“The Kansas City Symphony has just announced its 2016-17 season, and it’s a lineup that crackles with excitement,” writes Patrick Neas in Saturday’s (1/16) Kansas City Star (Missouri). “There are large-scale choral works such as Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem, the world premiere of a violin concerto by renowned Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara and the rafter-raising Organ Symphony No. 1 by Alexandre Guilmant featuring the brilliant Paul Jacobs as soloist…. ‘There are across the season 34 composers and 43 works, 16 of which have not been performed by the Symphony since it was founded in 1982,’ [Executive Director Frank] Byrne said. ‘We have five Kansas City premieres and one world premiere.’ … The Kansas City Symphony will perform works by contemporary composers Patrick Harlin, Michael Gandolfi, David Hertzberg and Narong Prangcharoen…. Especially exciting is a piano concerto by a young Russian virtuoso.” Said Music Director Michael Stern, “Daniil Trifonov is playing his own concerto. How cool is that?” Also planned are Mozart’s Requiem, Brahms’s Symphony No. 2, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, and Schubert’s “Unfinished” Symphony. The orchestra “is offering a plethora of pops concerts, including an expansion of the popular Screenland at the Symphony series.”
Posted January 19, 2016
