“Last season, the Tuscaloosa Symphony Orchestra focused on music inspired by Shakespeare,” writes Mark Hughes Cobb in Sunday’s (9/18) Tuscaloosa News (Ala.). “The theme for the 2016-17 concert season sounds as if it could have been drawn from the Bard: Reveries and Wonders…. The TSO will present new or less-known works [including the season-opening performance on Sept. 18] of Christopher Theofanidis’ tone poem for orchestra, ‘Dreamtime Ancestors,’ based on aboriginal creation myths. It was commissioned by New Music for America, a consortium of smaller-budget orchestras joining forces to commission top-flight works.” The season also includes a November chamber concert featuring music by Handel, Albinoni, Rheinberger, and Britten; a Christmas concert with the Alabama Choir School and Prentice Concert Chorale; a family concert featuring Nathaniel Stookey’s The Composer Is Dead, set to text by Lemony Snicket; and a performance with the University of Alabama’s Huxford Symphony Orchestra of works by Respighi and Ravel. Said TSO Music Director Adam Flatt of the latter, “It gives both orchestras an opportunity to play really large-scale pieces like this. And it’s in line with what the TSO ought to be doing, which is plugging itself into the fabric of the musical community.”
Posted September 20, 2016
