The Willson Center for Humanities and Arts and the Hugh Hodgson School of Music will welcome renowned conductor and orchestra director Robert Spano to the University of Georgia on March 24 as the Willson Center’s annual Delta Visiting Chair for Global Understanding.

Spano’s visit, which will include two public talks on campus and a workshop for UGA student composers with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, is part of the Willson Center’s Global Georgia public event series and the UGA Humanities Festival.

Spano is music director of the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and music director laureate of the ASO, where he served as music director for 20 years. He will begin a three-year term as music director of the Washington National Opera with the 2025-2026 season.

“Engaging new work, hearing it come to life for the first time is always thrilling,” Spano said. “We have a great history of reading the works of the talented composers at UGA, and I’m so looking forward to having this opportunity again as Delta Chair.”

Spano has won four Grammy Awards and been nominated for eight, all for recordings with the ASO. He received the Georgia Governor’s Award for the Arts and Humanities in 2020 and was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame in 2012 — one of two classical musicians who have received this honor. He is currently principal conductor of the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra and Music School and will transition to principal guest conductor for its 2025-2026 season.

UGA music composition students will participate in a workshop with Spano and ASO musicians in Atlanta on Friday, March 21. The students will meet privately with Spano before a public reading and rehearsal of their works by the orchestra in Atlanta Symphony Hall from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. The students will then participate in a post-workshop discussion with Spano and ASO musician that will also be open to the public.

Spano will be in residence at UGA on Monday, March 24. He will give a public talk, “Behind the Baton: An Inside Look at How Major Orchestras Operate,” at 11:30 a.m. in Room 350 of the Miller Learning Center and another public presentation at 5 p.m. in the Hodgson School’s Edge Recital Hall.

The Hodgson School has held two previous student composing workshops with Spano and the ASO, in 2018 and 2022, each with primary support from a Willson Center Public Impact Grant.

The Delta Visiting Chair for Global Understanding, established by the Willson Center through the support of The Delta Air Lines Foundation, hosts global scholars, creative thinkers, artists and innovators who engage with audiences on and off the UGA campus through lectures, seminars, discussions and other community events. The Delta Chair program aims to foster conversations that engage with global perspectives through the humanities and arts. The chair was last held by Pulitzer Prize-winning author and New Yorker staff writer Hua Hsu in March 2024.

The Delta Chair is founded upon the legacy of the Delta Prize for Global Understanding that, from 1997-2011, was presented to individuals including Nelson Mandela, Mikhail Gorbachev, Ted Turner, Desmond Tutu, and Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter whose initiatives promoted world peace by advancing understanding and cooperation among cultures and nations.