Since the Merc finally announced it, I guess I can post this too. No comments for now. Perhaps later ….

Symphony Silicon Valley
2008-09 Season Preview

Amram Barber Beethoven Berlioz Brahms Debussy Dvorak
Ellington Ginestera Guilmant Haydn Mendelssohn Prokofiev
Respighi Schubert Shostakovich Tchaikovsky

Symphony Silicon Valley’s seventh season, announced today, will include eight programs performed from September 2008 to June 2009. The season will open with dance music from three continents — South America, North America and Europe – including Duke Ellington’s The River. A season highlight is the first concerto to be commissioned for pianist and local icon Jon Nakamatsu, composed by David Amram and scheduled for January 2009. Jon Kimura Parker will perform Shostakovich’s First Piano Concerto in May and Jonas Nordwall will showcase the California Theatre organ in late March, performing Guilmant’s first Organ Symphony.

The season also features two Beethoven symphonies and two major concertos for violin: Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto performed by Associate Concertmaster Christina Mok in October, and Brahms’ Violin Concerto with returning powerhouse Ju-Young Baek in March, 2009. Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony features in December as Symphony Silicon Valley’s second presentation in the innovative ‘Beyond the Score’ format, pioneered by the Chicago Symphony. Four conductors will return for the season, including George Cleve and Paul Polivnick with two programs apiece, while two new conductors will join the Symphony’s roster.

2008-09 season ticket renewals begin in early March, with new subscriptions on sale in April. Season ticket prices range from $568 for an 8-concert package in the Dress Circle or Grand Tier, to $132 for a 4-concert package in the Side Orchestra or Side Mezzanine.

Program 1: Dances at an Opening
Saturday, Sept. 27, 2008 at 8:00 pm Sunday, Sept. 28, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Conductor: Leslie Dunner
Alberto Ginastera Four Dances from Estancia
Duke Ellington The River Suite
Serge Prokofiev Suite from Romeo & Juliet
An irresistible sampling of dance music from three 20th century masters. Prokofiev’s dramatic Romeo & Juliet, one of the most expressive of all ballet scores, sweeps us from the pageantry and menace of two warring families to the passion and heartbreak of young lovers. We begin with dances from Ginastera’s high-spirited ballet about gauchos’ life on the Argentine pampas. Duke Ellington’s jazz-infused suite follows, drawn from his ballet for the great dancer/choreographer Alvin Ailey. Leslie Dunner, Music Director of Joffrey Ballet, makes his third appearance with the Symphony.

Program 2: Mendelssohn & Beethoven
Thursday, Oct. 16, 2008 at 7:30 pm Saturday, Oct. 18, 2008 at 8:00 pm Sunday, Oct. 19, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Conductor: George Cleve
Soloist: Christina Mok, violin
Ludwig van Beethoven Symphony No. 1 in C major
Felix Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E minor
Claude Debussy La Mer

Associate Concertmaster Christina Mok performs Mendelssohn’s supremely demanding Violin Concerto, the melody-filled centerpiece of a program led by Maestro George Cleve. Cleve opens with Beethoven’s First Symphony, written at the peak of the composer’s youthful classicism and instantly hailed as a masterpiece; and concludes with Debussy’s brilliant, rule-breaking invocation to all the colors and moods of the sea.

Program 3: Beyond The Score: Tchaikovsky’s 4th
Saturday, Dec. 6, 2008 at 8:00 pm Sunday, Dec. 7, 2008 at 2:30 pm
Conductor: Paul Polivnick
Piotr Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 4 in F minor

“Be ready to experience much, much more than a pre-concert lecture and musical offering.” (New York Times) Paul Polivnick conducts Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4 in a novel format pioneered by the Chicago Symphony. “The program’s first half …grabs and rivets (you) with a highly developed multimedia presentation that swells anticipation.” After the intermission comes the full symphony, a “19th century Russian music drama to rival the great literary dramas of Pushkin and Tolstoy;” — and a familiar favorite becomes an exciting discovery.

