Orchestra debuting at Sondheim

Orchestra Iowa will present a program featuring the music of Mahler, Haydn and Mozart at 3 p.m. April 10 at the Stephen Sondheim Center for the Performing Arts.

All patrons attending the performance are invited to ?Insight,? an informative, informal discussion presented by Maestro Timothy Hankewich and guest artist Anthony Arnone prior to the concert. Held in the Sondheim center beginning at 2 p.m., the discussion will guide patrons through the historical, cultural and personal issues related to the program.

Hankewich and the orchestra are making their debut performance at the Sondheim center with a classical program including Haydn?s Cello Concerto in C Major and Mozart?s Great G minor Symphony. The program also will include a rarely performed work by Gustav Mahler. First composed in 1884 as incidental music for a play, Blumine formed the kernel from which Mahler?s First Symphony was born. Mahler eventually removed the movement from the symphony, perhaps because the gentle trumpet solo, performed over a small orchestra, was in too sharp a contrast to the gigantic scoring of the rest of the piece.

Joining Hankewich and the orchestra will be guest cellist Anthony Arnone, who enjoys a varied career as a soloist, chamber musician, conductor, recording artist and teacher throughout the country and around the world. He is presently associate professor of cello at University of Iowa School of Music and also is on the faculty of the Preucil School of Music in Iowa City where he teaches and conducts.

Founded in April 1921, Orchestra Iowa is one of the oldest symphony orchestras in continuous operation west of the Mississippi River. Its 82 professional musicians perform more than 120 public performances throughout eastern Iowa each year, many of which can be heard on Iowa Public Radio and seen on Iowa Public Television.

Tickets for Orchestra Iowa?s performance, sponsored by Physicians for the Arts and United Healthcare, are $25 for adults and $15 for students. Tickets may be purchased at the ticket office by calling 472-2787 or online at www.fairfieldacc.com.