Pittsburgh Symphony free program to explore global origin stories

Where did we come from?

Why are we here?

Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra will explore those existential questions and more in “Origin Stories,” a free program set for 7 p.m. Jan. 27 at Heinz Hall in Pittsburgh.

Assistant Conductor Moon Doh will lead the musical journey inspired by ancient understandings of how people, our world and our universe came to be.

Artists Mikael Owunna and Marques Redd will host the exploration of origin stories from the Jewish, Greek, Mayan and Igbo peoples. The discussion will include how composers express wonder and awe through their music, how instrumentation choices bring stories to life and how art provokes reflection on our own origin stories.

The program will include works by classical composers such as Haydn and Beethoven, along with contemporary composers that may not be so familiar to audiences, said Suzanne Perrino, PSO senior vice president of learning and community engagement, who is producing the concert.

The works will span the globe, from Russia through Europe to South America and Korea, she said.

Inspiration for “Origin Stories” came from Owunna’s work “Playing the Cosmic Strings,” which is replicated in a mural on the eastern exterior wall of Heinz Hall.

Installed earlier this year, the 67-by-24-foot work was commissioned by the symphony in partnership with the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership.

Courtesy of Ed DeArmitt

Artist Mikael Owunna speaks at a Pittsburgh Symphony event showcasing his "Playing the Cosmic Strings" mural on Heinz Hall in downtown Pittsburgh.

Born and raised in Pittsburgh, Owunna is a Nigerian-American multimedia artist whose work explores the intersections of visual media and engineering, optics, Blackness and African cosmologies.

He says “Playing the Cosmic Strings” is inspired by West African Igbo String-Wave cosmology, in which music is understood as sonic harmonies emanating from the vibrations of the infinite strings everywhere in creation.

Redd, a frequent collaborator with Owunna, is seen in the mural as both the Cosmic Spider weaving the structure of the world and as a child playing a string game.

Wonder and awe

Conductor and hosts will speak throughout the program.

“They’ll be giving a diversity of perspectives into the composers’ creative processes and how those relate to creation myths and stories,” Perrino said.

Contemporary composers on the program include Jessie Montgomery, a violinist and recipient of the Leonard Bernstein Award from the ASCAP Foundation, and Carlos Rafael Rivera, an Emmy Award-winner who scored the Netflix series “The Queen’s Gambit.”

“There will be an all-string work by Jessie Montgomery, who is an African-American composer exploring different types of instrumentation,” Perrino said. “The work is very rhythmic and driving, and it really makes you feel like you’re playing the cosmic strings.”

The Rivera work is based on the Popol Vuh, a text that recounts the mythology and history of the Kʼicheʼ, one of the Maya peoples.

Free concert tickets are available at pittsburghsymphony.org. Masks and proof of full vaccination or negative covid-19 test are required of all attendees.

The concert connects with the online educational unit “Schooltime: Origin Stories,” which will be available online Jan. 25-June 30. The unit includes a PSO concert video, behind-the-scenes footage with Owunna and resources on each featured origin story.

Educators can register for the unit on the symphony website.