HOUSTON (Aug. 22, 2019) – Tony Award and Grammy Award-winning actress and vocalist Renée Elise Goldsberry, original cast member of the musical phenomenon Hamilton, comes home to Houston to open the Houston Symphony’s 2019–2020 POPS Series alongside conductor Steven Reineke, Sept. 6–8. Saturday night attendees are invited to stay late and enjoy an after-party featuring music, specialty cocktails, free giveaways, and mingling with musicians.
The program features beloved Broadway standards like “You’ll Never Walk Alone,” plus songs from other shows in Goldsberry’s distinguished Broadway career, like The Lion King, Rent, and mega-hit musical Hamilton. “[Audiences] get to hear songs that they know and love from the shows that I’ve done,” said Goldsberry, “while I also share my experiences with those songs in a very intimate setting—a beautiful symphony hall. It’s really just me and a microphone and the best musicians in the world.”
This performance marks the Broadway star and Houston native’s debut appearance with the Houston Symphony in an evening full of recognizable showtunes. “I’ve been travelling around the country playing this particular concert with really wonderful symphonies, and it feels really amazing,” said Goldsberry. “What’s strange is that the people I’m closest to in the world have not shared this with me.” Until now.
Renée Elise Goldsberry performs with the Houston Symphony Sept. 6–8 at Jones Hall for the Performing Arts, 615 Louisiana Street, in Houston’s Theater District. For tickets and information, please call 713.224.7575 or visit houstonsymphony.org. Tickets may also be purchased at the Houston Symphony Patron Services Center in Jones Hall (Monday–Saturday, 12–6 p.m.). All programs and artists are subject to change. Generous support for this concert weekend comes from United Airlines, the Symphony’s official airline.
RENÉE ELISE GOLDSBERRY
Friday, Sept. 6, 8 p.m.
Saturday, Sept. 7, 8 p.m.
Sunday, Sept. 8, 2:30 pm.
Steven Reineke, conductor
Renée Elise Goldsberry, vocalist
About Steven Reineke
Steven Reineke has established himself as one of North America’s leading conductors of popular music. In addition to his role as Principal POPS Conductor of the Houston Symphony, this season, he celebrates his 10th anniversary as music director of The New York Pops at Carnegie Hall. Additionally, he is principal pops conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the Toronto Symphony Orchestra.
Steven is a frequent guest conductor with The Philadelphia Orchestra and his extensive North American conducting appearances include Atlanta, Cincinnati, Edmonton, San Francisco, and Sarasota.
On stage, he has created programs and collaborated with a range of leading artists from the worlds of hip hop, Broadway, television, and rock, including Common, Kendrick Lamar, Nas, Sutton Foster, Megan Hilty, Cheyenne Jackson, Wayne Brady, Peter Frampton, and Ben Folds, among others. In 2017, he was featured on NPR’s All Things Considered leading the National Symphony Orchestra, in a first for the show’s 45-year history, performing live music excerpts between news segments. In 2018, Steven led the same orchestra and hip hop legend Nas performing his seminal album, Illmatic, on PBS’s Great Performances.
As the creator of more than 100 orchestral arrangements for the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra, Steven’s work has been performed worldwide, and can be heard on numerous Cincinnati Pops Orchestra recordings on the Telarc label. His symphonic works Celebration Fanfare, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and Casey at the Bat are performed frequently in North America, including performances by the New York Philharmonic and Los Angeles Philharmonic. His Sun Valley Festival Fanfare commemorated the Sun Valley Summer Symphony’s pavilion, and his Festival Te Deum and Swan’s Island Sojourn were debuted by the Cincinnati Symphony and Cincinnati Pops Orchestras. His numerous wind ensemble compositions are published by the C.L. Barnhouse Company and are performed by concert bands worldwide.
A native of Ohio, Steven is a graduate of Miami University of Ohio, where he earned Bachelor of Music degrees with honors in both trumpet performance and music composition. He lives in New York City with his husband, Eric Gabbard.
About Renée Elise Goldsberry
Renée Elise Goldsberry received the Tony Award, Grammy Award, Drama Desk Award, and Lucille Lortel Award for her performances off and on Broadway in the musical phenomenon Hamilton. Since winning the Tony Award, she has appeared in Baz Luhrmann’s The Get Down for Netflix and has shot the title role for HBO’s The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks opposite Oprah Winfrey. She is currently starring in the Netflix series Altered Carbon.
Prior to Hamilton, Renée’s appearances on stage include her Outer Critics Circle Award-nominated performance opposite Frances McDormand in the play Good People, as well as the original stage version of The Color Purple. She made her Broadway debut in The Lion King and was the last Mimi in Rent. Her off-Broadway appearances have included several Shakespeare productions for the Public Theater’s New York Shakespeare Festival, where Hamilton originated.
Her television appearances include recurring roles on The Good Wife, Law & Order: SVU, and The Following. She was twice nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for her performance on One Life to Live. On film, she appeared most recently in Sisters with Tina Fey and Amy Poehler and in Every Secret Thing with Diane Lane and Elizabeth Banks.
About the Houston Symphony
During the 2019–20 season, the Houston Symphony celebrates its sixth season with Music Director Andrés Orozco-Estrada and continues its second century as one of America’s leading orchestras with a full complement of concert, community, education, touring, and recording activities. The Houston Symphony, one of the oldest performing arts organizations in Texas, held its inaugural performance at The Majestic Theater in downtown Houston June 21, 1913. Today, with an annual operating budget of $35.2 million, the full-time ensemble of 88 professional musicians presents nearly 170 concerts annually, making it the largest performing arts organization in Houston. Additionally, musicians of the orchestra and the Symphony’s four Community-Embedded Musicians offer over 1,000 community-based performances each year at various schools, community centers, hospitals, and churches reaching nearly 200,000 people in Greater Houston annually.
The Grammy Award-winning Houston Symphony has recorded under various prestigious labels, including Naxos, Koch International Classics, Telarc, RCA Red Seal, Virgin Classics and, most recently, Dutch recording label Pentatone. In 2017, the Houston Symphony was awarded an ECHO Klassik award for the live recording of Alban Berg’s Wozzeck under the direction of former Music Director Hans Graf. The orchestra earned its first Grammy nomination and Grammy Award at the 60th annual ceremony for the same recording in the Best Opera Recording category.
MEDIA CONTACTS:
Eric Skelly: 713.337.8560, eric.skelly@houstonsymphony.org
Mireya Reyna: 713.337.8557, mireya.reyna@houstonsymphony.org
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