100th Season Brochure for The University of Southern Mississippi Symphony Orchestra

THE UNIVERSITY OF

S O U T H E R N M I S S I S S I P P I

SY MPHON Y

10 0 TH A N NIV ERSA RY

S E A S O N 2019-2020

Earliest photo of the symphony, circa 1920

The University of Southern Mississippi Symphony Orchestra, circa 2019

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ANNIVERSARY

Lorena Tomson establishes the true predecessor of The University of Southern Mississippi Symphony Orchestra with an orchestra of 11 members.

Welcome to the Centennial Celebration season

Throughout this epic season, we will honor the past and look to the future with blockbuster classical and popular music, selections from the operatic and musical theatre stages, and exciting guest artists and conductors, including performances by many of our alumni and friends you have enjoyed watching perform over the past generation.

Every concert will provide you with exhilarating musical experiences with some big surprises along the way, so please don’t miss out!

Join us all season long to commemorate the 100th anniversary of a true gem of our university and community.

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of The University of Southern Mississippi Symphony Orchestra, celebrating 100 years of excellence in music performance, training of young musicians, and community and educational outreach.

Margaret Gillard takes the reigns as conductor of the USM Symphony Orchestra.

THE CREATIVE TEAM THAT BROUGHT YOU THE ATLANTIS AND SHANGRI-LA GALAS presents

CASABL ANCA A PARTNERS FOR THE ARTS GALA CELEBRATING THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN MISSISSIPPI SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA’S 100th ANNIVERSARY THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 2019, AT 7 P.M. EVENT CHAIR Leigh Ann Underwood EVENT HOSTS Chris Winstead Jay Dean Michael Miles Ron Hancock

FOOD/WINE Anita Murphey Traci Rouse Wes Rouse Sally Sullivan

PUBLICITY Jim Coll David Gustafson Mike Lopinto Randy Swan

EVENT DESIGNER Mike Lopinto

PATRON SERVICES Jerry DeFatta Lynn McMullan Becky Montague

SPONSORSHIPS Stacy Ahua Lisa Conn Cory Ferraez Linda Boutwell Griffith Amy Hinton Dick Jordan Millie Swan

EVENT DECOR Nancy Leader Mike Lopinto John David Williams

From Russia With Love!

Michael Miles, conductor Petronel Malan, piano November 7, 2019, 7:30 p.m.

Bennett Auditorium Reinhold Glière - Russian Sailor’s Dance from The Red Poppy Dimitri Shostakovich - Festive Overture Sergei Rachmaninoff - Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini Piotr Illyich Tchaikovsky - Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture

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Opening night at the symphony provides the power and passion of music from Russia. Three Russian favorites – Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky – will excite, move and romance you into the night. South African concert pianist, Petronel Malan, described by the New York Times as “formidable…dizzying…magical,” joins the orchestra in Rachmaninoff ’s most famous and beautiful work for piano and orchestra.

“Formidable…dizzying…magical.”

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Lauded by reviewers as an unmistakably creative force in the classical music industry, South African pianist, Petronel Malan’s critical acclaim culminated in the nomination of three Grammy® Awards, including “Best Instrumental Solo Album” for her debut disc. Malan’s career was launched following five gold medals at international piano competitions throughout the United States, and now, she maintains a full performance schedule as recitalist, orchestral soloist and chamber musician in major venues throughout the world.

Frank Earl Marsh is hired to chair the Department of Music and conduct the Symphony Orchestra.

Marsh establishes the Opera Workshop. Both the Symphony Orchestra and Southern Opera Theater have continued without interruption to the present.

TICKETS

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Holiday Choral Spectacular 5O 19

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Frank Crockett moves his strings educational outreach program from the University of Mississippi to The University of Southern Mississippi, establishing the Symphony Orchestra’s dual mission of education and outreach.

Michael Miles, conductor Greg Fuller, conductor Jonathan Kilgore, conductor December 3 and 5, 2019, 7:30 p.m.

