The Philadelphia Orchestra Yannick Nézet-Séguin Music Director

Yannick and Lisa Batiashvili have enchanted concert audiences all over the world; she returns to the Orchestra with Tchaikovsky's spectacular Violin Concerto anchoring two different programs over two weekends. This concert highlights Scandinavia: Sibelius's Seventh Symphony was a U.S. premiere for the Orchestra with Leopold Stokowski, long a champion of the Finnish master's works. And you may not be familiar with Sweden's Franz Berwald, but his beautiful Third Symphony, composed in 1845, makes a compelling pair with the Sibelius.

Principal Guest Conductor Stéphane Denève leads two weeks of concerts inspired by the glorious art of the Barnes Foundation. Albert Barnes and Leopold Stokowski were both importing the best of European culture into Philadelphia in the 1930s, with a shared desire to make that culture accessible to the public. They debated art and music in a series of letters; Stokowski even spoke at the dedication of the original Barnes Foundation building in Merion.

Acclaimed French conductor Emmanuelle Haïm makes her Philadelphia Orchestra debut, presenting two of the leading lights of English Baroque music. Handel's Music for the Royal Fireworks has been lighting up the sky (in concert halls!) since 1749. In his cantata Il delirio amoroso (The Delirium of Love), soprano Erin Morley brings the “silken clarity … and the needlepoint precision of her coloratura” (The New York Times) to this Orpheus-like tale based on classical mythology.

A pair of Philadelphia Orchestra debuts, by two rapidly rising stars: David Afkham on the podium and Seong-Jin Cho at the keyboard. Cho brings his prize-winning technique to Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 20. Beethoven's stirring Coriolan Overture was inspired by a play about war and peace in ancient Rome. Brahms was daunted by Beethoven's towering legacy; that may be why it took him so long to finish his majestic Symphony No. 1. For almost 150 years, audiences have agreed it was worth the wait.

Yannick teams up with mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato, one of the biggest vocal talents in the world, a rare combination of exceptional skills and winning personality. She'll shine in Chausson's musical poem about love, death, and the sea. The Philadelphians take center stage in Wagner's Prelude to Act I of Lohengrin and Respighi's Fountains of Rome. And we are eager to welcome back American composer Mason Bates after the resounding success of his fascinating and futuristic Alternative Energy in 2017.

You may think you know Appalachian Spring, but the newly completed version performed here is the complete chamber ballet score orchestrated for a large ensemble. (Eugene Ormandy himself asked Copland to expand the orchestration a half century ago.) Consider it our “simple gift” to you! Our good friend Cristian Macelaru leads this all-American program. He's arranged a suite from Jake Heggie's opera Moby Dick (“a masterpiece of clarity and intensity”—San Francisco Chronicle).

The breadth and depth of Tchaikovsky's musical genius are on display in this dazzling celebration of his music, led by our dynamic Assistant Conductor Kensho Watanabe. Inspired by a trip to sunny Italy, Tchaikovsky transforms the sounds he heard all around him into a delightful “Italian Fantasia” (his original title for Capriccio italien). He turns to Mozart for inspiration in his Rococo Variations, the closest Tchaikovsky came to writing a cello concerto, performed by rising star Edgar Moreau.