The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra will give a free concert, Sunday, July 30, at the Ebenezer Baptist Church for the National Black Arts Festival, performing under the baton of African-American conductor Chelsea Tipton II. The program includes works by African-Americans and related to African-American history: African-American cellist Desmond Neysmith will play the solo on Lalo's First Movement from Cello Concerto in D Minor. The event starts at 6 p.m. and is open to the public. Tipton is currently associate conductor with the Savannah Symphony Orchestra. Raised in Greensboro, N.C., Tipton has served as assistant conductor for the Eastern Music Festival (N.C.) during the summer. In addition to being the conductor of the Cincinnati Youth Orchestra for three years, Tipton has appeared with the Greenville (S.C.) Symphony Orchestra, the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, the Carolina Chamber Symphony, the Louisville Orchestra and the Seven Hills Sinfonietta.
Tipton earned a master of music degree in orchestral conducting from Northern Illinois University and a bachelor of music in clarinet performance from the Eastman School of Music. As a clarinetist, Tipton has performed with the Rochester Philharmonic, Heidelberg Festival Opera Orchestra (Germany) and Chicago Sinfonietta.
The program will include Lyric for Strings by George Walker, the first African American composer to win the Pulitzer Prize in music in 1996. Born in Washington, D.C., in 1922, Walker attended the Curtis Institute, studying piano with Serkin and Horszowski and composition with Roario Scalero. In 1950, he signed with Columbia Artists, becoming the first black classical musician to receive major management. In 1956, he was the first African American to receive a doctorate from the Eastman School of Music. He also studied composition in Fontainbleau, France with Nadia Boulanger.
Adolphus Hailstork's dramatic Celebration is also one of the works slated for a performance. The driving energies and spiritual subtleties of one of Duke Ellington's greatest tone poems, Harlem, will also be recreated by the orchestra, in addition to selections from Gershwin's Porgy and Bess.
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