The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (ASO) is an American
orchestra
An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families.
There are typically four main sections of instruments:
* bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, c ...
based in
Atlanta
Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...
,
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States
Georgia may also refer to:
Places
Historical states and entities
* Related to the ...
, USA. The ASO's main concert venue is
Atlanta Symphony Hall in the
Woodruff Arts Center
Woodruff Arts Center is a visual and performing arts center located in Atlanta, Georgia. The center houses three not-for-profit arts divisions on one campus. Opened in 1968, the Woodruff Arts Center is home to the Alliance Theatre, the Atlant ...
.
History
Though earlier organizations bearing the same name date back as far as 1923, the Orchestra was officially founded in 1945 and played its first concert as the
Atlanta Youth Symphony The Atlanta Symphony Youth Orchestra, commonly known as the ASYO, is an organization featuring Atlanta's young instrumentalists, created in 1974. Each May, about 300 middle to high school instrumentalists go through one or more auditions for places ...
under the direction of
Henry Sopkin, a
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
music educator who remained its conductor until 1966. The organization changed to its current name in 1947 and soon began attracting well known soloists such as
Isaac Stern
Isaac Stern (July 21, 1920 – September 22, 2001) was an American violinist.
Born in Poland, Stern came to the US when he was 14 months old. Stern performed both nationally and internationally, notably touring the Soviet Union and China, and ...
and
Glenn Gould
Glenn Herbert Gould (; né Gold; September 25, 1932October 4, 1982) was a Canadian classical pianist. He was one of the most famous and celebrated pianists of the 20th century, and was renowned as an interpreter of the keyboard works of Johann ...
. In 1967, with the departure of Sopkin,
Robert Shaw (founder of the
Robert Shaw Chorale
The Robert Shaw Chorale was a renowned professional choir founded in New York City in 1948 by Robert Shaw, a Californian who had been drafted out of college a decade earlier by Fred Waring to conduct his glee club in radio broadcasts.
History ...
) became the Music Director, and a year later the orchestra became full-time. In 1970, Shaw founded a
choir
A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...
, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus. In 1988,
Yoel Levi
Yoel Levi (Hebrew: יואל לוי) (born 16 August 1950) is an Israeli musician and conductor.
Early life
Born in Romania, Levi grew up in Israel.
He studied at the Tel Aviv Academy of Music, receiving a Master of Arts degree with distinction. ...
became Music Director and Principal Conductor. Under him, the Orchestra played at the opening and closing ceremonies of the
Centennial 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Levi became Music Director
Emeritus
''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...
in 2000, and was succeeded as Music Director by
Robert Spano
Robert Spano ( ; born 7 May 1961, Conneaut, Ohio) is an American conductorDavidson, Justin. "CLASSICAL MUSIC: Looking for Magic: Mixing visuals and language into a performance is just part of conductor Robert Spano's pursuit of orchestral risk" ...
.
Allison Vulgamore was hired as president of the orchestra in 1993, remaining in the role until 2009.
The current executive director of the ASO is Jennifer Barlament, since January 2016.
The orchestra toured
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
under Yoel Levi in 1991; and with its Chorus, under Robert Shaw, in 1988. In 2006 the orchestra and its chamber chorus, under Robert Spano, served as the resident ensemble for California's Ojai Festival. The full ASO Chorus has thrice visited Berlin, giving three performances on each occasion of
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other ...
's ''
War Requiem
The ''War Requiem'', Op. 66, is a large-scale setting of the Requiem composed by Benjamin Britten mostly in 1961 and completed in January 1962. The ''War Requiem'' was performed for the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral, which was b ...
'' (2003),
Hector Berlioz's ''
Grande Messe des Morts
The ''Grande Messe des morts'' (or Requiem), Op. 5, by Hector Berlioz was composed in 1837. The ''Grande Messe des Morts'' is one of Berlioz's best-known works, with a tremendous orchestration of woodwind and brass instruments, including four ant ...
'' (2008), and
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms (; 7 May 1833 – 3 April 1897) was a German composer, pianist, and conductor of the mid- Romantic period. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, he spent much of his professional life in Vienna. He is sometimes grouped wit ...
's ''
Ein Deutsches Requiem
''A German Requiem, to Words of the Holy Scriptures'', Op. 45 (german: Ein deutsches Requiem, nach Worten der heiligen Schrift, links=no) by Johannes Brahms, is a large-scale work for chorus, orchestra, a soprano and a baritone soloist, com ...
'' (2009) with the
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
The Berlin Philharmonic (german: Berliner Philharmoniker, links=no, italic=no) is a German orchestra based in Berlin. It is one of the most popular, acclaimed and well-respected orchestras in the world.
History
The Berlin Philharmonic was f ...
under ASO Principal Guest Conductor
Donald Runnicles
Sir Donald Cameron Runnicles OBE HonFRSE (born 16 November 1954, Edinburgh, Scotland) is a Scottish conductor.
Life and career
The son of William Runnicles, a director of a furniture supply company and a choirmaster and organist, and Christin ...
