Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra to Present Valentine's Day Weekend Concert, Today

PITTSBURGH - Give your loved one the gift of music at the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra's BNY Mellon Grand Classics Valentine's Day weekend concert, "Romeo and Juliet and Carmen," on February 12 and 14 at Heinz Hall.

In honor of the holiday weekend, the Pittsburgh Symphony performs a program full of romantic melodies and beautiful love themes. Slovakian conductor Juraj Val?uha returns to lead Tchaikovsky's Shakespeare-inspired musical tale of star crossed lovers with the Romeo and Juliet Overture; Dvo?ák's most beloved cello concerto performed by American cellist Joshua Roman in his Pittsburgh Symphony debut; Wagner's stunning "Prelude und Liebestod" from his opera Tristan und Isolde; and excerpts from Bizet's impassioned and fiery Carmen suites.

A pre-concert talk, open to all ticket holders and led by Assistant Conductor Andrés Franco, will occur on stage one hour before each concert. Program notes for the weekend are available online at pittsburghsymphony.org/valentine and on the PSO mobile app the day of the concert.

On February 12, a student cello ensemble will perform one hour before the concert in the Grand Lobby and on February 14, an ensemble from the Ellis School will perform from 1:30 to 2:15 p.m., also in the Grand Lobby. Pre-concert performances are open to ticketholders.

The concert begins at 8 p.m. on Friday and 2:30 p.m. on Sunday. Doors open one hour before the concert start time. Tickets, ranging in price from $20 to $94, can be purchased by calling the Heinz Hall box office at 412-392-4900 or visiting pittsburghsymphony.org/valentine.

The Pittsburgh Symphony would like to recognize and thank BNY Mellon for its 2015-2016 title sponsorship of BNY Mellon Grand Classics. Fairmont Pittsburgh is the official hotel of the Pittsburgh Symphony. Delta Air Lines is the official airline of the Pittsburgh Symphony.

About the Artists

JURAJ VAL?UHA has been chief conductor of the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI, Torino, since 2009. He studied composition and conducting in Bratislava, St. Petersburg (with Ilya Musin) and in Paris.

The 2015 season saw his debut with Orchestre National de France. In the following seasons, he led the Philharmonia Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Gewandhaus Leipzig, Swedish Radio, Oslo Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Dresden and Munich Philharmonic. He made his U.S. debut with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic and NSO Washington.

In 2010-2011, he led the Munich Philharmonic, Philharmonia, Maggio Musicale in Florence, Santa Cecilia Orchestra in Rome, Houston Symphony and Los Angeles Philharmonic as well as La Boheme at La Fenice Venice. With his RAI Orchestra, he visited the Abu Dhabi Classics with soloist Yo-Yo Ma. In 2011-2012 he had his debut with the Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, