Conductor

Led by renowned German conductor Kevin John Edusei, the Colburn Orchestra returns to The Wallis with a lavish program spotlighting the rich cultural heritages of its composers. The concert opens with Ernest Bloch’s Jewish-inspired masterpiece Schelomo, an intense and poignant rhapsody that casts the cello as King Solomon and the orchestra as a world full of temptation. Bedřich Smetana’s Má vlast (“My Country”) then invites the audience on a journey through Bohemia’s countryside and lore in a rousing, atmospheric love letter to his Czech homeland.

EPSG:4326

Cultural Landscapes: Smetana’s Má vlast

Colburn School

Join in the festivities as the SLSO presents Beethoven’s personal favorite—his blazing, boisterous Seventh Symphony. Pianist Joyce Yang’s interpretation of Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini is sure to ignite sparks of energy across Powell Hall in this spirited Thanksgiving weekend event, which also features conductor Kevin John Edusei’s SLSO debut. Yang has impressed audiences all over the globe, with reviewers applauding her “tremendous power” (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel) and “impeccable technique” (TheaterJones).

Beethoven’s Seventh

Powell Hall

Prepare for a fascinating voyage through exotic landscapes to the great expanses of the human heart, with music by Saint-Saëns, Shostakovich and Rossini.

Javier Perianes performs Saint-Saëns

Sydney Opera House

Conductor Kevin John Edusei and pianist (and IU Jacobs School of Music professor) Sofya Gulyak perform Rachmaninoff’s dazzling Piano Concerto No. 1, and Shostakovich’s dramatic Symphony No. 10 reveals a haunting yet triumphant tale of survival and resilience.  

Dark Passions and Triumph: Shostakovich’s Tenth Symphony

Hilbert Circle Theatre

Start your weekend with our must-see Friday night concert series and social experience, Symphonic Piazza. Prepare to escape, mingle, and be entertained as you enjoy the perfect combination of a shorter format concert with enjoyable and engaging lobby activities to share with family, friends, and our musicians. It’s your new go-to date night! The fun continues in the lobby after the concert, as we’ll have even more memorable things for you to experience.

Pines of Rome and Bruch's Second Violin Concerto

Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts

What would you do for love? Romeo and Juliet risked everything, and Tchaikovsky poured all of this passion into his music. The Little Mermaid also followed her heart, and Zemlinsky’s gorgeous retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s classic fairy tale is a colourful – and gripping – masterpiece. Kevin John Edusei conducts, Gillian Moore hosts, and RSNO favourite Makoto Ozone is the soloist in Rachmaninov’s dazzling, deliriously romantic Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. The perfect date night? We think so!

Love & Fairy Tales Rachmaninov & The Mermaid

Usher Hall

“I am the new Bacchus, pressing out glorious wine for the human spirit”: Ludwig van Beethoven never pulled his punches, but until you’ve heard his Seventh Symphony in full flight, you’ve never known just how intoxicating music can be. That’s just the climax to a whole concert that takes aim straight at the emotions.

At the end of a long life, Richard Strauss poured all the colours of the sunset into his heart-rending Four Last Songs – they’re a favourite on Desert Island Discs, and when they’re sung by the glorious voice of soprano Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha, you’ll understand why.

Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Strauss’ Four Last Songs

Cadogan Hall 

A grieving composer captured an artist's work in a suite of piano pieces. Later, that music lit a fire in the genius orchestrator Maurice Ravel to create one of the best-loved works in the concert hall. Experience Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition through the dynamic power of a world-class orchestra. Guest conductor Kevin John Edusei leads the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra in the heel-kicking Hungarian folk suite Dances of Galanta. In between, the ASO welcomes violin soloist Isabelle Faust for the elegiac Violin Concerto No. 2 by Bela Bartók.

Pictures at an Exhibition

The Woodruff Arts Center

Composed during his final illness before death, Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra is considered his last masterwork, filled with brilliant, virtuosic writing that challenges each section of the orchestra. Debussy’s La mer is an impressionist masterpiece that captures the sea’s shifting moods–from calm to turbulent–with vivid, atmospheric sound. 

Virtuosic Soundscapes

Alice Pratt Brown Hall

When Jess Gillam isn’t in the recording studio or serenading audiences with her acclaimed saxophone playing, she can be heard hosting her award-winning BBC radio program, This Classical Life. In Gillam’s bold, uplifting, and open-minded approach composer Anna Clyne found the perfect soloist to champion her new saxophone concerto, Glasslands, in which she lets loose the Irish folkloric spirit of the banshee through the virtuosity of the solo instrument.

Stravinsky The Rite of Spring

Denver Performing Arts Complex

A clarinet soars upwards – and immediately, you can picture the skyscrapers of jazz-age Manhattan. There’s nothing quite like Rhapsody in Blue, and few living pianists play Gershwin with more flair than our soloist today, Japanese jazz legend Makoto Ozone. And with RPO Conductor-in-Residence Kevin John Edusei is conducting, there are endless pictures to be painted and stories to be told.

High in the mountains of Transylvania, György Ligeti hears a shepherd blow his horn, and gypsy fiddles flash around the campfire.

Conductor

Kevin John Edusei

Events

Upcoming events

16 - 18 Jan, 2026

Pines of Rome and Bruch's Second Violin Concerto · Kansas City Symphony

Feb 13, 2026

Love & Fairy Tales Rachmaninov & The Mermaid · Usher Hall

Feb 26, 2026

Royal Philharmonic Orchestra Strauss’ Four Last Songs · Cadogan Hall

19 - 21 Mar, 2026

Pictures at an Exhibition · Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Apr 25, 2026

Virtuosic Soundscapes · The Shepherd School of Music

Past events

Dec 6, 2025

Cultural Landscapes: Smetana’s Má vlast · Colburn School

Nov 29, 2025

Beethoven’s Seventh · St. Louis Symphony Orchestra

Future and recently performed repertoire

Conductor in Coriolan Overture by Beethoven

Colorado Symphony

Conductor in Concerto for Orchestra by Bartók

Cadogan Hall

Conductor in Pictures at an Exhibition by Mussorgsky

Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Conductor in Má vlast by Smetana

Colburn School

Conductor in Concert Românesc by Ligeti

Cadogan Hall

Conductor in Violin Concerto No. 2 by Bartók

Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Conductor in Dance Suite by Bartók

St. Louis Symphony Orchestra

Conductor in Schelomo: Rhapsodie Hébraïque by Bloch

Colburn School

Conductor in Four Last Songs by Strauss

Cadogan Hall

Conductor in Symphony No. 7 by Beethoven

St. Louis Symphony Orchestra

Conductor in Dances of Galánta by Kodály

Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

Conductor in The Rite of Spring by Stravinsky

Colorado Symphony

Conductor in Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini by Rachmaninoff

Usher Hall

Conductor in The Mermaid by Zemlinsky

Usher Hall

Conductor in Symphony No. 7 by Beethoven

Cadogan Hall

Conductor in Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture by Tchaikovsky

Usher Hall

Conductor in Glasslands by Clyne

Colorado Symphony

Conductor in Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini by Rachmaninov

St. Louis Symphony Orchestra

Conductor in Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin

Cadogan Hall

Conductor in Adgilis Deda: Hymn for orchestra by Moussa

Cadogan Hall

About

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