You can welcome spring in a classical mood when the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra performs at 3 p.m. Sunday, March 25 in Hodgson Concert Hall at The UGA Performing Arts Center.

Guest conductor and violinist Leonidas Kavakos will lead the ASO in a program featuring Mozart's Symphony No. 34 and Beethoven's Symphony No. 4. Kavakos will perform as soloist in Mozart's Violin Concerto No. 3.

A native of Athens, Greece, Kavakos attracted international attention as a violinist when he won the Sibelius Competition in 1985, and the Paganini Competition three years later.

Since, he has performed with the world's major orchestras, including the Leipzig Gewandhaus, the London Symphony, the Orchestra of the Mariinsky Theatre, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Royal Concertgebouw, the New York Philharmonic and the Boston Symphony.

Kavakos served as artistic director of the Camerata Salzburg from 2007-09 and since has conducted many of the world's leading orchestras such as the Budapest Festival Orchestra, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, La Scala Filharmonica, Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, and the Houston Symphony Orchestra.

This season, he is conducting and performing with the Stockholm Philharmonic, the Gothenburg Symphony, Maggio Musicale, RAI Torino and the Boston Symphony.

Kavakos' recording of the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto won Germany's ECHO Klassik Award for Best Concerto Recording in 2009, and he won the Gramophone Award for the first ever recording of the original version of Sibelius' Violin Concerto.

Tickets are $20-$55 with discounts for UGA students. They can be purchased online at pac.uga.edu or by calling 706-542-4400, toll free 888-289-8497.

Nancy Riley, a Ph.D. candidate in musicology at UGA, will give a pre-concert lecture 45 minutes prior to the symphony's performance. The lecture is free and open to the public.