“Entering its 85th season, the Lansing Symphony Orchestra may be at the pinnacle of its long history. Under the musical leadership of Timothy Muffitt for eight years, the orchestra has grown in size, quality, budget and audience,” writes Ken Glickman in Saturday’s (5/17) Lansing State Journal (Michigan). “And with a stage full of 75 paid professional musicians and a budget of about $1 million, the LSO is by far the largest arts organization in the Lansing area.” The season includes six classical concerts, a chamber series directed by LSO flutist Richard Sherman, a family series, pops concerts, and a jazz band. “One of Muffitt’s goals in preparing the season each year is to program music that Lansing audiences haven’t heard for a while. This year, it has a heavy slant toward bedrock romantic music”—Tchaikovsky, Bruch, Elgar, as well as Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Chopin, Schubert, and Mozart. Flutist Sherman will perform “a work by local composer Marjan Helms,” and the season will open with Michael Gandolfi’s Garden of Cosmic Speculation: The Willowtwist. The final season program will feature “a world premiere … the Variations on a Folk Tune for Piano and Orchestra by Robert Aldridge…. The program also includes Ravel, Rossini, and Stravinsky.”
Posted May 19, 2014
