Livermore-Amador Symphony's final concert this season, "Building a New World," will take place on Saturday at Livermore's Bankhead Theater, conducted by music director Lara Webber.
The concert features "Listening to the Land," by Zhou Tian, Sergei Prokofiev's Piano Concerto No. 3 with soloist Frederic Chiu and Antonin Dvorak's "New World Symphony."
Tian is a Chinese American composer who was nominated for a Grammy Award for his work "Composition for Orchestra." His moving elegy "Listening to the Land" is a movement from Tian's suite "Broken Ink." It was inspired by a Song Dynasty poem by Xin Qiji about lost love.
The orchestra is excited to welcome pianist Chiu, an exceptional interpreter of the music of Prokofiev. Chiu is a full-time professor of piano at Carnegie Mellon University, as well as an adjunct professor at the Hartt School of Music. He is an acclaimed innovator and an engaging and virtuosic pianist.
Prokofiev's colorful Piano Concerto No. 3 is the most often performed of his five piano concertos. It was written over a period of 10 years (1911-1921) while the composer was in exile from his native Russia. The concerto is by turns haunting, lively, poetic and bright.
Czech composer Dvorak wrote his popular "New World Symphony" in 1893 while in New York City, serving as the director of the National Conservatory of Music of America. Native American music and African American spirituals influenced the music Dvorak wrote while he was in North America.
The symphony premiered at Carnegie Hall, and a recording of it was aboard Apollo 11, which made the first moon landing in 1969.
The concert begins at 8 p.m. Saturday (June 4), with a prelude talk at 7 p.m. For updates, check www.livermoreamadorsymphony.org.
For tickets, visit the Bankhead ticket office at 2400 First St. in Livermore, www.livermorearts.org or call 925-373-6800.
Editor's note: Patricia J. Boyle, past president of the California Writers Club Tri-Valley branch, writes about the Livermore-Amador Symphony.
