YSO returns for two concerts

Staff report

Youngstown

After a midwinter hiatus, the Youngstown Symphony Orchestra will return to Powers Auditorium for two February concerts.

Tickets are on sale now for Saturday’s YSU Night at the Symphony and the Feb. 11 Symphonic Valentine concerts.

At Saturday’s concert, Youngstown State University football coach Eric Wolford will join conductor Randall Craig Fleischer for the inspiring Lincoln Portrait.

Coach Wolford will narrate Copland’s tribute to the 16th president with words from Lincoln’s speeches and the Gettysburg Address.

Also on the evening’s program will be Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man.”

Copland wrote the piece in 1942 after a request by Eugene Goossens, then Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra conductor, to American composers to create a patriotic fanfare in support of the WW II war effort.

Other works to be performed are Bernstein’s West Side Story Symphonic Dances, Shubert’s “Unfinished” Eighth Symphony and Brahm’s “Academic Festival Overture.”

Wolford, a Youngstown native and graduate of Ursuline High School and Kent State University, was named the sixth head coach in YSU history Dec. 15, 2009. Prior to coming to YSU, he held assistant coach positions at South Carolina, Illinois, Arizona, North Texas, Houston, South Florida and Kansas State.

The Feb. 11 concert will be a stroll down memory lane with Frank Sinatra.

Symphonic Valentine with the YSO, featuring guest conductor Carl Topilow, will present a bouquet of Sinatra hits and tunes from the Big Band era, featuring Michael Maguire.

Maguire is best known for his Broadway performances in “Les Miserables,” for which he won a Tony Award, Drama Desk Award and Theatre World Award.

Recently, he recreated the role for the 10th anniversary concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

Topilow, who currently serves as conductor of both the Cleveland Pops Orchestra and Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra, is renowned worldwide for his versatility, whether he is holding a conductor’s baton or his trademark red clarinet.

The Symphonic Valentine concert is underwritten in part by John and Denise York and The DeBartolo Corporation.