Welcome June and the leading edge of summer! Our final concert begins with Anton Bruckner’s rousing “Romantic” Symphony, so named by Bruckner himself and inspired by his vision of a day in the life of a medieval village from dawn to dusk. The audience will hear the morning horn call welcoming the day ahead, the thundering hooves of mounted knights departing the castle, the frenzy of a hunt, and the revelry of a village meal and festival to end the long and eventful day. Then, the Symphony closes this concert and its 2023-2024 season with the help of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, who gave the world perhaps the second-most well-known four-note opening salvo in the classical music canon with the opening notes of his Piano Concerto no.1, among the most popular and most performed piano concertos. Virtuoso pianist Awadagin Pratt – famed for his formidable technique as well as his love for pranking and colorful concert attire – joins the Symphony for a fiery finish. Don’t miss this scintillating season finale.

In Maestro Eckart Preu’s own words

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains and fire pits, live ensemble in the lobby, pre-concert talk to gain greater knowledge regarding the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

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Our March concert bids a fond farewell to the dark days and starry night skies of winter – and, by the way, don’t forget to turn your clocks forward one hour after this concert for Daylight Savings on Sunday, March 10th – with a program that celebrates the nature of the universe, and the place music holds within it. French composer Guillaume Connesson’s fascinating Cosmic Trilogy explores the entire span of existence as we know it, posing question after musical question and offering gorgeous responses. Ralph Vaughn Williams’ Serenade to Music offers a ravishing paean to the music of the spheres, which reportedly brought audience member Igor Stravinsky to tears at its premiere performance. To conclude a mystical evening, prepare to enjoy Johannes Brahms’ magnificent masterpiece for soloists, chorus, and orchestra, his incandescent Deutsches Requiem. Join your Long Beach Symphony for an early celebration of Spring and new beginnings!

In Maestro Eckart Preu’s own words

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains and fire pits, live ensemble in the lobby, pre-concert talk to gain greater knowledge regarding the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

Get all the PERKS and SAVE with a Classical Subscription or 3-Concert Sampler Pack Subscription

A night of emotional warmth and vibrant colors awaits audiences in this concert program, tailor-made to combat the dark, cold, mid-February winter blues. Concert Overture No.2 by Florence Price, with its welcoming themes from popular Spirituals and more than a passing nod to American patriotism, will get things going. The passion continues when Long Beach Symphony’s own Cécilia Tsan takes center stage in Antonín Dvořák’s ardent cello concerto, beloved both for the deeply felt emotion it evokes in audiences and for the showmanship and mastery it showcases in its soloist. Modest Mussorgsky’s vivid Pictures at an Exhibition completes the evening’s program. Originally composed for piano solo, the stunningly creative work was later arranged for full orchestra forty years after Mussorgsky’s death by Maurice Ravel to immediate and enduring high praise. From the wistful whimsy of The Gnome to the kibbitzing of Two Polish Jews and concluding with the majesty of The Great Gate of Kiev, Mussorgsky’s musical visualization of a Russian gallery of paintings always delights.

In Maestro Eckart Preu’s own words

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains and fire pits, live ensemble in the lobby, pre-concert talk to gain greater knowledge regarding the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

Get all the PERKS and SAVE with a Classical Subscription or 3-Concert Sampler Pack Subscription

Long Beach Symphony presents an evening of exciting, contrasting musical styles and art forms, plus the introduction of a new soundscape where Indian and western classical music come together in a haunting and extraordinary piece about climate change.

It’s a combination of styles, full of energy and contrasts as we are joined by Hindustani violinist Kala Ramnath and Long Beach Ballet.

The evening starts with Stravinsky’s Pulcinella Suite, a lighthearted piece narrating our antihero’s narrow escapes while pursuing his affairs of the heart; an intimate piece based on Baroque music of the 18th century and yet 20th century neoclassicism making it very entertaining and theatrical.

Guest Hindustani violinist virtuoso Kala Ramnath, renowned as the leading 21^st century practitioner of Hindustani classical violin, will take the stage to perform highly sought-after and multiple-award-winning Indian-American composer Reena Esmail’s Violin Concerto, who wrote this piece specifically for Ramnath and Hindustani violin — a rhythmically captivating tour-de-force for orchestra and Hindustani violin. The concerto aptly channels Esmail’s talent for weaving Western and Indian classical music traditions to paint melodic pictures both rapturous and melancholic. As part of this musical presentation, Long Beach Symphony is proud to be a participant in the CA Festival Celebration of New Music.

From Scott Joplin, known as “the King of Ragtime,” Treemonisha overture, from his three-act opera recently rediscovered in the 1990s, will be followed by the boisterous and jazzy, cool, effervescent, improvisatory, and toe-tapping Fancy Free by Leonard Bernstein where, appropriately, the Long Beach Ballet will take the stage.