Program 4: A Nakamatsu Premiere
Thursday, Jan. 15, 2009 at 7:30 pm Saturday, Jan. 17, 2009 at 8:00 pm Sunday, Jan. 18, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Conductor: Paul Polivnick
Soloist: Jon Nakamatsu, piano
Franz Joseph Haydn Symphony No. 95 in C minor
David Amram Piano Concerto No. 1
commissioned by William and Marie Bianco
Ottorino Respighi Feste romane

Maestro Polivnick returns for the premiere of the first piano concerto to be commissioned expressly for international star and local favorite Jon Nakamatsu, written by world-music master David Amram. The concert begins with Symphony No. 95, one of the twelve extraordinary ‘London’ symphonies that capped Haydn’s career and helped change how music was heard. To conclude, a huge orchestra performs Respighi’s spectacular musical panorama of Roman public celebrations across the ages, from the Circus of classical Rome to the barrel-organs and barkers of Respighi’s own day.

Program 5: The Organ & the Great C
Saturday, March 14, 2009 at 8:00 pm Sunday, March 15, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Conductor: Paul Haas
Soloist: Jonas Nordwall, organ
Samuel Barber Adagio for Strings
Felix Alexandre Guilmant Organ Symphony No. 1
Franz Schubert Symphony No. 9 – the Great C Major.
A double Symphony debut. The California Theatre organ’s commanding classical range is shown off by internationally acclaimed organist Jonas Nordwall in a powerful work by French virtuoso Guilmant. We also introduce rising young conductor Paul Haas, praised for his ‘fiery brilliance’ and ‘bold, muscular, go-for-broke conducting,’ to lead Schubert’s magnificent Ninth Symphony, the ‘Great’ C Major. The concert opens with Barber’s haunting Adagio for Strings, a favorite ever since its premiere by radio broadcast in 1938.

Program 6: Brahms & Dvorak
Thursday, Mar. 26, 2009 at 7:30 pm Saturday, Mar. 28, 2009 at 8:00 pm Sunday, Mar. 29, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Conductor: George Cleve
Soloists: Ju-Young Baek, violin
Hector Berlioz Le carnaval romain
Johannes Brahms Violin Concerto in D major
Antonin Dvorak Symphony No. 9 – From the New World

A celebrated Brahms interpreter, George Cleve leads prize-winning Korean violinist Ju-Young Baek in her third appearance with Symphony Silicon Valley, performing the concerto critics call “the most sublime essay for violin and orchestra ever written.” The concert begins in a jubilant mood with our second nod to Italian high spirits: Berlioz’ lively and lyrical Le carnaval romain. Maestro Cleve then turns to another giant: Dvorak’s triumphant New World Symphony, a thoroughly European work that is remains the best loved symphony ever composed in America.

Program 7: Spring Symphonies
Thursday, May 7, 2009 at 7:30 pm Saturday, May 9, 2009 at 8:00 pm Sunday, May 10, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Conductor: Gregory Vajda
Soloist: Jon Kimura Parker, piano
Dmitri Shostakovich Symphony No. 9 in E-flat major
Dmitri Shostakovich Piano Concerto No. 1 in C minor
Ludwig van Beethoven Symphony No. 4 in B-flat major
Shostakovich’s quick-fire, sunny-tempered piano concerto is performed by the dazzling Jon Kimura Parker, who brings “gargantuan technique, awesome timing, oceanic depth, volcanic fire, and more fun than the whole Marx Brother’s catalog” to his Symphony debut. Audiences do not ‘so much erupt as spontaneously explode’ for this pianist; we are in for a treat. Returning conductor Gregory Vajda welcomes Spring with Shostakovich’s popular 9th Symphony, called by the composer himself “a merry little piece.” Beethoven’s buoyant Fourth Symphony concludes our tribute to the season.

Program 8: Lord Nelson Mass
Saturday, June 6, 2009 at 8:00pm Sunday, June 7, 2009 at 2:30pm
Conductor: Jane Glover
Soloists: to be announced
Choir: Symphony Silicon Valley Chorale (Elena Sharkova – Music Director)
Serge Prokofiev Symphony No. 1 Classical Symphony
Piotr Tchaikovsky Serenade for Strings
Franz Joseph Haydn Lord Nelson Mass
A perfect match between conductor and concert program. Eminent British maestra Jane Glover is a much recorded orchestral, opera and choral conductor with a special love for Mozart and Haydn. Under her baton, the orchestra, soloists and Symphony Chorale join forces in Haydn’s glorious Lord Nelson Mass, written during the turmoil of the Napoleonic wars and hailed as Haydn’s “greatest single composition.” Glover completes the program with Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony, a salute to the Haydn tradition, and Serenade, Tchaikovsky’s deeply-felt homage to Mozart, which he called ‘a piece from the heart.’

For more information contact: Andrew Bales, Symphony Silicon Valley 408 286-2600 ext. 2