After a pandemic absence of more than two years, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra returns to the UGA Performing Arts Center’s Hodgson Concert Hall Friday, March 4 at 8 p.m. Principal Guest Conductor Donald Runnicles leads Mahler’s epic First Symphony and Michelle Cann is the soloist in the Piano Concerto in One Movement by Florence Price (1887-1953), the first Black American woman to have a symphony played by a major orchestra.
A pre-performance talk will be given in Ramsey Concert Hall at 7:15 p.m. (free admission).
Following decades of neglect, Price’s music is having a moment. The Philadelphia Orchestra is recording all four of her symphonies. When Cann — the Eleanor Sokoloff Chair in Piano Studies at the Curtis Institute — played Price’s concerto with the Philadelphia Orchestra last year, the Philadelphia Inquirer called her performance “exquisite.”
In advance of this Athens concert, WUGA is broadcasting The Price of Admission: A Musical Biography of Florence Beatrice Price, a one-hour documentary by Terrance McKnight of WQXR in New York. It will air in the time slots usually occupied by Athens News Matters, Friday, Feb. 25 at. 1 p.m.; Saturday, Feb. 26 at 10 a.m.; and Sunday, Feb. 27 at noon.
Runnicles, who also serves as general music director of the Deutsche Oper Berlin and music director of the Grand Teton Music Festival, is most at home in Romantic and post-Romantic repertoire. Thus, the Mahler First is in his wheelhouse. A symphony like no other, it opens with the unforgettable sound of a still, quiet note in the highest and lowest strings, then woodwinds imitating bird calls, and offstage trumpets.
The second movement is a vivid Austrian folk dance, the third a sardonic funeral march based on “Frère Jacques.” By the time the piece reaches its glorious end, the French horns stand up to deliver a chorale as radiant as Handel’s “Hallelujah” chorus.
The Atlanta Symphony will appear again at Hodgson Concert Hall May 1, with Runnicles and two soloists, violinist David Coucheron and harpist Elisabeth Remy Johnson. That concert is during the Performing Arts Center’s 25th anniversary week, which begins with an April 24 performance by six-time Tony Award winner Audra McDonald. The orchestra helped inaugurate the hall in 1996 and has visited the venue consistently in the years since.
Classical music in the UGA Presents season continues with Edgar Meyer and the Scottish Ensemble (April 1) and the Pacifica Quartet and clarinetist Anthony McGill (April 19).
For each of these performances, 25 tickets are available for just $25, to mark the 25th anniversary of the Performing Arts Center. Tickets for UGA students are always $10.
For a complete list of UGA Presents performances, click here.
Three Ways to Order Tickets
- Purchase tickets online 24/7 online here.
- Call the Performing Arts Center Box Office at (706) 542-4400, Mon.-Fri., 10:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m.
- Visit the UGA Performing Arts Center Box Office, Mon.-Fri., 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. (5 minute parking is available in the drop off circle at the Performing Arts Center for purchasing or picking up tickets.)
COVID protocols
For information about the Performing Arts Center’s current COVID-19 protocols, click here. Flexible ticketing will be in place for all performances occurring through May. Patrons may exchange tickets for another performance or receive a full refund until 12:00 p.m. on the day of the performance, if occurring on a weekday, or by Friday at 5:00 p.m. if occurring on a weekend.