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LJS&C Press Releases
LJS&C 2007–2008 Season Announced; Opens with Philip Glass American Premiere
La Jolla, Calif. (May 9, 2007) — The La Jolla Symphony & Chorus (LJS&C) announces its 2007–2008 season featuring an American Premiere, exciting guest artists, and guest appearances by some of America's most notable composers. The LJS&C's 53rd season will be the first under the leadership of Music Director Steven Schick, who describes the programming as lush and inviting, creating a linkage between the great works of the past and enticing new directions.
The season opens on November 3–4 with the American premiere of Philip Glass's Cello Concerto featuring the return of cellist Wendy Sutter. The Academy Award-nominated composer plans to attend the premiere as part of his 70th birthday year of celebration. The same program features the luminous music of Alaskan composer John Luther Adams in a "white note" piece, The Light that Fills the World, influenced by the environment of his home state. Beethoven's Fourth Symphony, which completes the Beethoven cycle for the LJS&C, concludes the program.
The chorus takes the stage on December 8–9 under the direction of Choral Director David Chase for L'Enfance du Christ, Berlioz's beautiful Christmas oratorio that tells the story of the flight into Egypt by Mary, Joseph and the infant Jesus.
The hallucinogenic Symphonie Fantastique, a work Schick refers to as the "Tommy" (by the Who) of its day, headlines the February 9–10 concerts. Also featured is Young Artists Competition Winner Pasha Tseitlin in Prokofiev's lyric Violin Concerto, and Ingram Marshall's lyric and beautiful Kingdom Come—for electronic tape and orchestra—that makes use of the composer's recordings of Serbian and Croatian chants in a moving elegy for victims of that war.
The March 15–16 concerts offer unusual variety. Stravinsky's masterpiece, the Symphony of Psalms, is the centerpiece of a program that includes Schubert's charming Symphony No. 6 and the Adante for Strings by Ruth Crawford Seeger. UCSD composer Chinary Ung's Inner Voices opens the concert, blending elements of the music of his birthplace, Cambodia, with the forces of a symphonic orchestra in a breakthrough work that won the prestigious Grawemeyer Award for music.
On the May 3–4 program, audiences will hear two symphonies from Prague—Mozart's Symphony No. 38 (the "Prague" Symphony) and Dvorak's Symphony No. 7. The concert opens with Dark Waves, another work by John Luther Adams, who is expected to attend this performance
The season concludes on June 7–8 with Richard Strauss' moving tone-poem about the transfiguration of the human soul, Death and Transfiguration. Haydn's energetic Symphony No. 102 starts off the program followed by the LJS&C's first performance of music by that great American maverick Edgard Varese in Offrandes.
Performances take place in Mandeville Auditorium at UCSD. Concert times are 8:00 p.m. on Saturday and 3:00 p.m. on Sunday. Early-bird discount subscriptions are on sale now through June 30. To subscribe or for more information, call the LJS&C office at (858) 534-4637 or visit www.lajollasymphony.com.
The La Jolla Symphony & Chorus, San Diego's oldest and largest community orchestra and chorus, is a non-profit musical performing group dedicated to inspiring San Diego with the joy of music. Its 110-person orchestra and 130-person chorus perform groundbreaking orchestral and choral music along with traditional favorites from the classical repertoire. In April, the LJS&C named internationally renowned contemporary percussionist and UCSD music professor, Steven Schick, as its new Music Director. Schick shares the 2007–2008 season with Choral Director David Chase.
