Lynchburg provides inspiration for Sunday’s symphony season opener

When Mark Landry set out to compose a piece for the Lynchburg Symphony Orchestra, he wanted something with a Lynchburg flavor.

After doing research, Landry, the music and worship pastor at Appomattox’s Liberty Baptist Church, found inspiration in Anne Spencer, a Harlem Renaissance poet who called the Hill City home.

The title of his piece, “If ever a garden was Gethsemane,” comes from the first line of her poem, “For Jim, Easter Eve.”

In the poem, Spencer compares her backyard garden and sanctuary, Edankraal, to the garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus prayed the night before his crucifixion.

“It was a place of comfort,” Landry says. “She talks about leaving her grief there, and (of) it also being a place where she goes for solitude.”

“If ever a garden was Gethsemane” will be performed during the symphony’s season opener, a program of sacred and secular music performed by the combined choirs of area churches. It is scheduled for 3 p.m. Sunday in the E.C. Glass High School auditorium.

Landry also will be on hand to talk about the inspiration and creation of his music at 2:15 p.m. in the Glass chorus room; he’ll be joined by Robert Maxham, who will discuss the concert’s orchestral music.

The orchestra will perform six more Landry compositions, including two psalm settings and two movements from a Requiem he composed.

“I’ve always enjoyed the creating aspect of music. I enjoy something coming out of me and having that realized,” he says. “(But) it’s not an ego thing for me. It’s seeing how God works through me. He’s the one that gave me the talent.”

The program also will include performances of Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man,” an orchestral suite from Bizet’s opera “Carmen” and von Suppe’s “Light Cavalry Overture.”

The event is a member concert of Daniel Pearl Music Days, an international network of performances to honor the legacy of the late journalist/musician, who was kidnapped and murdered by terrorists in Pakistan in 2002.

Tickets are $20 for adults, $7 for students and free for children 12 and younger with an accompanying adult ticket holder. They can be purchased online at http://www.LynchburgTickets.com or in person at Givens Books, Aylor’s Farm and Garden, the Lynchburg Visitor Information Center, Hardwick’s Gifts and the Summit.

For more information, call (434) 845-6604 or visit http://www.lynchburgsymphony.com.