This season we explore music which connects our common humanity to the world around us, beginning with how we face personal challenges, and ultimately, how the music can tame the furies – in short, the Myth of Orpheus!

Joining us on stage will be André De Shields, winner of the 2019 Outer Critics Circle, Drama Desk, Grammy and Tony awards as Best Featured Actor in a Musical for his unanimously critically acclaimed performance as Hermes in Hadestown!

Every work on this program was inspired by Orpheus in the Underworld – glorious music by Franz Liszt, George Walker, Christoph Willibald Gluck, Jacques Offenbach, and Ludwig van Beethoven.

Hear the beautiful music from Gluck’s opera, Orfeo and Euridice, which inspired Liszt to write his depiction of the struggle between civilization and barbarism. George Walker, the dean of twentieth century Black American composers, included a dramatic text in his retelling of the story. Finally, Offenbach “can-canned” his way into the story with his universally-loved overture, “Orpheus in the Underworld”.

A surprise in this great music is the monumental Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 4, also inspired by the Orpheus myth, played by the sensational fifteen-year-old Anwen Deng.

Anwen Deng, piano
Michael Stern, conductor
André De Shields, host
Full Orchestra

Musical Program to include
Franz Liszt Orpheus, Symphonic Poem
Ludwig van Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 4
George Walker Orpheus for Chamber Orchestra
Christoph Willibald Gluck Dance of the Blessed Spirits from Orfeo ed Euridice
Jacques Offenbach Overture to Orpheus in the Underworld

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