This concert will be conducted by Guest Conductor, Roger Kalia.

Designed to engage listeners of all ages, Orchestral Kaleidoscope invites audiences into a colorful afternoon of musical storytelling, virtuosity, and cultural dialogue—reflecting the season’s theme, Where Our Stories Meet, through works that showcase the orchestra’s full expressive range.

Clarice Assad’s Baião N’ Blues opens the program with a dynamic fusion of northeastern Brazilian dance rhythms and American blues. 

Benjamin Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra is a landmark work of orchestration rooted in the Baroque elegance of Henry Purcell’s theme and an enduring favorite for concertgoers of all ages. The work systematically explores each section of the orchestra before culminating in a brilliant fugue, demonstrating both individual color and collective power.

Wojciech Kilar’s Orawa, a strings only piece inspired by the highland music of Poland’s Tatra region, begins the second half of our program.

The program concludes with Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 9, a work that defies expectations. Instead of the monumental triumph many anticipated at the close of World War II, Shostakovich delivered a wry, compact symphony that satirizes grandeur with wit, irony, and lean precision.