Main Street Baptist Church Your Symphony Orchestra is joined by The University of Southern Mississippi Choirs, the Hattiesburg Civic Chorus, and Hattiesburg area high school singers as they collaborate in our annual holiday community celebration!

The perfect gift!

Hey Daze, an original musical written by Associate Director of Bands, Robert Hays is performed in Hattiesburg and Jackson. The Southern Miss fight song, “Southern to the Top,” is from this production.

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William T. Gower becomes the conductor of the USM Symphony Orchestra.

His contributions to the orchestra continue to be honored today through the annual William T. Gower Concerto Competition.

Carl “Doc” Severinsen, leader of the Tonight Show Band, performs with the Orchestra.

TICKETS

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Isn’t It Romantic Apo Hsu, conductor Alexander Russakovsky, cello February 20, 2020, 7:30 p.m.

Manonni Performing Arts Center

One of the most dynamic conductors of our time, Ms. Apo Hsu, returns to guide the orchestra in an evening of music from the Romantic period.

Ms. Hsu’s last appearance with the orchestra in 2014 was a critical success, and this program is sure to excite the musical novices and purists alike with lush, rich, beautiful romanticism. Southern Miss School of Music cello professor, Alexander Russakovsky, will also join the orchestra to perform one of the period’s great cello solo works.

“She generates electricity from the podium in two directions: into the orchestra and into the audience.”

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Ron McCreery takes over as conductor of the USM Orchestra and establishes the University String Project.

Metropolitan Opera baritone, Robert Merrill; Metropolitan Opera soprano, Roberta Peters; and Metropolitan Opera bass, Norman Treigel performed with the Orchestra.

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A dynamic force in the music world, Taiwanese conductor, Apo Hsu has circled the globe with an international career encompassing a wide array of guest appearances, residencies and tour performances. In the United States, she has appeared as a guest conductor with major national orchestras from coast to coast, including the San Francisco Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra (Washington, D.C.) and many others. She appears regularly on concert stages in her native Taiwan, including recent guest appearances with the Kaohsiung City Symphony Orchestra and National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra.

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Giuseppe Verdi - Overture to La forza del destino Piotr Illyich Tchaikovsky -Variations on a Rococo Theme in A major, Opus 33 Johannes Brahms - Symphony No. 2 in D major

Southern Miss School of Music faculty member, Alexander Russakovsky, is one of the South’s leading performers and pedagogues on cello. He studied at the Leningrad Conservatory, under renowned Russian professors, Emmanuel Fishman and Anatoli Nikitin. He earned his Bachelor of Music at the Jerusalem Rubin Academy and his master’s degree at the Yale University, where he studied under Aldo Parisot. He holds a doctorate in cello performance from the University of California, Santa Barbara. A founding member of the Jerusalem Academy String Quartet, Russakovsky has performed with the group throughout Israel, as well as in Germany, Switzerland, Holland and France. A recipient of many awards, he won the Angela and Maurice M. Clairmont Competition in Tel Aviv, the Performing Arts Scholarship Foundation Competition in Santa Barbara, and the 1999 Career Grant of the Esperia Foundation.

TICKETS

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Jay Dean is hired as director of Orchestral Activities The trio of President Aubrey K. Lucas, Dean Harold Luce, and Jay Dean funnel abundant creativity, hard work and resources into the Symphony Orchestra, setting it on a course of exponential growth in size and quality.

Showbiz!

A CENTURY OF SHOW TUNES Mike Lopinto, director Michael Miles, music director March 12, 2020, 7:30 p.m.

Manonni Performing Arts Center The creative team that created Showbiz! brings you the fourth and most entertaining production yet! Joining our talented students will be School of Music alumni Ezekiel Andrew and Nikisha Williams, fresh from their recent roles in Ragtime and Hamilton. This production will survey the musical theater song book to bring you a fast-paced review of the best show tunes from the past 100 years of musicals.

