Detroit Symphony Announces 2016-17 Season

The Detroit Symphony Orchestra (DSO) 2016-17 Classical Season will begin in late September with a star-studded weekend including the virtuosic Hilary Hahn performing Beethoven's Violin Concerto and Chinese piano phenom Lang Lang performing Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 4. These traditional concerti are paired with contemporary compositions that establish the theme of the DSO's season: "Gershwin and His Children: The Influence of Popular Culture on Classical Music."

What follows will be the ninth season of partnership between the DSO and Music Director Leonard Slatkin, who has extended his commitment to the DSO as Music Director through the 2017-2018 season, and as Music Director Laureate for seasons to follow.

As of today, subscriptions are on sale for the DSO's 2016-17 Orchestra Hall Classical, Pops, and Young People's Family Subscription Series. Patrons may purchase subscriptions at dso.org, in person at the Max. M. & Marjorie S. Fisher Music Center at 3711 Woodward Ave., or by calling the Box Office at 313.576.5111.

Slatkin's reputation for championing contemporary American music has been well-established throughout his prolific career, and will be on display next season with 17 compositions by American composers, and three World Premieres. Among these newly minted works is a composition penned by the DSO's Fred A. & Barbara M. Erb Jazz Creative Director Chair Terence Blanchard. This piece, which is yet to be named, will be written to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Detroit's historic summer of civil unrest in 1967. The premiere is part of a multi-year project of diverse voices, programs and exhibitions that bridges gaps in understanding Detroit's past-and challenges the region to realize its full potential as American's great comeback story.

In continuation of the tradition begun by 2013's incredibly successful Beethoven Festival, next season's Mozart Festival (#Mozartfest) will be the fourth DSO Winter Music Festival-a three-week immersive look at the famously light-hearted 18th century composer who challenged the status quo of European music. While the festival's full-orchestra works will focus on the later part of Mozart's brief, yet monumental career, each one of his double concerti and concerti for winds and orchestra will be performed by 15 world-class soloists found within the DSO's own ranks. Past Winter Music Festivals have featured Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and Brahms (Brahms Fest takes place Feb. 11-28, 2016).

While the 2016-17 season will welcome 14 artists making their Orchestra Hall debut, several audience favorites will return to Orchestra Hall. Back by popular demand, cabaret singer and frequent collaborator of Pink Martini Storm Large will reprise her role of Anna I and II in Kurt Weill's Seven Deadly Sins. Large has performed this piece with orchestras across the U.S., however she debuted in the role with the DSO in a program the orchestra took to the Spring For Music festival at Carnegie Hall in 2013.

A complete series of Live From Orchestra Hall webcasts will return for its sixth full season, offering a free broadcast of each classical program at dso.org/live. See concert listings below for a full schedule. Dates marked with an asterisk denote webcast concerts.

The DSO Classical Series is sponsored by PVS Chemicals Inc.

A MESSAGE FROM MAESTRO SLATKIN ABOUT THE SEASON'S THEME

February 24, 1924. World War I was over. The stock market had not yet collapsed. Americans were looking for something different. On this day, they got it.

The history of Rhapsody in Blue is well documented. Written quickly and somewhat improvised on the spot, George Gershwin's contribution to "An Experiment in Modern Music" changed the very nature of how classical music was perceived. Aeolian Hall was the scene of a very long program, featuring no less than 26 separate musical selections. It was Paul Whiteman's idea to find a way to make jazz, and other vernacular music of the time, part of the collective conscience of the listener.

Although the Rhapsody was not well received by the critics, over a period of three years the work was performed by Whiteman 84 times, and its recording had sold more than a million copies. This was not just an isolated, one-off experience. That original concert opened a floodgate of new compositional thought. It was the time of Stravinsky, Ravel, Shostakovich and so many others. Each of those composers, and many more, took to the new craze and tried to find ways to incorporate idiomatic writing into their own compositions.

Over the course of the 2016-17 season, the DSO will feature many of the groundbreaking pieces that took the mainstream of the popular culture and changed the way all of us perceive classical music. We will see how other cultures reacted and incorporated their own brand of local music into the concert hall. There will be premieres that promise to be exciting and bold. And we will learn that Gershwin was not really the first composer to utilize these elements.

During the season we will try to understand why the "jazz age" existed and will consider its lasting impact on society today. Long before the term "crossover" came into use in music, composers were taking their audiences on new paths, combining various aesthetics to produce a new genre in music. I have been looking forward to presenting this trip for quite some time and hope that you will join me. It promises to be a journey well worth taking.