Audiences can enjoy a relaxed, fun, yet elegant evening along the dancing fountains, firepits, and bars on the Plaza, and a 7pm Pre-Concert Talk that will give further context into the evening– with the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

In Music Director Eckart Preu’s own words…

About Kala Ramnath and her unique skills as a Hindustani violinist

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains and fire pits, live ensemble in the lobby, pre-concert talk to gain greater knowledge regarding the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

Get all the PERKS and SAVE with a Classical Subscription or 3-Concert Sampler Pack Subscription

Join your Long Beach Symphony for Opening Night of the 2023-2024 season at the beautiful Terrace Theater. Music Director Eckart Preu launches the orchestra’s new season with a rainbow palette of 19th century musical colors. Johannes Brahms’ lushly harmonic, pulsating Hungarian Dances kick things off with a bright rhythmic energy. Next, renowned pianist and Romantic Era specialist Andreas Boyde joins the orchestra to perform the singular, highly imaginative Piano Concerto by Antonín Dvořák. Written especially for an outstanding popular Czech pianist who championed the young Dvořák, the composer’s only piano concerto will envelope listeners in waves of harmony and emotion. Finally, our celebratory season opening concert concludes with selections from another Romantic icon, the deeply personal “Ma Vlast” – “My Homeland” – by the Czech composer Bedrich Smetana. This beloved and popular work featuring the beloved “The Moldau”, resounding with patriotism, nostalgia, and passion, will send audiences away with ringing ears and hammering hearts.

In Music Director Eckart Preu’s own words:

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains and fire pits, live ensemble in the lobby, pre-concert talk to gain greater knowledge regarding the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

Get all the PERKS and SAVE with a Classical Subscription or 3-Concert Sampler Pack Subscription.

You may also buy tickets through Ticketmaster.

Two of classical music’s most romantic Russian composers share the stage in this concert that also presents Enrico Chapela’s high-flying “Rotor”, with its intensity and emotion paving the way for more ardent musical expression as the program unfolds. Both Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky are treasured by music-lovers for their deeply felt works that epitomize the heights and depths of human yearning and heroism. Russian-born pianist Natasha Paremski guests.

Take a sneak peek at the PROGRAM BOOK

Our season finale offers audiences an infectious array of American musical genius. Award-winning pianist Michelle Cann takes center stage performing the Piano Concerto in One Movement by groundbreaking American composer Florence Price. The concert also includes brilliant 21st -century works by Brian Nabors and Nan Schwartz, along with Duke Ellington’s swinging “Harlem” and George Gershwin’s foot-tapping “An American in Paris.” We will send you out dancing!

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains, live ensemble in the lobby, pre-concert talk to gain greater knowledge on the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

In this powerful evening of extremes, audiences will be transported by compositions that cross the span of times. Anticipate a highly-charged, exhilarating evening at the Terrace Theater when the symphony embarks on a thrilling musical pilgrimage through Ana Lara’s passionate terrain of fire and ice (listen here); and then, Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, or “songs of Bavaria,” sets 24 poetic texts from the Germany of a millennium ago to paint a vivid picture of medieval life, including religious verses, social satires, and bawdy drinking songs. This exhilarating presentation will include three soloists, the Long Beach Camerata Singers, the South Bay Children’s Choir, and returning to Long Beach, the acclaimed Silver-Garburg Piano Duo. Expect an exuberant orchestral panorama of Orff’s pulsating musical journey.   ~ See artist bios at the bottom of this page. Watch the video here:

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains, live ensemble in the lobby, pre-concert talk to gain greater knowledge on the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.  

Music Director Eckart Preu and the Long Beach Symphony launch the 2022-2023 season with a trio of beloved classical masterworks. Opening the concert is Sergei Prokofiev’s ebullient Classical Symphony, among the composer’s most popular works. Next, Concertmaster Roger Wilkie steps into the spotlight in Mendelssohn’s passionate Violin Concerto. The program concludes with the world’s most famous symphony, which may make you jump from your seat as it opens with perhaps the most iconic phrase in the classical repertoire: the majestic “bum bum bum BUM” of Ludwig van Beethoven’s richly triumphant Symphony No.5.

Get an early start on enjoying this concert by reading the Program Notes:

Symphony No. 1 “Classical” (Prokifiev)

Violin Concerto (Mendelssohn)

Symphony No. 5 (Beethoven)

Take a peek at the Program Book and learn more.

Music For All Seasons: On this spectacular evening, Long Beach Symphony, under the direction of Maestro Eckart Preu, will rouse audiences with Mozart’s Symphony No. 40 in G minor and Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, a group of four violin concertos embodying each season of the year.  Each of the seasons will be exquisitely presented by Long Beach Symphony’s own stellar lead violinists Roger Wilkie, Agnes Gottschewski, Chloé Tardif, and Chyi-Yau Lee. Vivaldi’s best-known work, Four Seasons (1725) is the world’s most popular and recognized pieces of Baroque music. Audiences will recognize the evolving sounds from movies like Tin Cup, Spy Game, A View to Kill, What Lies Beneath, White Chicks, Saved!, Pacific Heights and The Other Sister; and they will be reminded of many wedding ceremonies attended.

Over 60 years later, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart would compose Symphony No. 40 in G minor, one of only two symphonies he wrote in minor keys reflecting the “Storm and Stress” artistic movement and showcasing darker and stronger emotions.

Audiences will enjoy the Classical Series fun and elegant evening surrounded by the Terrace’s dazzling fountains, live ensemble in the lobby, Pre-Concert Talk to gain greater knowledge on the evening programming, and the ability to “Sip & Enjoy” in the concert hall.