© 2026 WOSU Public Media
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Akron Symphony Lets its City Hear How it Sounds

Residents of Akron recorded their favorite sounds for "City Meets Symphony"
Akron Symphony Orchestra
/
Akron Symphony Orchestra
Residents of Akron recorded their favorite sounds for "City Meets Symphony"

Correction:  The evening is billed as "Sounds of Akron," not "Sounds of Home."  We also previously reported the Akron Symphony would also be performing  Dvorak’s “My Home” Overture.

Saturday night, E. J. Thomas Hall will resonate with the sounds of Akron. The Akron Symphony Orchestra will perform the world premiere of  “City Meets Symphony.”

Composer Clint Needham collected iconic audio from all over the city in a Knight Foundation pilot project, to create a symphony. Residents of Akron used a smartphone app to record their favorite sounds to send to the composer.

He also collected some on his own.

“I was lucky enough to go on the Portage Lakes, really amazing sort of water sounds. I was able to ride the Cuyahoga Valley train. So many train sounds, and people talking, bicycling, their bike bells. I just got a ton of different sounds.”   

The concert is titled “Sounds of Akron.”

Along with “City Meets Symphony,” Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 4  is on the bill.

Copyright 2021 WKSU. To see more, visit WKSU.

Vivian Goodman
Vivian is a native Clevelander who grew up mostly in Beachwood but spent part of her adolescence in Glasgow, Scotland, where she attended Hutcheson’s Girl’s Grammar School. She graduated from Beachwood High School in 1966. She later became one of the first inductees to its Gallery of Success.