Name: French Music with a Jazz Flair
Start: 2024-03-03T15:00:00
Location: First Lutheran Church

Rockford Symphony Orchestra

Experience the musical brilliance of compositions exploring destiny and the courage to face it. The concert opens with Carlos Simon’s Fate Now Conquers, a 2020 work depicting the “unpredictable ways of fate,” inspired by Beethoven’s journals and Homer’s Iliad. Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 features soloist Miri Yampolsky, whose artistry showcases the lyrical elegance and innovation of this pinnacle piano work. The evening concludes with Brahms’s Symphony No. 2, a radiant and expansive masterpiece filled with warmth, hope, and a triumphant spirit.

From Fate to Triumph

Coronado Theatre

This concert featuring student musicians is a great way to spend an afternoon and introduce younger family members to an orchestral concert experience.

RSYO Spring Orchestra Concert

Belvidere High School

The season concludes with a jubilant celebration honoring the 250th anniversary of the United States, showcasing American music and its rich and diverse heritage. The evening begins with Jessie Montgomery’s A Hymn for Everyone, a vibrant work that reflects the spirit of unity and shared history. Leonard Bernstein’s powerful Symphony No. 1 (“Jeremiah”) follows, blending bold orchestration with a heartfelt exploration of faith and resilience. Jeff Midkiff’s From the Blue Ridge brings the soul of bluegrass to the concert hall in a thrilling mandolin concerto inspired by Appalachian traditions. The concert concludes with the innovator of the “American Sound,” Aaron Copland, with two movements of his tribute to the American West, Rodeo.