.
Since 2005, the Orchestra had been actively planning for the construction of a new principal concert hall. In 2008, the ASO opened its new 12,000-seat
Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre at Encore Park
The Ameris Bank Amphitheatre (formerly Verizon Amphitheatre) is a contemporary amphitheatre, located in the northern Atlanta suburb of Alpharetta, Georgia, United States.
The amphitheatre mainly hosts shows by popular music artists, comedians ...
in north Fulton County in the town of Alpharetta, some 22 miles north of Atlanta, where it presents concerts of its own as well as those by various pops groups. Encore Park and the Amphitheatre are owned by the Woodruff Arts Center, the ASO's parent organization. Including Encore Park and its activities at Atlanta Symphony Hall and Chastain Park, the ASO expects to present more than 300 performances annually. With a budget expected to increase to US$50 million with the completion of its new Amphitheatre, the ASO has become one of the six or seven largest orchestras in America, by budget size. The ASO's budget includes not only the costs of production, along with musician and staff salaries and benefits, but also the Orchestra's very significant expenditures on education, community outreach, special events and fundraising.
Past assistant conductors of the ASO have included
Joseph Young. The current associate conductor of the ASO is Jerry Hou. One noted past ASO member was
Jane Little
Jane Emma Little (born 1972) is an English broadcaster and writer.
Biography
Born in Kendal, Kendal, Cumbria, then in the county of South Westmorland Rural District, Westmorland, she read Theology and Religious Studies at King's College, Cambri ...
, who debuted as a
double bass
The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or #Terminology, by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched Bow (music), bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox addit ...
ist in Atlanta on February. 4, 1945, at the age of 16. Said to be the longest-tenured orchestra musician in the world, Little remained a member of the ASO for the rest of her life until her death on May 15, 2016 at age 87, a few hours after collapsing during an ASO concert.
In December 2020,
Nathalie Stutzmann
Nathalie Stutzmann (née Dupuy; born 6 May 1965) is a French contralto and conductor.
Biography
Born in Suresnes in France, Stutzmann first studied with her mother, soprano Christiane Stutzmann, then at Nancy Conservatoire and later at the ''Éc ...
first guest-conducted the ASO. She returned in February 2021 for an additional guest-conducting engagement, in a streamed quarantine concert. In October 2021, the ASO announced the appointment of Stutzmann as its next music director, effective with the 2022-2023 season, with an initial contract of four years. Stutzmann is the first female conductor to be named music director of the ASO.
The orchestra was featured on
R.E.M.
R.E.M. was an American rock band from Athens, Georgia, formed in 1980 by drummer Bill Berry, guitarist Peter Buck, bassist Mike Mills, and lead vocalist Michael Stipe, who were students at the University of Georgia. One of the first alternati ...
's 1991 album ''
Out of Time'', most notably on "
Losing My Religion
"Losing My Religion" is a song by American alternative rock band R.E.M., released in February 1991 as the first single from the group's seventh album, '' Out of Time'' (1991). Built on a mandolin riff, the song was an unlikely hit for the grou ...
". Members of the orchestra performed with the band on November 10, 1991, when R.E.M. recorded a special live performance of "Losing My Religion" for an
MTV
MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...
10th Anniversary Special.
Recordings
The orchestra and chorus made their first recording, a 2-LP Christmas album entitled ''Nativity'', for Turnabout/
Vox Records
Vox Records is a budget classical record label. The name is Latin for "voice."
Some Vox releases such as Peter Frankl's Debussy Piano Works and György Sándor's Complete Prokofiev Sonatas were reissued in premium vinyl boxsets by the audi ...
in 1975, conducted by Robert Shaw. This was an album directly based on their annual Christmas concert. A slightly shortened version of the 75-minute album was issued by Vox in the 1990s on compact disc under the title ''Christmas with Robert Shaw''.
In 1978, the ASO became the first American orchestra to make a
digital recording
In digital recording, an audio or video signal is converted into a stream of discrete numbers representing the changes over time in air pressure for audio, or chroma and luminance values for video. This number stream is saved to a storage de ...
intended for commercial release, when it played
Igor Stravinsky
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of the ...
's ''
Firebird
Firebird and fire bird may refer to:
Mythical birds
* Phoenix (mythology), sacred firebird found in the mythologies of many cultures
* Bennu, Egyptian firebird
* Huma bird, Persian firebird
* Firebird (Slavic folklore)
Bird species
''Various sp ...
'' suite and excerpts from
Alexander Borodin
Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin ( rus, link=no, Александр Порфирьевич Бородин, Aleksandr Porfir’yevich Borodin , p=ɐlʲɪkˈsandr pɐrˈfʲi rʲjɪvʲɪtɕ bərɐˈdʲin, a=RU-Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin.ogg, ...
's
opera
Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librett ...
, ''
Prince Igor
''Prince Igor'' ( rus, Князь Игорь, Knyáz Ígor ) is an opera in four acts with a prologue, written and composed by Alexander Borodin. The composer adapted the libretto from the Ancient Russian epic '' The Lay of Igor's Host'', which re ...
