SPCO and South Dakota Symphony pick up ASCAP award
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The South Dakota Symphony and The St. Paul Chamber Orchestra have received awards for adventurous programming from ASCAP, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers.
South Dakota Symphony Music Director David Gier says his orchestra takes its commitment to playing the music of today very seriously.
"Composers have always been established by being played in the concert hall. And if composers don't get played in the concert hall then we're in danger of losing an art form, at least the living breathing aspect of that art form," said Gier.
Gier says up to 25 percent of the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra's programming is music by living American composers, and its audience benefits from that.
"The people who've been subscribers over the past five seasons have a pretty good sense of what living American composers are producing today."
This is the fourth year in a row the South Dakota Symphony has won the award.
The SPCO has won 14 ASCAP awards, the most recent being awarded just last year.
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