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ALTOONA -- The Altoona Symphony Orchestra will open Season 98, "New Perspectives," with Quests, a concert led by guest conductor Maestro Isaac Selya.
The performance will take place on Saturday, Sept. 26, at 7:30 p.m., in the Historic Mishler Theatre.
Season 98 marks an exciting time of transition for the ASO as the orchestra bids farewell to longtime Music Director and Conductor Maestro Nick Palmer and welcomes four candidates for the position to the podium. Maestro Palmer will conduct the Season 98 holiday and May Pops concerts, while the four classical concerts of the season will each have a different guest conductor. Each candidate will bring a unique musical perspective and vision for the artistic future of the Altoona Symphony Orchestra, offering audiences an opportunity to experience the possibilities ahead and share their feedback.
The first of these concerts,"Quests," reflects Maestro Selya's interest in building new audiences by connecting the classical canon with music from popular culture. The program demonstrates that whether the setting is an enchanted opera, a fantasy video game or a 19th-century symphony, orchestral music has the power to transport audiences into another world.
The concert opens with Mozart's Overture to Die Zauberflute (The Magic Flute), an opera filled with adventure, challenges and the search for wisdom and virtue. The journey then takes a modern turn with Jeremy Soule's "Dragonborn" from The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, a 2011 critically-acclaimed video game, transporting audiences into the epic fantasy world of dragons, ancient ruins and Norse mythology.
Ralph Vaughan Williams' Concerto for Oboe and Strings in A minor will feature the expressive sounds of ASO Principal
Oboe Lenny Young, before concluding with Brahms' Symphony No. 4 in E minor, the composer's final symphony and one of the great works of the Romantic orchestral repertoire.
Founded in 1928, the Altoona Symphony Orchestra is a professional orchestra serving the greater Altoona and Blair County community. The ASO is proud to be in its 98th season of presenting exceptional live orchestral performances and educational programs that inspire, connect and enrich the community through music.