FABIO LUISI conducts
AMARYN OLMEDA violin

RÓZSA Violin Concerto, Op. 24
BARTÓK Romanian Folk Dances
KODÁLY Dances of Galanta
BRAHMS A Selection of Hungarian Dances

The DSO will perform Rózsa’s Violin Concerto for the first time in 70 years, performed by a recently discovered young violin sensation! Our tribute to the vitality and rhythms of the folk music of Eastern Europe permeates this evening’s repertoire; Brahms’ Dances, especially, capture the lively soul of Hungary. You’ve probably heard Dance No. 5 — a delightfully popular encore that will send you home dancing the Csárdás.

Tickets start at $31 (including fees).

This concert celebrates the DSO’s 125th Anniversary and marks the first performance of Miklós Rózsa’s Violin Concerto by the DSO since its premiere on January 15, 1956, with renowned violinist Jascha Heifetz and conductor Walter Hendl.

ANA MARÍA PATIÑO-OSORIO conducts
JULIAN STECKEL cello
MEREDITH KUFCHAK viola

DVOŘÁK Cello Concerto in B minor
JONATHAN LESHNOFF Four Scenes from Childhood (World Premiere)
MENDELSSOHN Symphony No. 4 in A Major, “Italian”

Not only will you bask in the sunshine of Mendelssohn’s “Italian” Symphony (he dubbed it “blue sky in A Major”), but you’ll also hear two concertos and two soloists! First, Dvořák’s Cello Concerto — intense, charged with emotion and considered by many the greatest ever composed for the instrument — quotes a beautiful Czech folk song in the instrument’s most ethereal range; and our Principal Viola Meredith Kufchak gives the world premiere of a concerto by Jonathan Leshnoff, a GRAMMY®-nominated composer ranked among the most-performed living composers by American orchestras. It’s all under the exciting leadership of Ana María Patiño-Osorio, second-prize winner at the Malko Competition for conductors, in her DSO debut.

Tickets start at $31 (including fees).

FABIO LUISI conducts

GLINKA Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila
TCHAIKOVSKY Symphony No. 2 in C minor, “Little Russian”
STRAVINSKY The Firebird Suite (1945)

Music Director Fabio Luisi will step into Stravinsky’s shoes as he conducts a replica of the 1946 concert, when the great composer led the DSO in these very works — an inspired program of quintessentially Russian music. To that point, we have a clue in the nickname of Tchaikovsky’s Second Symphony, with the final movement spinning colorful variations on “The Crane,” a lively folk song on everyone’s lips at the time. The Firebird’s exotic scenario is the stuff of fairytales: a prince, 13 princesses, the Firebird’s magic feather and an ogre. Its bold orchestral colors glitter and pulse, creating fantastic effects — from primitive to luminous — leading to a spectacular, shimmering climax.

Tickets start at $33 (including fees).

This concert celebrates the DSO’s 125^th Anniversary. In 1946, Igor Stravinsky conducted the Dallas Symphony in this exact program.

FABIO LUISI conducts
NATHAN OLSON violin
STUART STEPHENSON trumpet
KATHRYN HENRY soprano

BEETHOVEN “Ah, perfido!” Scene and Aria for Soprano and Orchestra
BACH Violin Concerto in E Major
HAYDN Trumpet Concerto in E-flat Major
MOZART Symphony No. 35 in D Major, K. 385, “Haffner”

Three spectacular soloists grace this program that follows a thread of musical styles from Baroque to early Classical. Co-Concertmaster Nathan Olson is front-and-center in Bach’s Violin Concerto in E Major, whose poignant Adagio is one of his most sublime creations, with the solo violin exquisitely embroidering the underlying bass line. Our Principal Trumpet Stuart Stephenson does the honors in Haydn’s tour de force concerto, traversing the instrument’s registers by leaps and bounds, but also bringing out its singing qualities. Mozart’s festive “Haffner” Symphony ends in a romping rondo, that Mozart said had to be played “as fast as possible.” In a dramatic concert aria, Kathryn Henry calls down the wrath of the gods on her perfidious lover. Hell hath no fury…

MAHLER Symphony No. 8, “Symphony of a Thousand”

The nickname “Symphony of a Thousand” scarcely does justice to Mahler’s epic work — one of the greatest in the concert repertoire. Its immense scope makes performances rare and, therefore, are to be treasured. Part One of Mahler’s mystical work begins with a powerful unleashing of sound that sets the hymn, “Come, Creative Spirit,” a text that also foreshadows the message of Part Two of the Symphony. The expansive second half transports us to the final scene of Goethe’s dramatic poem Faust, the title character who had bargained away his soul to the devil and thus to eternal damnation. But the beatific voices of a “chorus mysticus,” underscored by thunderous timpani rolls, reach into the stratosphere and promise that Faust’s soul — borne higher and ever higher to heaven through the intercession of hosts of penitent women and holy men and ultimately angels, will be redeemed through “the eternally feminine” — the power of love.

This 60-minute program will be performed without intermission.

SEBASTIAN WEIGLE conducts
MARIA DUEÑAS violin

KORNGOLD Straussiana (DSO Premiere)
KORNGOLD Violin Concerto in D Major
DVOŘÁK Symphony No. 7 in D minor

From the pen of the composer who pioneered the art of original film music, making it symphonic in scope and sophisticated in feel, comes Korngold’s glorious Violin Concerto that, not surprisingly, includes allusions to those movie scores. In the spotlight is Maria Dueñas, an in-demand star of the violin world. The concerto is lyrical, rapturous, with a finale alive with spectacular pyrotechnics. To conclude the concert, Dvořák’s Seventh Symphony, filled with Bohemian rhythms (like the exciting sounds of the “furiant,” an aptly named dance in the third movement), is one of his most beloved works.

Tickets start at $33 (including fees).