by Summer Callahan
“We should have a festival in the spring when Tallahassee is so beautiful!” said an anonymous community member in 1967, brainstorming ways to save the city from economic disaster. It’s as true today as it was then.
Join Tallahassee residents and visitors on Saturday, March 29, at the Springtime Tallahassee parade and catch over a hundred floats, dance groups, individuals, horse-drawn carriages, and more.
Those who arrive early are in for a special treat: a pre-parade performance by Capital City Band of Tallahassee State College, led by TSC Director of Bands, Lisa M. Foltz.
Lisa Foltz has been singing since before she can remember. Along the way, she picked up piano, organ, flute, oboe, and a couple semesters of saxophone “for fun.” Her whole family sings, with her granddaddy playing the banjo, her grandmother playing the piano, and her mother playing the organ. At school, she sang in the chamber choir.
After college, she lived in Atlanta for 11 years, performing with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus and Chamber Chorus (ASO). Even after moving to Tallahassee, Foltz commuted to Atlanta to work with the ASO for three more years.
Over the course of her career, she’s appeared at Carnegie Hall, Chicago’s Ravinia Festival, across the United States, and with the Berlin Philharmonic in Berlin’s Philharmonie (three separate times). After a serendipitous meeting at a conference in Jacksonville, Foltz performed a “podium exchange project” with Chilean conductor Alejandro Meléndez.
In 2023, she and Meléndez performed with and conducted La Orquesta Universitaria La Serena. “Everybody was so friendly,” said Foltz. “I felt like a rock star. And my Spanish improved a lot.”
These days, Foltz sings at her church and works as an adjunct professor of voice; serves as a featured vocalist and assistant director of the Thursday Night Music Club; and acts as music director and conductor of Rose City Symphonic Band in Thomasville, Georgia.
Read more on the Tallahassee Democrat.
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