Name: Joy of Italy
Start: 2025-03-25T19:30:00
Location: Callaway Auditorium

LaGrange Symphony Orchestra

The ingredients for this musical feast are rich and varied! The members of LSYO join with the LSO for the annual side-by-side performance, led by conductor Michael Giel. The program will also feature the winner of our acclaimed Young Artist’s Competition that for many years has brought outstanding young musicians from Georgia and surrounding states to Callaway Auditorium to perform with the LSO. In addition to the winner’s artistry enriching our musical experience, they benefit from an invaluable opportunity to advance their own career. After Bizet’s delightfully compact Carmen Suite No. 1, with its many beloved, popular melodies from the opera, the LSO concludes the evening with Mendelssohn’s joyful Symphony No. 4 in A major, the “Italian”. This work, preceded by the so-called “Scottish” Symphony and the Hebrides Overture, was also the product of a European tour Mendelsohn undertook between 1829 and 1831. The places, landscapes and cultures had a profound impact on Mendelssohn’s creativity, and Italy in particular left him bursting with happiness. He wrote to his father “This is Italy! And now has begun what I have always thought – to be the supreme joy in life. And I am loving it!”. In writing to his sister, Fanny (also a great composer and pianist), he expressed “The Italian symphony is making great progress. It will be the jolliest piece I have ever done. Especially the last movement!” Join us for the effervescent Joy of Italy!