The 2023-24 Season is Announced!
Music Director Carl St.Clair and President John Forsyte just announced classical programming for Pacific Symphony’s 2023-24 season. The Symphony’s 45th season and opening of the Hal and Jeanette Segerstrom Family Foundation Classical Series begins on Thursday, Sept. 21. The series holds 36 concerts as part of a 12-program subscription series, four Sunday Matinees, and three specials, the 2023-24 classical season presents wide-ranging selections of masterworks, treasured classics, and exciting new discoveries.
Commenting on the 2023-24 season, Music Director Carl St.Clair said, “Pacific Symphony’s 45th season marks an important point in the evolution of the orchestra. It’s been gratifying to lead and experience that transformation—from the earliest days, to our first international tour of Europe in 2006, to playing a sold-out Carnegie Hall debut five years ago, to raves from The New York Times followed by our first tour of China, all the while building and deepening our relationships with the community of Orange County, and building strong educational programs.
“Throughout it all,” St.Clair continued, “We have commissioned or premiered new music and placed composers in a central role in community engagement. Through my relationships with composers, I gain insights both into their art and also historic works. Opening night, we’ll welcome our audiences back with a compelling work by Viet Cuong performed by the highly regarded new music ensemble Eighth Blackbird. That opening night program also features Richard Strauss’s triumphant tone poem, Ein Heldenleben. This is a work I led throughout Germany on the orchestra’s first international tour, and I am particularly excited to feature Pacific Symphony concertmaster Dennis Kim, who has a substantial solo in the piece. The work’s lush orchestration showcases heroic turns for many o the musicians and the orchestra as a whole.”
St.Clair went on to recognize “Symphonic Voices,” the successful opera program he initiated that is beginning its second decade this season with a new production of Puccini’s La Bohème. He feels that “opera is now part of Pacific Symphony’s DNA.” The Symphony is a gifted and versatile ensemble that has evolved into a sensitive opera orchestra under St.Clair’s masterful leadership, placing the orchestra and the composer’s magnificent music at center stage. In addition, the Symphony’s commitment to artistic collaborations have expanded the roles of Pacific Chorale through the opera-vocal initiative. “Our musical relationship with Pacific Chorale has always been important to me. The final program of the 45th season is a fitting finale that pairs Morten Lauridsen’s Lux Aeterna with Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and its triumphant ‘Ode to Joy.’ You can expect to experience a sense of awe and wonderment when you hear this program.”
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