matthews

IN MEMORY OF J.H. “BUDDY” KUHNS

Diane and Jim Stone

Janice Kuhns

GIFTS OF MERIT

GIFTS OF $5,000+

Pre Con, Inc.

Chuck and June Rayfield

Penny Tuthill

Cheryl Yancey

GIFTS OF $1,000–$4,999

Avery Point by Erickson Senior Living

Joanne Barreca

David and Julie Brantley

Mr. & Mrs. Geoffrey Dean Cahill

Chesterfield Auto Parts

IN MEMORY OF PEGGY BOYD

J. Mark and Paula Miller

Richmond Symphony League

Sherri Sledd

Sara Hunt

Jay and Lynne Headley

George Keen III and Elizabeth Keen

Carol and Jack Rasnic

Faye W. Holland

Terry N. and Cheryl Keller

Elinor and Frank Kuhn

Midlothian Tennis Club

Veronica and Jerry Wauford

Matthew and Susan Williams

Wills Financial Group

IN MEMORY OF MIKE MAUPIN

Read F. and Virginia W. McGehee

IN MEMORY OF DR. JAY NOGI

Mrs. Sandi Nogi

IN MEMORY OF ALAN PATERSON

Mr. and Mrs. Robert J. Spiers Jr.

Debra Sampson

Mr. and Mrs. Robert J. Spiers Jr.

IN MEMORY OF NED RENNOLDS

Anonymous

IN MEMORY OF THERESA STAPLES

Anne Marie Fontaine

IN MEMORY OF LOU WILSON

Angela and André Basmajian

GIFTS OF $300–$999

Active Medicare Solutions

Catena Armstrong

Myra T. Bennett

Ann and Paul Bolesta

Kelly and Collins Doyle

Alison Wood Eckis

Maria Gallegos

Johnson Childress

Connelly Financial Services

Hoover & Strong

Jason and Jennifer Keller

Liberty Homes, Inc.

THANKSGIVING WEEKEND

LET IT SNOW!

Saturday, Nov. 26, 2022 @ 8:00pm

Sunday, Nov. 27, 2022 @ 3:00pm Carpenter Theatre, Dominion Energy Center

It’s Richmond’s favorite holiday musical tradition – back again on Thanksgiving Weekend by popular demand! Celebrate the season with family and friends with your Richmond Symphony, and the Richmond Symphony Chorus at the Carpenter Theatre with seasonal carols, classics, excerpts from Handel’s Messiah, and sparkling holiday favorites!

HOLIDAY BRASS

Saturday, Dec. 3, 2022 @ 7:30pm Saint Christopher’s School (Louis F. Ryan Recital Hall)

Sunday, Dec. 4, 2022 @ 3:00pm Randolph-Macon College (Blackwell Auditorium)

Deck the halls - with Holiday Brass! A shimmering celebration of holiday hits for the whole family, and right in your neighborhood!

GENERAL INFORMATION

CONTACT

Richmond Symphony Patron Services

612 East Grace Street, Suite 401 Richmond, VA 23219 804.788.1212 x2

patronservices@richmondsymphony.com

HOURS

Monday-Friday, 9a-5p

Voicemail and email are checked 2 hours prior to concerts.

TICKET INFORMATION

• Child tickets are good for ages 3-18.

• Discounts are available for College Students with a valid student ID.

• Group discounts are available for groups of 8+. Some restrictions apply. Call Patron Services for more information.

• Subscribers may exchange tickets for free; some restrictions apply. Review your subscriber guide or contact Patron Services for more information.

• Single ticket buyers who feel ill or have been recently exposed to Covid-19 are asked to stay home. Please contact Patron Services prior to the performance for ticket options.

• If you are unable attend a concert contact Patron Services prior to the concert date to donate your tickets and receive a receipt for your taxes.

TICKETS & SUBSCRIPTIONS

Phone: 804.788.1212 x2

Online: richmondsymphony.com

In Person: Visit the Altria Theater box office to purchase single tickets to any Richmond Symphony concert. Tickets may also be purchased at the venue at least 1½ hours before any concert (subject to availability).

LATE SEATING

Late arrivals will be seated by ushers at an appropriate break in the music as determined by management.

COAT CHECK

The Carpenter Theatre offers a free coat check at the Concierge desk. Altria Theater has a free coat check in the ballroom downstairs. Other venues do not offer a coat check.

PHOTOGRAPHY

Feel free to take pictures without a flash during the concert and share with us on Facebook or Twitter. We ask that you turn down the brightness of your screen and stay mindful of your neighbors.

VIDEO OR AUDIO RECORDINGS

Due to copyright laws, audio and video recording devices are strictly prohibited inside the concert hall.

PLAN YOUR VISIT

Go to “Plan Your Visit” page at richmondsymphony.com or call Patron Services for information on restaurants and parking near the theater.

DONATE

Donations can be submitted online at richmondsymphony.com, by phone at 804.788.4717 x102, or mailed to the Richmond Symphony at the address above. We thank you for your support!

CONNECT WITH US!

/richmondsymphony

@rvasymphony

@rvasymphony

@rvasymphony

Join Richmond Symphony Director of Education & Community Engagement Walter Bitner for this deep dive into the music of our Symphony Series for the 2022-23 Season. Each class in this unique companion course will focus on the repertoire of the Symphony’s next Masterworks concert performance and feature a special guest with a critical role in the performance. Guests will include Music Director Valentina Peleggi, Associate Conductor Chia-Hsuan Lin, and many more! Through recordings, images, scholarship, biographies, backstage stories, and discussion we will listen and engage more deeply with the music and the artists who bring it to life.