Contact: Maridith Geuder
STARKVILLE, Miss.--For its first 2010 concert, the Starkville-Mississippi State University Symphony celebrates the 200th birthday of German-born composer Felix Mendelssohn with a Jan. 9 campus concert.
Titled "Mendelssohn Magnificence," the 7:30 p.m. performance in the Bettersworth Auditorium of Lee Hall is free to all.
Featuring several major works, the program opens with "Fingal's Cave," a musical representation of the composer's impressions of the seaside of the Hebrides off the coast of Scotland.
The first half of the evening's schedule will conclude with the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto, one of the greatest and most frequently performed works for the instrument. Starkville native Shandy Phillips, a Juilliard School graduate and award-winning performer and composer, will be featured soloist.
Following a brief intermission, the orchestra will conclude with the composer's Symphony No. 5, subtitled "The Reformation." A tour de force in orchestral literature, it is based, in part, on the Martin Luther chorale "A Mighty Fortress is Our God."
In addition to composing, the German-born Mendelssohn (1809-47) was a pianist and conductor.
For more about the concert, contact the music department at 662-325-3070.
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For more information about the symphony association, visit www.starkvillemsusymphony.org.
For more information about Mississippi State University, see http://www.msstate.edu/.