Yo-Yo Ma to launch Vancouver Symphony Orchestra’s 105th season
Also part of VSO’s 2023-24 programming: guest solosists Steven Isserlis and Sarah Chang; B.C. premiere of John Adams’s Harmonielehre; new commissions; and more
Yo-Yo Ma. Photo by Larry French/Getty Images for SiriusXM
THE THEME FOR Vancouver Symphony Orchestra’s 2023-24 season is Escape to Extraordinary, and it’s getting things off to a fitting start with a performance by Yo-Yo Ma. The globally acclaimed cellist appears for one night only on September 8, joining the VSO for Dvorak’s Cello Concerto.
From there, the VSO’s 105th season features everything from Mahler’s monumental Symphony No. 6 to an appearance by Australian-born New York City-based post-post-modern diva Meow Meow to Marvel Studio’s Black Panther in Concert. New commissions and iconic masterworks round out the offerings.
Speaking at the season announcement at the Orpheum Theatre on March 30, music director Otto Tausk said that the through line is the focus on music’s power to connect people.
“I think that’s the most important thing we do,” Tausk said at the event, which featured brief performances by some VSO members, including its Brass Quintet and principal flute Christie Reside, principal cello Henry Shapard, and percussionist Vern Griffiths. “The repertoire we chose helps us in doing that, in making sure that music is meaningful.
“Music is something that empowers us all and brings us together during celebrations and also like this week in sadder times,” said Tausk, reflecting on the death of former VSO composer-in-residence Jocelyn Morlock. “Music is comforting and is important to our world. We have new music reflecting on our society. New music helps us start discussions about what’s going on in our world; it reflects on big issues but also on smaller and more personal issues.”
Otto Tausk.
Works by Mahler open and close the 2023-24 season.
“This is in line with what we’ve been doing in the past few years: building on our Mahler repertoire,” Tausk said. “We’ve done 4 and 5 and 1; now it’s time for 6. Six is a big one. It’s a big symphony, and his wife Alma thought Mahler’s 6 was the most personal one. His voice is most recognizable in that symphony.
“We end the season with Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, The Song of the Earth, which is a small song cycle, but it is probably his best symphony,” Tausk added. “Song of the Earth is based on Chinese poetry, and it has been a long wish to combine that with something from China to see if we can get that colour in a contemporary piece. We selected Dorothy Chang’s Concerto for Piano and Erhu. We’re really excited to put those works together.
“The world seems very divided at the moment,” he added. “Let’s have music be the bridge between us all, all around the world, not just here but everywhere.”
Returning for Remembrance Day is the VSO’s tradition of performing a requiem, with Verdi’s on the 2023 calendar.
Tausk is especially excited about American composer John Adams’s Harmonielehre, which the maestro said has never been performed in Vancouver due to its scale. “It’s a huge piece; it’s very exciting and very rhythmical,” Tausk said. “It originated from a dream he had that he was crossing a bridge and saw an oil tanker in the water that changed into a space rocket and took off—that’s what you can expect the sound of the orchestra to be as well.”
The VSO will perform Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 5, which is close to Tausk’s heart. “Prokofiev is a really important composer to me,” he said. “It’s a composer that I have done a lot, especially at the very beginning when I started conducting. It was the entire Prokofiev repertoire that I did when I came to conducting. I’m really happy we are now having that encounter with the VSO, myself, and Prokofiev. I’m pretty sure that if that goes well, we’ll program lots more Prokofiev in coming years. Just imagine a composer that has written the most beautiful melodies ever put in symphonies; the most extraordinary and beautiful symphonic colours you can imagine.”
Other 2023-24 classical highlights include Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, Stravinsky’s Petrouchka, and Haydn’s The Creation. Among the 21st-century works on the lineup are Thorvaldsottir’s Catamorphosis and new commissions by Kelly-Marie Murphy and Nicholas Ryan Kelly.
Steven Isserlis.
Guest soloists performing with VSO include British cellist Steven Isserlis, Israeli violinist Vadim Gluzman, and American violinist Sarah Chang; guest conductors will include Leonard Slatkin, Joann Falletta, Gemma New and others.
The London Drugs Pops Series is to offer Queens of Soul and R&B, Louis Armstrong, Star Wars, the Roaring 20s, Motown, and Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas in Concert.
The holiday season features Vivaldi’s Four Seasons (at the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts) as well as the new Elf in Concert, among other shows.
Movie Nights with the VSO presented by TELUS features Marvel Studio’s Black Panther in Concert; Star Wars: A New Hope in Concert; Casino Royale in Concert; and more. Summer blockbusters run the gamut from Ratatouille in Concert to Bugs Bunny at the Symphony.
Sarah Chang. Photo by Colin Bell
In June, the VSO will present its annual Day of Music, which features 12 hours of free music by 100 acts from all over B.C. The event opens up the VSO School of Music, Orpheum Theatre, and the Annex to the public.
June 24 marks the second annual Path Forward, curated by the VSO Indigenous Council.
Symphony at Sunset returns to Deer Lake Park, and VSO will also perform in Whistler.
“The orchestra is playing with such an incredible intensity and commitment, I can see it grow every day, even in rehearsal,” Tausk says. “Now we’re saying, ‘Let’s focus on really small details to see where we can go, where we can fly. It seems we can go much further than we ever imagined we could.”
Subscriptions start from $25 a concert. More information is at www.VancouverSymphony.ca.
Meow Meow. Photo by Magnus+Hastings
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