Clarinetist

Featuring SPCO violinist Maureen Nelson’s new arrangement of Medieval works, this program is a musical response to the poet Rumi who wrote: “The lamps are different, but the Light is the same. One matter, one energy, one Light, one Light-mind, endlessly emanating all things.” Opening with music of Hildegard von Bingen, this Express Concert is a journey of light through the eyes of different composers. At the heart lies Franz Joseph Haydn’s uplifting Midday Symphony and Osvaldo Golijov’s lush Tenebrae for String Quartet.

EPSG:4326

Express Concert: Haydn’s Midday Symphony

Ted Mann Concert Hall

Temple Israel

Ordway Center for the Performing Arts

Saint Paul's United Church of Christ

Principal Bass Zachary Cohen plays an arrangement of Franz Schubert’s famous work for arpeggione, a now extinct instrument similar to a bowed guitar, alongside Florence Price’s technically and lyrically epic String Quartet No 2. Originally published in 1935, the quartet was rediscovered in 2009 with hundreds of manuscripts written by Price over her lifetime — audiences are in for a treat as the SPCO tackles the entire work after having previously performed the “Juba” movement for streaming audiences early in the pandemic.

Zachary Cohen Plays Schubert’s Arpeggione Sonata

Trinity Lutheran Church of Minnesota

Wayzata Community Church

SPCO violinist Eunice Kim takes center stage in this program that builds toward Felix Mendelssohn’s seminal violin concerto — a Romantic paragon of the instrument’s standard repertoire and an audience favorite. Also included on the program are three movements from Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel’s epic piano cycle, Das Jahr, written to depict the twelve months of the year and arranged for chamber orchestra by SPCO Principal Horn James Ferree.

Eunice Kim Plays Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto

St. Andrew's Lutheran Church

This program features one of Franz Joseph Haydn’s famous “London” symphonies, Symphony No. 99, written in anticipation of his second trip to London and the first of three from this collection performed by the SPCO throughout the season. Also included on the program are the beautiful melodies of brother and sister Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn. Felix Mendelssohn’s String Octet brings the depth and complexity of a symphony with only eight players, and three movements from Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel’s epic piano cycle, Das Jahr, depict the twelve months of the year, arranged for chamber orchestra by SPCO Principal Horn James Ferree.


Haydn’s Symphony No. 99

Wooddale Church

Shepherd of The Valley Lutheran Church

Just as our 64th season brought a return to full-length concerts featuring the entire orchestra together again, this culminating concert celebrates the orchestra as a whole. Round out the season with a finale featuring Ludwig van Beethoven’s timeless Pastoral Symphony — a masterwork inspired by the natural world and performed under the baton of world-renowned conductor Gábor Takács-Nagy in his SPCO debut.

Season Finale: Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony with Gábor Takács-Nagy

Fans of chamber music will delight in this concert featuring three quintets of winds and strings alike. Franz Hasenöhrl's arrangement of Richard Strauss’ immensely popular tone poem Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks cleverly distills the large-scale orchestral work to its essence. The work is based on medieval German folk tales about a practical joker whose exploits range from pranks in the marketplace to revenge on upper-class society. Closing out the program is Antonín Dvořák’s American Quintet, written during his summer in Spillville Iowa.

Dvořák, Haydn and Strauss

Humboldt High School Auditorium

Written during his summer in Spillville Iowa, Antonín Dvořák’s American Quintet draws on influences he saw as uniquely American — African-American spiritual melodies, taught to him by composer Henry T. Burleigh, and rhythms from Native American music, which he discovered through the traveling Kickapoo Medicine Show. Other pieces on this program reflect similar influence. David Bruce’s Gumboots is derived from the Apartheid-era South African dance, and Louis W. Ballard’s Ritmo Indio is a study in American Indian rhythms.

Ballard, Bruce and Dvořák

Capri Theater

This program highlights the dynamic range of SPCO musicians as soloists within a unified, self-led ensemble. Principal Clarinet Sang Yoon Kim tackles the technically-demanding solo in Bernhard Crusell’s “Grand” clarinet concerto before the orchestra delivers one of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s most well-known symphonies.

Express Concert: Mozart’s Symphony No. 40

Explore the interwoven musical traditions of Spain and Latin America in this program curated by SPCO violinist Maureen Nelson. The program opens with the only symphony by the legendary “Spanish Mozart,” Juan Crisóstomo de Arriaga, followed by Andean-inspired music for string orchestra by Gabriela Lena Frank, a wind quintet by Maurice Ravel inspired by Havana, and Renaissance works quoting a Quechua (South American Indigenous) melody arranged by Maureen Nelson.

Express Concert: Legends/Leyendas with Maureen Nelson

SPCO violinist Eunae Koh curates a program of composers from the Romantic era to the present day inspired by emotional and natural landscapes. Clara Schumann’s Three Romances and Louise Farrenc’s Sextet showcase the virtuosic talent of both composers who were celebrated pianists and influential advocates for their contemporaries. An evocative work for oboe, viola and cello by living composer Hilary Tann is inspired by a ruined castle in Wales. The program ends with a jubilant, but rarely performed, string quartet by Swedish composer Valborg Aulin.

Romantic Landscapes with Eunae Koh

From Caroline Shaw to Duke Ellington, experience a program over the holiday weekend that highlights the wide range of sound and diversity of music from the United States in the 20th and 21st centuries. Sandbox composer-in-residence Viet Cuong will debut a new work in a celebratory culmination of his inaugural residency with the orchestra. An SPCO staple, Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, rounds out this eclectic program of music from the U.S

Sang Yoon Kim

Clarinetist

Events

1 - 4 Feb, 2024

Express Concert: Haydn’s Midday Symphony · Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra

5 - 7 Oct, 2023

Zachary Cohen Plays Schubert’s Arpeggione Sonata · Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra

Sep 29 - Oct 1, 2023

Eunice Kim Plays Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto · Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra

22 - 26 Sep, 2023

Haydn’s Symphony No. 99 · Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra

9 - 10 Jun, 2023

Season Finale: Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony with Gábor Takács-Nagy · Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra

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