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Jay Dean becomes director of the Opera program and establishes working relationships with professional opera companies in the region.

Jay Dean and the Symphony Orchestra celebrate its 75th anniversary with Itzhak Perlman as guest soloist, performing the Beethoven Violin Concerto in D Major.

Yo-Yo Ma performs for the first time with the Symphony Orchestra.

Opera legend and Laurel, Mississippi native, Leontyne Price conducts a masterclass for voice students.

With an active career in both opera and music theatre, alumnus Ezekiel Andrew has been seen in productions of both genres across the country. He is garnering nationwide attention for his portrayal of the character Coalhouse Walker, Jr. in the timeless classic, Ragtime. As a powerful and experienced “crossover” artist, Ezekiel has performed theatre repertoire favorites on opera stages throughout the country including Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera with the Southern Opera and Musical Theatre Company; Quasimodo in Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame with the Utah Festival Opera and Musical Theatre; and Bernardo in West Side Story with the Southern Mississippi Opera and Musical Theatre Company. Ezekiel is a proud native of Mississippi and currently resides in New York.

Southern Miss alumna Nikisha Williams is a singer/actress originally from Mobile, Alabama.

At Southern Miss, she had extensive training in classical singing and participated in many operas and musicals, including I Pagliacci, La Boheme, Smokey Joe’s Café, Sweeney Todd, and Ragtime. In Memphis, she performed in Don Giovanni and Pagliacci at Opera Memphis, and Hairspray and Memphis at Playhouse on the Square, the latter garnering her a nomination for Leading Actress in a Musical at the 2016 Memphis Ostrander Awards and a win as Best Female Actor in her performance as Felicia Farrell in Memphis at the 2017 Diversity on Stage and Film Awards.

Nikisha is the winner of Season 12’s “So You Think You Can Belt” competition, held at the West End Lounge in New York City.

She will also be featured in the next season of Articulate, where her story of fusing performance with her survival job will air on PBS. In September 2017, Nikisha joined the cast of the Broadway national tour of The Color Purple as a female swing and Celie understudy. She is now part of the Hamilton Broadway (Philip Company) touring company, where she is part of the ensemble and understudies Eliza Hamilton, Angelica Schuyler and Peggy Schuyler/Maria Reynolds.

TICKETS

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Verdi Requiem

Featuring the Southern Chorale Greg Fuller, conductor March 31, 2020, 7:30 p.m.

Main Street Baptist Church Giuseppe Verdi - Messa da requiem

Guiseppe Verdi’s Requiem remains an unrivaled masterpiece and one of the most treasured choral works of all time. It is truly a work by which all other requiems are measured. The Requiem was composed in 1874 to honor the passing of Alessandro Manzoni, an Italian novelist, poet and patriot whose works helped influence Italian unification. In this epic work, operatic soloists join forces with a massive choir and orchestra to create an exhilarating emotional journey for listeners.

“It’s not often that a fortunate operagoer witnesses the birth of a star!” critics hailed for Danielle Talamantes’ recent role début as Violetta in La traviata with Hawaii Opera. This past season also included performances as Mimì in La bohéme with Fairfax Symphony and a return to The Metropolitan Opera to reprise the role of Frasquita for their productions of Carmen. In addition, she appeared as a soloist in multiple classical masterworks, including Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 and Faure’s Requiem at Carnegie Hall, as well as Verdi’s Requiem with the National Philharmonic, among others.

Kirstin Chávez is considered one of the most riveting and significant performing mezzo-sopranos today. Her powerful voice, with its expansive range, the dramatic intensity of her acting, and her natural sensuality combine to make her an arresting and unique presence on the operatic and concert stages. Chávez’s Carmen has taken her all around the globe and into such celebrated venues as Lincoln Center, the Sydney Opera House and the Arena di Verona.

