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Baylor Symphony Orchestra, 10-7-10

BAYLOR SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA PERFORMS "ART" MUSIC IN CONCERT

The Baylor Symphony Orchestra's next concert, called "Meditations for the Eye and Ear" and exploring the world of paintings, will take place on Thursday, October 7, beginning at 7:30 p.m. in Jones Concert Hall. Director of Orchestral Activities Stephen Heyde will conduct.

Co-sponsored by the Baylor University Honors College, the concert is presented in celebration of the Mark Foster Foundation exhibit, "Sacred Texts, Holy Images: Rouault's Miserere and Chagall's The Bible Series." All of the music is connected with the visual arts.

Opening the program will be Prairie Light, a piece by contemporary composer Dan Welcher, who serves as Professor of Composition at the University of Texas at Austin. This work, dating from 1985, was inspired by three watercolors by Georgia O'Keefe.

Aaron Copland's famous ballet Appalachian Spring debuted in 1944, and the composer crafted an orchestral suite the following year. As Professor Heyde explains, "Though not related to a specific piece of visual art, this composition interlocks perfectly with the theme of tonight's concert. In its original edification, it was, of course, a work of visual art and the perfect marriage of music and movement."

German composer Paul Hindemith drew inspiration for his 1934 Symphony "Mathis der Maler" (or "Mathis, the Painter") from the sacred art works of Matthias Grünewald (1475-1528). The movements ("Angelic Concert," "Entombment," and "The Temptation of St. Anthony") are based on three panels from Grünewald's altarpiece for the monastery at Isenheim.

The program will close with the final section, "The Great Gate of Kiev," from Modest Mussorgsky's piano suite Pictures at an Exhibition, as heard in the original 1886 orchestration of Mikhail Tushmalov, who was a student of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.

This concert is free of charge and open to the public. For more information, call the Baylor University School of Music at 254-710-3991.