The Well-Tempered Ear

Classical music: Greg Zelek closes out the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s organ recital season this Friday night with music by Bach, Schumann, Franck and Liszt

By Jacob Stockinger

The Madison Symphony Orchestra (MSO) organist Greg Zelek (below) will perform a recital this Friday night, May 11, at 7:30 p.m. in Overture Hall of the Overture Center, 201 State St.

According to the MSO, “Zelek thrilled the Overture audience with his spellbinding debut recital in 2016, and then again with his appearances in 2017 and 2018 as the Madison Symphony Orchestra’s new Principal Organist and Curator of the Overture Concert Organ (below).”

This past weekend, Zelek played an impressively virtuosic organ passage in the “Glagolitic Mass” by Leos Janacek and was warmly received by the audience.

This time, Zelek returns to close out the season’s concert organ series in a “Voices of Spring” program of music that includes music by Johann Sebastian Bach, Robert Schumann, John Weaver, Cesar Franck and Gioachino Rossini as well as the  monumental 30-minute Fantasy and Fugue on the Chorale “Ad nos, ad salutarem unjam” by Franz Liszt.

For the complete program and an audiovisual sample of Zelek’s playing Bach, go to: https://www.madisonsymphony.org/zelek

Zelek recently completed Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees, and an Artist Diploma at the Julliard School. Adds the MSP: “Greg continues to cultivate his reputation as one of the most exciting organists in the American organ scene.” (You can hear Zelek play Bach’s famous Toccata and Fugue in D  minor in the YouTube video at the bottom.)

Admission for each Overture Concert Organ performance is $20.

Tickets can be purchased at madisonsymphony.org/zelek, (608) 258-4141 or the Overture Box Office.

Student Rush tickets can be purchased in person on the day of the concert at the Overture Box Office at 201 State Street. Students must show a valid student ID and can receive up to two $10 tickets.

This performance is sponsored by Walter and Karen Pridham. Support for all Overture Concert Organ programs is provided by the Diane Endres Ballweg Fund.

With a gift from Pleasant T. Rowland, the Madison Symphony Orchestra commissioned the Overture Concert Organ, which is the stunning backdrop of all MSO concerts.