Kicking Off the 2018-19 Season – Musical Journeys

Dear Music Lovers,

I am thrilled that the Longmont Symphony’s 2018-19 season is beginning soon! We have so many exciting programs, soloists, projects, collaborations, and great music in store for you. As I begin my second season with the LSO, I am excited to be exploring one of my greatest passions, the intersection of music and healing, with our audience. In early December, the LSO is collaborating with the Boulder Ballet on a sensory-friendly Nutcracker performance for families with children of different abilities. We are proud to be meeting the needs of this segment of our community.

Our season kicks off on October 6 with a celebration of Leonard Bernstein’s 100th birthday. We will perform his choral/orchestral work Chichester Psalms with our friends from the Longmont Chorale alongside other composers whose work Lenny championed. Written in 1965, as the United States was entering the Vietnam War, Chichester Psalms was Bernstein’s plea for unity and peace.

In many ways, our November 10 performance, “A Cultural Affair,” continues the journey of unity and peace that we began with Chichester Psalms. We will be featuring a Juilliard-trained pianist from Longmont’s Sister City of Chino, Japan. Founded by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Sister Cities International has been promoting peace through cultural understanding for over half a century. All of the works on that program take inspiration from cultures besides the composers’ own: Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G was inspired by American jazz and Debussy’s La Mer was inspired by Japanese art. I am particularly excited that we will be giving the second performance — and Colorado premiere — of the Boulder-based composer Conor Brown’s How to Relax with Origami. While “world premiere” looks good on paper, countless symphonic works get that distinction and then sit on the shelf, never to be performed again. While less impressive on paper, I find that it is the second performance of a composition that is the critical step that allows a work to enter the standard repertoire. Commissioned and premiered by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra last year, Conor’s piece is certainly worthy of being in the standard orchestral repertoire, and we are excited to be bringing an original orchestral work of his to Colorado for the first time!

I would be remiss if I did not mention how excited I am to be expanding our chamber orchestra series at Longmont Museum’s beautiful Stewart Auditorium. Not only are we continuing our Beethoven Symphony Cycle there in April, but we are also performing a separate concert in October with the distinguished cellist Alice Yoo on a program that features the Colorado premiere of Richard Danielpour’s meditation on the last notes that Mozart ever composed as well as Mozart’s final symphony, No. 41, the “Jupiter.” Tickets are selling fast for both Museum concerts, so get yours soon!

I could go on about why our January Family Concert will be fantastic for kids and families, what makes our February “Sounds of America” concert with soprano Christie Conover so unique, and how our April performance of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto with Sharon Roffman will transport you in a beautiful, emotional way. However, what I find most compelling about our season is that the Longmont Symphony is about more than performing the best symphonic music ever written at a world-class level — we are about using the greatest expressions of the human spirit as a vehicle to positively impact our community and touch the lives of each member of our community, and we look forward to taking you on that musical journey.

I look forward to seeing you at the symphony!