By Chip Chandler — Digital Content Producer
The next Yellow City Sounds Live concert will hit a new note.
Composer and conductor Michael Ching will perform his original works on piano, including pieces from his contemporary chamber opera Speed Dating Tonight.
Ching will perform at 7 p.m. Thursday in the Panhandle PBS studio, 2408 S. Jackson St.
The concert — a joint production of Panhandle PBS and FM90 — is free. Seating is limited, and tickets are required. Doors open at 6:30 p.m.
The concert will be streamed live on FM90 and on kacvfm.org, then broadcast later on Panhandle PBS.
A highly acclaimed and prolific composer and a noted conductor, Ching has written works performed by opera companies and orchestras throughout the United States.
He has collaborated several times with Amarillo Opera as a conductor, and the company has performed Speed Dating Tonight several times.
But he's no johnny-come-lately to songwriting, either.
“Michael’s background is firmly rooted in the classical music and opera worlds; however, he also writes very funny and poignant pop tunes,” said Mike Fuller, FM90’s program director. “This will be a Yellow City Sounds Live event like no other to this point, and we are extremely pleased to be able to present to our audience
"Operas are really a collection of songs at heart," Ching said, "so I've been a songwriter as long as I've been writing opera. I ran the Memphis (Tenn.) Opera for 18 years and occasionally went down to Nashville to write songs there.
"Even though I don't have much to show from it as far as professional credits, it really helped me as a lyricist," he said.
As with his work in opera, Ching said his songwriting is more character based.
"It's not really about me," he said. "That's not the way I look at most of my songwriting — that I'm baring my soul."
Mostly, Ching said he looks at his songwriting as a necessary balance for his work in opera.
"Opera is a really, really collaborative medium. You can't do anything without working with someone else," he said. "If you want something you can organize and control and present by yourself, singer-songwriter isthe perfect medium. You can see how it's a yin-yang, a study of contrast in creative method."
Chip Chandler is a digital content producer for Panhandle PBS. He can be contacted at Chip.Chandler@actx.edu, at @chipchandler1 on Twitter and on Facebook.
