Name: 48th Annual Classical Roots Concerts
Start: 2026-03-06T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2026-03-07T23:59:00-05:00
Location: 48th Annual Classical Roots Concerts

Mar 6 – Mar 7

Website

Overview

Friday, March 6 at 10:45am

Saturday, March 7 at 7:30pm

For information about the full evening "Classical Roots Celebration" and to purchase those separate tickets, please click HERE

Since 1978, the Detroit Symphony Orchestra’s Classical Roots concerts have increased the awareness of the significant contributions that African American composers and musicians have made to classical music.

Premiered by trombonist Kenneth Thompkins and the DSO in 2023, Carlos Simon’s moving concerto commemorates the Underground Railroad and, in Simon’s words, “the stories, accounts, and experiences told by many enslaved people and abolitionists.” Thomas Wilkins also conducts William Grant Still’s vibrant and uplifting Fourth Symphony, which celebrates a wide variety of American musical cultures.

Program:
James Lee III - Fanfare for Universal Hope
John Rosamond Johnson (arr. Roland Carter) - Lift Every Voice and Sing
Brazeal Dennard Chorale - (Works to be Announced)
CARLOS SIMON - Troubled Water for Trombone and Orchestra
WILLIAM GRANT STILL - Symphony No. 4 "Autochthonous"