2007-2008
Concert Season
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Thomas Shoebotham,
Music Director |
We are proud and excited to offer Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in our
opening concert. This monumental work is a ‘rite of passage’ for any
orchestra, and “it is a very difficult work for all involved: orchestra, chorus,
soloists and even the conductor”, says Maestro Thomas Shoebotham.
“ I also look forward very much to giving the premiere of Lee Actor’s
Celebration Overture. He is a wonderful composer, a first-rate musician
with an individual voice and superb craftsmanship.”
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Lee Actor,
Composer-in-Residence
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The second concert is different in that we do not have a featured soloist on
the program. Instead, we offer an overture (Wagner’s Meistersinger Prelude)
and then what are, in effect, two symphonies. The Stephen Paulus Age of
American Passions is in three movements, fast-slow-fast, and has much of
the thematic and harmonic development that would be typically associated
with a symphony. The Sibelius Symphony No. 5 is a masterwork, demanding
but yielding great musical rewards to musician and listener alike.
The third concert contains a piece that Music Director Shoebotham considers
one of the most special, moving works in all 20th century music,
Strauss’ Four Last Songs: “They are the last works he composed in his
long life, and are a tribute to his strong love of the soprano voice. Even
though he could not have expected his soprano wife to sing them, we may
legitimately imagine these works as a tribute to her.” Also on the program
is Mozart’s Overture to the Magic Flute and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony
No. 5, a thrilling, dramatic work.
In the fourth concert of out 20th season, we showcase Daniel Glover as
piano soloist in Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. A
local talent, he has demonstrated amazing technique coupled with highly
musical performances throughout the Bay Area, and we expect no less in
the performance of this 20th century masterpiece. Also on the program is
Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun by Debussy, and Brahms’ Symphony
No. 2, which is one of Maestro Shoebotham’s favorite works in the symphonic
literature.
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Upcoming Concerts
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Family
Concert
3 PM, Sunday, May 18, 2008
Cubberley Theatre
4000 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto
- Celebration Overture
by Lee Actor
- Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 124, 2nd mvmt
by Ludwig van Beethoven
- Prelude to Die Meistersinger
by Richard Wagner
- Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 73, 4th mvmt.
by by Johannes Brahms
- Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64, 4th mvmt.
by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
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