What does freedom sound like? At University of the Pacific, that question will move from the history books to the concert stage through music shaped by presidential words, the civil rights movement and a contemporary composer’s voice.
Pacific Orchestras will present A New Birth of Freedom on Wednesday, November 4, from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m., at Faye Spanos Concert Hall in Stockton. The Conservatory of Music’s program, conducted by Kevin Sütterlin, brings together Aaron Copland’s Lincoln Portrait, Margaret Bonds’ The Montgomery Variations and the California premiere of Lawren Brianna Ware’s The Moirai.
Pacific places the concert in the context of the United States’ 250th anniversary, describing a program concerned with the country’s ideals and its continuing pursuit of freedom. For Stockton listeners, it offers a way to consider that history through the choices composers make about whose stories an orchestra carries.
Lincoln’s Words in an Orchestral Portrait
Copland wrote Lincoln Portrait in 1942, during World War II, for a commission from conductor Andre Kostelanetz. According to the composer’s official website, Copland selected excerpts from Abraham Lincoln’s own words for its narration.
The combination of spoken language and orchestra gives listeners two ways into the work: the ideas in the text and the musical setting around them. It is a useful entry point for someone who does not regularly attend orchestral concerts. The narrative offers something concrete to follow while the instruments shape the surrounding atmosphere.
Margaret Bonds and the Civil Rights Movement
Bonds completed The Montgomery Variations in 1964 and dedicated it to Martin Luther King Jr. Her publisher, Theodore Presser, identifies the African American spiritual I Want Jesus to Walk with Me as the work’s foundation.
The publisher connects the composition to the Montgomery bus boycott of 1955–56 and the 1963 bombing of Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, which killed four Black girls. That background gives the work a place in a very different chapter of the American struggle for freedom from the one evoked by Lincoln’s speeches.
Hearing Bonds alongside Copland can invite a broader conversation about American concert music. The program makes room for both a widely performed presidential portrait and a Black woman composer’s response to the events of the civil rights era.
A California Premiere in Stockton
The inclusion of Ware’s The Moirai brings a living composer into that conversation. Pacific identifies the performance as the work’s California premiere, giving local audiences an opportunity to encounter a piece new to the state’s concert stages.
The Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s artist biography identifies Ware as a composer from Gadsden, Alabama, who earned a doctorate in composition at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Her place on the program connects the historical works with a contemporary musical career.
For the university’s musicians, the concert brings those contrasting works into one shared performance. For the wider Stockton community, it is an opportunity to hear the Conservatory’s orchestral work close to home and consider how familiar national themes can take on different meanings through music.
Planning an Evening at Pacific
Pacific lists admission at $10–$15. Tickets are offered online and at the door beginning 30 minutes before the performance. All students, Pacific faculty and staff, Pacific emeritus faculty and Pacific OLLI members may attend free with valid identification. Readers should check the ticket page for current availability and any applicable checkout fees.
Event Details
- Event: Pacific Orchestras presents A New Birth of Freedom
- Date: Wednesday, November 4, 2026
- Time: 7:30–8:30 p.m.
- Venue: Faye Spanos Concert Hall, University of the Pacific, 3601 Pacific Avenue, Stockton, CA 95211
- Organizer: University of the Pacific Conservatory of Music
- Admission: $10–$15; free with valid ID for all students, Pacific faculty/staff, Pacific emeritus faculty and Pacific OLLI members. Tickets online or at the door 30 minutes before the concert; no separate registration requirement is listed.
- Information: Official concert listing and tickets.
For one November evening, Stockton listeners can hear three composers across different generations take their place in an ongoing conversation about memory, identity and freedom.