Albany Symphony Announces 2024-2025 Season

ALBANY — The Albany Symphony 2024-2025 season will feature masterworks that include Beethoven’s Pastoral, Mozart’s Symphony No. 35, Dvorak’s New World Symphony, and Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No.1, as well as new works by a wide array of current-day composers. 

The programming for this season has been curated by conductor David Alan Miller. Concerts will take place in a wide variety of the most exciting Capital Region concert venues, including the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall, the Palace Theater, Proctors, and EMPAC.

The season opens in October with Tchaikovsky’s First Concerto, famed for the sequence of pounding chords with which the soloist’s part launches the first movement. The concert will also feature a world premiere by famed Cuban-American composer, Tania León, who won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize in Music for her orchestral work, Stride. Her Pregón is dedicated to Jesse Rosen and is inspired by the pregoneros, known as town criers in English, of her childhood memories, where she grew up, on the streets of Havana.

The year’s classics include Carl Nielsen’s Symphony No. 4, “The Inextinguishable,” Antonín Dvořák’s Symphony No 9, “From the New World,” Antonio Vivaldi’s Concerto for Two Oboes, Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, and more. 

Many of the country’s most exciting composers will be featured and celebrated throughout the season. Joan Tower’s Cello Concerto, A New Day, will debut in November and was written in memory of her husband, who passed away last year. The season brings first-time and returning composers to the Albany Symphony stage, including old friends like Loren Loiacono, Reena Esmail, and Daniel Bernard Roumain. Bobby Ge’s orchestral tone-poem, Water Music, will be given its world premiere at the American Music Festival. Ge is a Chinese American composer who explores the vivid beauty of the ephemeral. His work, often collaborative in nature, focuses on themes of home and communication. Additional high notes at the end of the season include Clarice Assad’s Percussion Quartet Concerto, with the amazing members of Third Coast Percussion, Sophia Jani’s What do Flowers do at Night?, and Christopher Theofanidis’ Clarinet Concerto. 

Albany Symphony oboists Karen Hosmer and Grace Shyrock will perform at the Holiday Mozart and Vivaldi concert. Harmony Zhu, a teenage prodigy who made her debut with the Albany Symphony in 2020, will perform Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Kala Ramnath, a seventh-generation violinist specializing in Hindustani (Indian) classical music, will perform. 

Guitarist Bokyung Kim will premiere a new concerto written for her by Nicky Sohn. Amaryn Olmeda will perform Samuel Barber’s Violin Concerto under the baton of guest conductor, Lidiya Yankovskaya, Music Director of Chicago Opera Theater, who grew up in Guilderland. 

The 2024-2025 season runs from October through the American Music Festival in June. Subscriptions offer patrons the opportunity to purchase their favorite seats before tickets go on sale to the general public. Season subscriptions offer flexibility and convenience. The deadline to renew is April 14. Through the Nielsen Associates’ Student Access Program, students can purchase discount subscriptions and enjoy the full benefits of being a subscriber for as little as $45. To purchase a subscription online and see a full schedule, visit http://www.albanysymphony.com or call the Albany Symphony Box Office at 518-694-3300.