“The Journey Home” offers a personal reflection within our American Adventures season, shaped by conductor Leonard Slatkin’s own musical path and the works that have accompanied him along the way. Cindy McTee’s Circuits crackles with electric energy and brilliant orchestral interplay. Voyager 130, a piece written by Slatkin’s son, looks outward and inward at once, inspired by space exploration yet grounded in memory and connection. Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No. 3 was written after the composer’s emigration from Russia to America, and is the music of longing, resilience, and the profound pull of home. 

The Journey Home

Riverwalk Center

EPSG:4326

Symphonic Band – Eric M. Smedley, conductor; Kyung Sun Lee, violin soloist

Auer Hall

Join pianist Sonia Leong for an afternoon of powerful musical storytelling. From jazzy perpetual motion to lush romantic beauty, the program concludes with Tchaikovsky’s deeply personal exploration of fate that builds to one of classical music’s most triumphant finales. Feel destiny’s drama unfold through sound.

Fantasy & Fate

Warren Atherton Auditorium

Shostakovich’s Fifth journeys from haunting depths to its famously ambiguous finale. Saxophone virtuoso Timothy McAllister is the soloist in John Corigliano’s Triathlon, which was written for him. With movements centered on soprano, alto, and baritone saxophones, the piece requires — in the composer’s words — “three feats of high athletic prowess.” Cindy McTee’s Double Play is inspired by mid-20th-century big-band jazz.

Slatkin Conducts Shostakovich’s Fifth

David Geffen Hall

He was plagued by self-doubt and had abandoned his music. But when inspired to compose again, Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote the masterpiece that would make him immortal. The sensational Olga Kern joins the North Carolina Symphony for Rachmaninoff’s ravishing Piano Concerto No. 2.  

Friday Favorites: Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto No. 2 - NC Symphony

Martin Marietta Center for the Performing Arts

As the New York Times declares, Emanuel Ax’s performances are “never less than spellbinding.” Experience the power and passion of this modern master live as the seven-time Grammy winner performs Mozart’s fierce and far-reaching Piano Concerto No. 20. In a fitting concert finale honoring former NSO Music Director Leonard Slatkin’s return during his 80th birthday year, Walton’s Symphony No. 1 erupts with energy evolving from fear and despair to strength and triumph.

Leonard Slatkin & Emanuel Ax

Kennedy Center

The community gathers to celebrate a milestone. Conductor Laureate Leonard Slatkin brings a lifetime of experience to Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, music of deeply personal emotions. Cindy McTee winds the orchestra like a clock, then lets it spin. Daniel Slatkin reaches into the cosmos for a work that uses music from the spacecraft Voyager’s golden record. And five of Domenico Scarlatti’s sonatas are given new life in Leonard's arrangements.

Slatkin's Legacy

University of Missouri-St. Louis

The Forces of Destiny

MassBay Community College

Now entering their third year as a band, Liverpool Philharmonic Youth Brass Band continue to excite and inspire the next generation of the North West’s young brass players. Under the baton of Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra’s section leader trombone, Simon Cowen, join Youth Brass Band for a thrilling performance of Brass Band classics.

Youth Company Festival: Liverpool Philharmonic Youth Brass Band

Yoko Ono Lennon Centre

Manhattan School of Music’s public programs are made possible in part by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

WATCH!: MSM Symphony Orchestra Conducted by Leonard Slatkin (HonDMA ’13)

Manhattan School of Music

Women of Notes

560 Music Center

The Carnegie Mellon Wind Ensemble utilizes a flexible instrumentation of winds, brass, and percussion to perform repertoire from standard concert band works to contemporary compositions of various instrumental combinations. 

Carnegie Mellon Wind Ensemble

Schenley Farms Historic District

Cim Orchestra Concert: From the New World

Severance Music Center

The Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra and guest conductor Leonard Slatkin invite you to join us for a night of music “From the New World”.

Cleveland Institute of Music Orchestra Concert

Complicated time and advanced harmony are a focus of this virtuosic performance by the Boston Conservatory Wind Ensemble, featuring works by Ralph Vaughan Williams, Igor Stravinsky, Magnus Lindberg, and Cindy McTee.

Boston Conservatory Wind Ensemble: Counterpoint

Old South Church in Boston

The Wind Symphony presents a program featuring works exploring human experience across time. The centerpiece of the concert is the consortium premiere of award-winning guest composer James Lee III’s Solar Testimonies, his symphony about the evolving life of a university community.

Illinois Wind Symphony

Krannert Center for the Performing Arts

Augustin Hadelich, violin

The Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts

The season ends where it began: with America, and everything it means to the composers and performers who call it home.  Cindy McTee's Adagio for String Orchestra opens the evening with quiet weight. Written in the aftermath of September 11, 2001, and commissioned by Leonard Slatkin himself when he was Music Director of the National Symphony, it returns here in his hands as a personal reflection on his lifelong commitment to American repertoire.  Copland's Billy the Kid follows. With the wide-open prairies, the gunfights, and the cowboy songs, it’s his most vivid portrait of the American frontier. This is a rare performance of the complete ballet rather than the usual suite.  

Cindy McTee

Events

Upcoming events

Jan 17, 2027

Augustin Hadelich, violin · Palm Beach Symphony

4 - 6 Jun, 2027

Closing Weekend: An American Celebration · Nashville Symphony

Past events

Jul 31, 2026

The Journey Home · National Repertory Orchestra

Apr 17, 2026

Symphonic Band – Eric M. Smedley, conductor; Kyung Sun Lee, violin soloist · Indiana University Jacobs School of Music

About

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