Name: The Art of Leaving
Start: 2023-05-19T21:00:00
Location: Benaroya Hall

Han Lash

Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra

Our 2025/2026 season culminates with the ultimate symphony — Beethoven’s Ninth, featuring an all-star cast of soloists chosen by Music Director Xian Zhang and joined by the massed forces of the Seattle Symphony Chorale. Revolutionary, epic and at 200 years old, still as driven as Beethoven’s own sense of our shared destiny, he crowned this summit of his music with the stunning addition of voices in a song for humanity, hope and joy. Xian pairs it with Artist in Focus Steven Mackey’s RIOT, for chorus, vocalist and the composer himself on electric guitar. This inspiring music places race and resilience in the foreground with a setting of words by Tracy K. Smith — culminating in positive affirmation and a celebration of perseverance, commitment and community.

Xian Conducts Beethoven 9

Benaroya Hall

During the pandemic, Han Lash composed six songs inspired by Bach’s inventions for a series called Notes from Exile — wistful, poignant and disarmingly direct. Now they introduce six new pieces to add to them, to create a set of 12 pieces: The Art of Leaving.