'', for the
Telarc
Telarc International Corporation is an American audiophile independent record label founded in 1977 by two classically trained musicians and former teachers, Jack Renner and Robert Woods. Based in Cleveland, Ohio, the label has had a long associ ...
label. The Telarc association, which resulted in 26
Grammy awards
The Grammy Awards (stylized as GRAMMY), or simply known as the Grammys, are awards presented by the Recording Academy of the United States to recognize "outstanding" achievements in the music industry. They are regarded by many as the most pres ...
, continued until 2010, one of the longest continuous associations of an orchestra with a record label. In 2011 the Orchestra began releasing recordings on its own ASO Media label. In 2004, the Orchestra began a project to record for the
Deutsche Grammophon
Deutsche Grammophon (; DGG) is a German classical music record label that was the precursor of the corporation PolyGram. Headquartered in Berlin Friedrichshain, it is now part of Universal Music Group (UMG) since its merger with the UMG family of ...
label several works by composer
Osvaldo Golijov
Osvaldo Noé Golijov (; born December 5, 1960) is an Argentine composer of classical music and music professor, known for his vocal and orchestral work.
Biography
Osvaldo Golijov was born in and grew up in La Plata, Argentina, in a Jewish family ...
.
One of the orchestra and chorus's best-known recordings, of
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony
The Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125, is a choral symphony, the final complete symphony by Ludwig van Beethoven, composed between 1822 and 1824. It was first performed in Vienna on 7 May 1824. The symphony is regarded by many critics and musi ...
conducted by Robert Shaw, was recorded for the now defunct Pro Arte label, and is out of print, though excerpts from the "Ode to Joy" fourth movement may be found in anthologies issued on the Reference Gold and Classical Heritage labels. Another of the ASO's recordings now out-of-print because it was recorded for the Pro Arte label is that of
Brahms
Johannes Brahms (; 7 May 1833 – 3 April 1897) was a German composer, pianist, and conductor of the mid-Romantic period. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, he spent much of his professional life in Vienna. He is sometimes grouped with ...
's
Piano Concerto No. 1, with
Peter Serkin
Peter Adolf Serkin (July 24, 1947 – February 1, 2020) was an American classical pianist. He won the Grammy Award for Most Promising New Classical Recording Artist in 1966, and he performed globally, known for not only "technically pristine" pl ...
as soloist and Robert Shaw conducting. It is one of the few recordings without a chorus that the orchestra made with Shaw.
Labor disputes
The ASO has suffered from labor disputes between management and musicians in recent years. In 2012, musicians agreed to decrease by ten weeks of pay yearly in order to help balance the ASO's budget, which had seen a major deficit in part due to years of mismanagement and declining ticket sales. As a result, the orchestra's status changed from a full-time, 52-week orchestra to a part-time, 42-week organization. In 2014, per the ''Atlanta Journal-Constitution'', the orchestra's management and principal musicians faced a 6 September 2014 deadline to reach a collective bargaining agreement or face delaying the opening of the season. This continued a rancorous history between management and players, as they attempt to extricate themselves from operating in the red, as has been the case for many years now. The local paper also indicated that their touted "operating budget" was unsustainable for a variety of reasons. In September 2014, after musicians refused to agree to a new contract, management
locked out
Lock(s) may refer to:
Common meanings
*Lock and key, a mechanical device used to secure items of importance
*Lock (water navigation), a device for boats to transit between different levels of water, as in a canal
Arts and entertainment
* ''Lock ...
the players and putting the beginning of the 2014–15 season in jeopardy. The lockout ended up lasting beyond the scheduled date at which the season was supposed to start, on September 25.
Music directors
*
Henry Sopkin (1945–1966)
*
Robert Shaw (1967–1988)
*
Yoel Levi
Yoel Levi (Hebrew: יואל לוי) (born 16 August 1950) is an Israeli musician and conductor.
Early life
Born in Romania, Levi grew up in Israel.
He studied at the Tel Aviv Academy of Music, receiving a Master of Arts degree with distinction. ...
(1988–2000)
*
Robert Spano
Robert Spano ( ; born 7 May 1961, Conneaut, Ohio) is an American conductorDavidson, Justin. "CLASSICAL MUSIC: Looking for Magic: Mixing visuals and language into a performance is just part of conductor Robert Spano's pursuit of orchestral risk" ...
(2001–2021)
*
Nathalie Stutzmann
Nathalie Stutzmann (née Dupuy; born 6 May 1965) is a French contralto and conductor.
Biography
Born in Suresnes in France, Stutzmann first studied with her mother, soprano Christiane Stutzmann, then at Nancy Conservatoire and later at the ''Éc ...
(2022–present)
References
External links
Atlanta Symphony Orchestra official website
{{Authority control
Midtown Atlanta
Musical groups from Atlanta
Musical groups established in 1945
Wikipedia requested audio of orchestras
1945 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state)
Orchestras based in Georgia (U.S. state)