The Virginia Symphony will perform a commissioned piece by composer Curtis Stewart Friday and Saturday. Next week, it partners with area churches for more concerts.
When composer Curtis Stewart sought inspiration for his latest project with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra, he found it in the words of Martin Luther King Jr.
Stewart’s piece, “I wouldn’t stop there: in the words of a KING,” will debut at Chrysler Hall on Friday, followed by a performance at the Ferguson Center for the Arts on Saturday. The free concerts, which include the Norfolk State University Choir, are part of a larger evening celebrating American music.
The roughly 9-minute piece was commissioned by the Symphony, which received a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, to create something like a spiritual to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Monday, Jan. 19.
Stewart, a seven-time Grammy-nominated violinist and professor at The Juilliard School in New York, has worked with the Symphony on multiple occasions.
“We’ve commissioned him a couple of times to write things for us and loved every minute of it,” said Eric Jacobsen, music director of the Symphony. “He really found an amazing way into this piece, into this program, into this concept.”
After listening to multiple speeches, Stewart focused on King’s Mountaintop speech, delivered in Memphis on April 3, 1968, the night before King’s assassination.
“I knew I wanted to extend King’s vision,” said Stewart, struck by King’s offering that if he could live in any age — the heyday of the Roman Empire, the Renaissance, the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation — “I wouldn’t stop there.”
The refrain is repeated emphatically throughout the 45-minute speech.
King encourages seeing the struggle for equality until the end — a message Stewart thought would resonate with today’s audiences…….
