Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, January 10, 1992 TAG: 9201100067
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JEFF DeBELL
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
ROANOKE SYMPHONY ASKS YOU TO COME AS YOU ARE MONDAY
Monday's concert by the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra, the fourth of the 1991-92 season, will open with Richard Strauss "Till Eulenspiegel."Also on the program are contemporary composer John Harbison's Concerto for Double Brass Choir and the Third Symphony of Robert Schumann.
The concert will be in the Roanoke Civic Center auditorium at 8 p.m. Victoria Bond will conduct.
Seats are available at prices ranging from $10 to $14, with a half-price discount available for students.
The orchestra is promoting Monday's concert as a "come as you are event" and is encouraging members of the audience to wear casual clothing if they like.
Strauss, the season's featured composer, completed "Till Eulenspiegel" in 1895. The tone poem was inspired by Renaissance legends of a prankish rogue - the title character - who thumbed his nose at society while living and whose irrepressible spirit seemed to survive even his death.
Harbison's Concerto for Double Brass Choir was commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic and was premiered in 1989. It is scored for the brass choirs with a deliberately small orchestra to heighten contrast with the brass.
"The volleys back and forth between the choirs is really what it is about," Harbison has said. He is a winner of the Pulitzer Prize for composing.
Schumann's Third Symphony, the "Rhenish," is a frank glorification of the life and landscape of the Rhineland and of one of its most famous buildings, the Cathedral of Cologne. The composer and his family moved to Dusseldorf in September 1850, and the five-movement symphony was completed before the end of the year.
It was first performed in Dusseldorf on Feb. 6, 1851, with Schumann conducting.