SSO to Produce 6 Concerts for 2022-23 Season; Ticket Sales Open for April SSO Concert Featuring Cuban-American Cellist Thomas Mesa

Springfield—The Springfield Symphony Orchestra (SSO) has announced that it will produce a 2022-2023 season that will include at least six concerts at Symphony Hall; and that tickets are now on sale for the first of two spring concerts to be held on Friday, April 22 at 7:30 p.m.

SSO Interim Director Paul Lambert said the SSO is planning a season of at least six concerts at Symphony Hall. Performances are being scheduled while the SSO and the musicians’ union continue contract negotiations.

Lambert said tickets for the SSO’s first of two Spring concerts, “Of Heroes and Poets,” are now on sale to the public. Tickets for the SSO’s May 13 concert, also to be conducted by Mark Russell Smith, are also on sale.

Tickets for the April 22 concert featuring Cuban American cellist Thomas Mesa, can be purchased on the Springfield Symphony Orchestra website, www.springfieldsymphony.org/event/of-heroes-and-poets/, or by calling the SSO box office at (413) 733-2291. The box office is open Monday to Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Mesa, the featured visiting artist,  is a musician affiliated with the Detroit-based Sphinx organization. Focused on increasing representation of Black and Latinx artists in classical music, Sphinx is a social justice organization dedicated to transforming lives through the power of diversity in the arts.  Mesa will perform Antonin Dvorak’s Cello Concerto. The Symphony will also present William Grant Still’s Danzas de Panama and Robert Schumann’s Symphony #2. The music will fill Symphony Hall with Latin tunes and rhythms.

Mesa has received numerous awards and recognitions, and has appeared as a soloist with orchestras in the United States and Mexico, including the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl, Santa Barbara Symphony, Southwest Florida Symphony Orchestra and the Cleveland Orchestra. Mesa received his BM from The Juilliard School, MM from Northwestern University, and is a doctoral candidate at Manhattan School of Music.

To learn more about the music that will be featured, visit the SSO’s website at www.springfieldsymphony.org/event/of-heroes-and-poets/.

Mark Russell Smith, who previously served as Music Director and Conductor of the SSO from 1995-2000, will serve as guest conductor for both the April 22 and May 13 concerts. Smith is Music Director and Conductor of the Quad City Symphony Orchestra. He has worked as Director of New Music Projects for the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and Artistic Director of Orchestral Studies at the University of Minnesota, and has also served as Music Director for the Richmond Symphony Orchestra and Cheyenne Symphony Orchestra.

The SSO’s next concert will be “Dances of Spring” on Friday, May 13. More details will be forthcoming on that planned concert and can also be found on the SSO’s website.

The Springfield Symphony Orchestra is the largest Massachusetts symphony outside of Boston. It consists of over 70 musicians from the NE region of the United States and Canada, and holds many performances in a given season – as either the full orchestra or in ensemble formats.