A native of Idaho Falls, Idaho, tenor Jonathan Yarrington is assistant professor of voice at The University of Southern Mississippi. Dr. Yarrington was a member of the Dallas Opera Studio from 2011-14, singing nearly 100 performances in the title roles of their education and outreach productions of Doctor Miracle and Jack and the Beanstalk. In 2012, he made his main-stage debut with The Dallas Opera as the Messenger in Aida.

Versatile American bass-baritone Kevin Short is thrilling audiences around the globe. In the United States, he has appeared with the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Houston Grand Opera, Los Angeles Opera, Washington Opera, and Seattle Opera, to name a few. He has also appeared in concert and recital with the Boston Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony, National Symphony, and Baltimore Symphony, among many others.

TICKETS

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The Southern Opera and Musical Theater Company season joins the Symphony Season.

Sir James and Lady Jeanne Galway perform with the orchestra for the first time.

Placido Domingo performs with the orchestra for a sold out international audience at the Mississippi Gulf Coast Coliseum.

The USM Symphony Orchestra performs “Spirit of Mississippi: A Concert of Hope” following Hurricane Katrina.

Jay Dean and the Orchestra are awarded the Governor’s Award for Leadership in the Arts.

Night of a Hundred Stars 1O O 2 l

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Renée Fleming performs with the USM Orchestra to a sold out audience at Thalia Mara Hall in Jackson, Mississippi.

Soprano Debra Voigt performs with the Orchestra.

The Orchestra backs up the Beach Boys to a sold out audience at the Beau Rivage Casino.

Featuring the William T. Gower Competition Winners Michael Miles, conductor plus a surprise guest conductor!

May 7, 2020, 7:30 p.m.

Bennett Auditorium Morton Gould - American Salute Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov - Capriccio Espagnol Concertos of the William T. Gower Competition Winners In this fitting conclusion to our Centennial Season, we honor the memory of William T. Gower, one of the most influential conductors of the USM Symphony Orchestra, by presenting the winners of the annual William T. Gower Concerto Competition in performance with the Symphony. We end the season with dramatic, expressive and powerful Capriccio Espagnol by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov. This work, along with a surprise guest conductor, provides dynamic colors and textures in a finale worthy of our Centennial Season.

The Southern Musical Theatre and Opera Company produces blockbuster stagings of Phantom of the Opera and Turandot in the same season.

Jay Dean retires as music director.

From 1988-2018, over 300 international students were recruited to Southern Miss to become members of the USM Symphony Orchestra and Southern Opera and Musical Theatre Company.

The orchestra became known for “Bringing the World to Mississippi.”

The School of Music receives a grant to make the Southern Youth Symphony Orchestra one of only 22 National String Project Consortium sites in the country.

Dr. Michael Miles takes the reigns as interim director of Orchestral Activities

TICKETS

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Where will the future take this venerable organization?

Season Tickets

Platinum $140 ($15 savings) Gold $130 ($12 savings) Silver $120 ($4 savings) Youth $50 (15 and under - $40 savings)

Individual Tickets Isn’t It Romantic and Verdi Requiem are $25 general admission.

Holiday Choral Spectacular is $20 general admission.

All other events $28, $24, $18 Youth Tickets (15 and under) $10 All university students admitted free with ID. The PFTA Casablanca Gala is not included in the season subscription.

Order now!

TICKETS

601.266.5418 800.844.8425 southernmisstickets.com

The incredible groundwork by tireless arts advocates, both in the university and the community, have set forth a mission to make our university and our community different a haven for the arts and education and achievement at the highest levels.

You can be a part of the future success of the organization in several ways: 1. Donate Any amount is valuable to sustaining our symphony.

2. Advocate Tell anyone and everyone what the symphony means to you and invite them to join you at our events. Your engagement and word-of-mouth is the single most important factor in future audiences experienceing what you love.

SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA 118 College Drive #5081 Hattiesburg, MS 39406

B RI NGI NG T H E WORLD TO M I SSI SSI P P I

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