South Carolina Philharmonic to perform all-American program of music by Gershwin, Goodwin, Price, Still

On February 5, the South Carolina Philharmonic will perform Three Songs for Tenor and Orchestra by local composer and jazz musician Dick Goodwin, on an all-American program including music by George Gershwin, Florence Price, and William Grant Still. Goodwin’s new three-movement work is based on poems by Frank Clark—“Foggy Brown Sugar,” “Infant Memories,” and “Partial Absence-Full Forgiveness”—and will feature tenor Johnnie Felder as soloist. Clark has been instrumental in developing the orchestra’s Healing Harmonies community engagement program that brings music to patients at hospitals throughout the Midlands. Clark wrote the poems with the goal of having them being paired with a composition featuring an African-American tenor. Music Director Morihiko Nakahara will conduct the program at Koger Center for the Arts, which will also feature George Gershwin’s An American in Paris, Florence Price’s Concert Overture No. 2, and William Grant Still’s “Afro-American” Symphony.