The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra last performed Mahler’s Symphony No. 7 in 1982. RPO Music Director Ward Stare is bringing Mahler’s Seventh Symphony back this week and Stare and the orchestra are doing a bang-up job with this huge, difficult work.
Ward Stare
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RPO 2019-20 season brings fresh programming
The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra has announced its 2019-20 Philharmonics and Pops series. Next year’s season features a meticulously crafted blend of beloved, heavyweight composers and fresh, new-to-the-RPO works from the 20th and 21st centuries.
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Ward Stare leads RPO in Mahler, Shostakovich symphonies
Ward Stare returns to the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra next week with two ambitious programs: On February 28 and March 2, he’ll essay Mahler’s enormous Symphony No. 7, and on March 7 and 9, he’ll highlight another 20th-century masterpiece, Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 10.
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Classical review: RPO with Jon Nakamatsu
On Thursday, Jon Nakamatsu’s finely judged reading of Beethoven’s Second Piano Concerto with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra was not only drop-dead elegant, but also full of the composer’s signature energy.
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Classical review: RPO’s 2018-19 season opener
Music Director Ward Stare kick-started the 2018-19 Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra season last night, with music by three very familiar composers. But when the program includes a powerhouse soloist, and the musicians acquit themselves so well, that familiarity is very satisfying.
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Classical review: RPO’s ‘Bernstein Celebration’
This week, Ward Stare and the Rochester Philharmonic are celebrating the centennial of that first among 20th century American musicians, Leonard Bernstein. This concert wasn’t just a tip of the baton to a revered musician; it was a salute by a lively, communicative conductor to an infinitely talented composer, conductor, and general muse to American […]
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Classical review: RPO performs ‘The Music of Swan Lake’
In Thursday’s concert of mostly ballet music at Kodak Hall, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra showed flashes of pure brilliance. Unfortunately, the performance as a whole was lackluster. The RPO opened the program with a trio of AntonínDvořák’s “Slavonic Dances,” and was joined onstage by members of the Rochester City Ballet. Stare conducted with a light […]
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RPO announces its 2018-19 season
The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra has announced its 2018-19 season, and Music Director Ward Stare continues to hone the RPO’s artistic image under his tenure. The orchestra seems to be gradually and methodically working to elevate its status to one of more national relevance. While Stare’s programming tastes can frequently be conservative, the choices he makes […]
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Classical review: RPO’s 2017-18 season opener
If you’re going to open a symphony orchestra season, you may as well open it with a dazzling flourish or two. Richard Strauss’s tone poem, “Don Juan,” begins with one of the greatest opening salvoes in the orchestral repertoire, a hurtling rocket of strings and brass. When Ward Stare and the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra leaped […]
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Itzhak Perlman returns to Rochester for a cinema serenade
Itzhak Perlman’s appearances with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, which date back to 1970, have included the great works of the concerto repertoire, like Beethoven, Brahms, Prokofiev, Bartók, Tchaikovsky. This week, Perlman will return to the RPO — performing for the first time with Music Director Ward Stare — in a program of a different kind […]
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The RPO’s 2016-17 season in review
CITY’s classical music critics recap the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra’s 2016-17 season
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Classical review: RPO performs ‘La Boheme’
Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra Music Director Ward Stare rose to prominence as Principal Trombone for Lyric Opera of Chicago. Here in the Flower City, he has made a conscious effort to perform operatic works in their entirety. On Thursday, when the RPO performed Giacomo Puccini’s beloved “La Bohème,” the result was unsettled at first, but ultimately […]
