This week, SASO is recording two recent concertos with viola soloist Brett Deubner for commercial CD release. We’ve played all the music in concert before; here’s a video of our first go at Amanda Harberg’s…
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The Stankovs play Mendelssohn with SASO
Felix Mendelssohn’s E-minor Violin Concerto is a concert staple, and his piano concertos get an occasional outing, but it’s more unusual to find his early Concerto for Violin, Piano and Strings on the concert stage….
SASO Presents Whitacre, He Zhanhao and Bruckner’s Te Deum April 1–3
Travel through your imagination from a young child’s moonlit bedside to ancient China, then 19th-century Vienna as you enjoy haunting, evocative and powerful music by Eric Whitacre, He Zhanhao and Anton Bruckner. Join the Southern…
Violinist Tiffany Chang Wins Dorothy Vanek Youth Concerto Completion
Violinist Tiffany Chang won the 2016 Dorothy Vanek Youth Concerto Competition sponsored by the Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra. In addition to the $1,000 cash prize, she was invited to solo with the orchestra in concerts…
SASO Musicians Return from Music Festival in Brazil
By Tim Secomb Musicians of the Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra recently returned from Brazil. The orchestra gave two performances at the Gramado In Concert International Music Festival. Gramado is picturesque town in the mountains of…
Latest stop on SASO international journey: Brazil
By Cathalena E. Burch, originally published in the Arizona Daily Star Forty members of the Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra landed in Brazil late last week and, on Valentine’s Day, performed the first of two concerts at the Gramado…
2015–16 program notes: Gould, Rachmaninov, Dvořák
Here are the program notes for the Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra’s concerts on Jan. 31 and Feb. 5–6, 2016. Get your tickets here. American composer Morton Gould was recognized for his musical abilities at an early…
SASO Musicians Head to Music Festival in Brazil
Contact Kevin Larkin at manager@sasomusic.org or (520) 308-6226 TUCSON, AZ – The well-traveled Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra is headed for another international performance – this time in Brazil. Forty SASO musicians will join members of the Symphony Orchestra of…
SASO Presents Soul-Stirring Music by Gould, Rachmaninov, Dvořák
Contact Kevin Larkin at manager@sasomusic.org or (520) 308-6226 Lush, haunting and hummable melodies infuse the next program of the Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra on Jan. 31 in northwest Tucson, Feb. 5 in Green Valley and…
Music Students Invited to Enter Youth Concerto Competition
Contact Kevin Larkin at manager@sasomusic.org or (520) 308-6226 TUCSON, AZ – Talented young musicians age 13 to 18 are invited to apply for the 2016 Dorothy Vanek Youth Concerto Competition sponsored by the Southern Arizona…
2015-16 Cycle 2 Program Notes
By Tim Secomb Karelia is a region of northern Europe, on the border between Russia and Finland. Tensions over the ownership of Karelia were an important aspect of Finland’s struggle for independence. In 1893, Finnish composer Jean…
SASO performs Mendelssohn, Sibelius and Vaughan Williams
Contact Kevin Larkin at manager@sasomusic.org or (520) 308-6226 TUCSON, AZ – The Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra welcomes three international guest artists Nov. 7 and 8 for concerts featuring the music of Sibelius, Mendelssohn and Vaughan Williams….
Program notes for SASO’s October 2015 concerts
By Tim Secomb Mexican composer José Pablo Moncayo García was one of the most important representatives of the Mexican nationalist movement in classical music, along with fellow composers Silvestre Revueltas and Carlos Chávez. His Huapango is an original…
When the finale isn’t quite final
By Cathalena E. Burch, originally published in the Arizona Daily Star Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra will get the rare opportunity to perform a concerto with the soloist for whom the piece was written. In two…
SASO Season Opens with Viola Concerto, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6
Contact Kevin Larkin at manager@sasomusic.org or (520) 308-6226 The Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra opens the season with Amanda Harberg’s Viola Concerto, composed for and played by her friend Brett Deubner, a champion of new works…
Tucson Lifestyle features SASO’s concertmaster
The September 2015 issue of Tucson Lifestyle includes a full-page feature on SASO’s concertmaster, Erika Roush. Read the feature as a downloadable pdf by clicking here, or read the entire issue of the magazine here.
SASO Musicians Present Highlights from 2015 Oaxaca Opera Festival
Twenty-five musicians from the Tucson-based Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra returned recently from Oaxaca, Mexico, where they performed in the Oaxaca Opera Festival for the third consecutive year. The full orchestra will perform highlights of the…
Honored for a Lifetime of Giving: SASO Season Sponsor Dorothy Vanek Receives Legacy Award
By David Rupkalvis, originally published in Explorer For much of her life, Dorothy Vanek has been a giver. Whether supporting the Tucson Symphony Orchestra, Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra, True Concord Voices and Orchestra or many…
Oaxaca Opera Festival in Mexican press
SASO, Linus Lerner and the 2016 Oaxaca Opera Festival are receiving plentiful advance coverage in the Mexican press. If you read Spanish, or if you’re just a monolingual voyeur, follow the links to short pieces…
SASO, Lerner heading back to Oaxaca
By Cathalena E. Burch, originally published in the Arizona Daily Star Opera is not native to the culturally rich southern Mexican state of Oaxaca, but a Tucson conductor and his orchestra are among those trying…
2015-16 Season Tickets Now Available
Through May 17, you may purchase early-bird-discount season tickets for SASO’s five 2015-16 concerts at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian for only $80. That’s five concerts for less than the cost of four single tickets! Season ticket…
SASO concert goes from sorrow to surprise
[The] Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra this weekend will host a teen violinist from Phoenix in a concert that also features an internationally known violist from our backyard.
SASO Features Violist Hong-Mei Xiao in Concerts April 10-12
Internationally acclaimed violist Hong-Mei Xiao returns to solo with the Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra in a program that also includes Khachaturian’s Masquerade Suite and the premiere of Michael Kiefer’s Psalm 22.
Desert Vista student 1st violinist to win Dorothy Vanek Youth Concerto Competition
By Allison Hurtado, originally published in the Ahwatukee Foothills News Desert Vista High School student Bobae Johnson knows a thing or two about winning a competition, but for her it’s not a sport she’s playing…