Macon native Roderick Cox returns home to conduct MSO’s ‘Pathos and Passion’
The Macon Symphony Orchestra is bringing Macon native Roderick Cox home this weekend, where he will fulfill part of his dream. Cox, who studied conducting at Northwestern University, will conduct the orchestra’s first concert of the season Saturday night at the Grand Opera House.
“My musical journey is my life’s journey,” Cox said. “I was a shy kid who grew up in Macon in a single-parent household. Affording high-level musical training was unrealistic, and becoming a conductor never crossed my mind. I thought I wanted to be a teacher. I wanted to be a band instructor, so that’s what I went to school to learn. Then, I took an orchestral conducting class.”
It was one evening with friends that changed his life forever.
“I was playing a game with friends where we all had to name one thing we wanted to do before we died, and I said that I wanted to conduct Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4. In order to make that dream come true, I had to change my life’s goal,” he said.
As the newly appointed assistant conductor of the Minnesota Orchestra, that goal has now become part of his daily life, where music isn’t just a job, but an essential part of who he is.
“What fascinated me about being (a conductor) is music, especially at the highest level, is the realization that the collective effort is greater than anyone of us can achieve individually. There is strength in unity, and that strength has helped make music not just a job but something that is forever part of my life,” Cox said. “Now, I’m coming back to Macon where I will conduct my very first Tchaikovsky’s No. 4 performance. I’ve waited for this special time to do No. 4. This is my hometown, which inspired me to continue my life in music.”
The evening’s program, titled “Pathos and Passion,” centers around two specific themes: love and fate. Beethoven’s Leonore Overture and Mendelssohn’s Suite from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” will build the theme, before Tchaikovsky’s piece cements it.
“All three pieces feature lovers who are fighting for their true happiness, but they are also fighting against fate, that fatal force which prevents our happiness from being realized,” Cox said. “Leonore is fighting to save her husband from being executed. She is fighting for his life, determined to have a happy ending. Then in ‘Midsummer’s Night Dream,’ the (lovers) are in conflict with others who wish to marry them, showing the fight between love and fate in comedic form. Both of these end with love’s victory, with the Mendelssohn’s selection showcasing the traditional wedding march.”
Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4 explores his own marriage to a woman he did not love.
“Despite being gay, Tchaikovsky promised his dying father that he would marry a woman at the next opportunity,” Cox explained. “He did not realize how soon that moment would happen. A woman confessed her love, but told him not to worry as she planned to kill herself. Tchaikovsky decided to marry her. Nine weeks after the wedding, he tried to kill himself by throwing himself into a freezing river. He went to his brother’s house to recover, never living with his wife again.
“Fate tore him away from his own happiness. Despite this, Tchaikovsky sees happiness reflected in those around him, leaving him with a fate-based theme of hope, where Tchaikovsky hopes that perhaps his own life will be better someday.”
Macon Symphony Orchestra
When: 7:30 p.m. Aug. 29
Where: Grand Opera House, 651 Mulberry St.
Cost: $38.50 adults, $18.50 students, $13.50 children
Information: www.maconsymphony.com
This story was originally published August 27, 2015 at 4:23 PM with the headline "Macon native Roderick Cox returns home to conduct MSO’s ‘Pathos and Passion’ ."