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Michael Daugherty’s ‘Letters from Lincoln’ with the Reno Phil Orchestra

Thomas Hampson sings with the Reno Philharmonic Orchestra on March 9 & 10, part of the Classix Series: Trailblazers, bringing a concert full of stories about trail blazers that have shaped history and our world. At the Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts, Mr. Hampson joins the orchestra for Michael Daugherty’s song cycle Letters from Lincoln. Hampson debuted the work in 2009 with the Spokane Symphony, which was recorded and released by Koch Records. Purchase links and more information is available via Hampson’s Recordings.

Hampson complimented Daugherty’s “lyricism, which just jumps out of his music.” Moreover, by having chosen to set texts taken from throughout Lincoln’s life, Daugherty has created a contrast, Hampson says, “between the chatty stuff and the big, lyrical stuff.”

Also featured on the program is Beethoven’s powerful and dramatic Overture to Fidelio, an orchestral tone poem that outlines the political and heroic opera’s plot. Concluding the evening is the Reno Phil Orchestra and Reno Phil Youth Symphony Orchestra playing Dvořák’s New World Symphony (Symphony No. 9), garnering its name because he wrote it during the 1890s when exploring the U.S.