Exhibitions
With guest Barbara Thiem, cello

The University Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Maestro Wes Kenney, performs the great orchestra showpiece Pictures at an Exhibition by Modeste Mussorgsky, as transcribed by Maurice Ravel. Expressing his excitement about the concert’s guest soloist, the maestro welcomes CSU faculty artist Barbara Thiem on what many consider the greatest cello concerto ever written, Ernst Bloch’s Schlomo; from the composer’s “Jewish Cycle,” the work premiered in Carnegie Hall in 1917. According to the score’s notes, Mason Bates’ Mothership “imagines the orchestra as a mothership that is ‘docked’…virtuosic riffs on the work’s thematic material [are soloed] over action-packed electro-acoustic orchestral figuration.” Originally commissioned by the YouTube Symphony, the evening’s energetic opener arrives complete with an entire lighting scheme created by CSU theatre students.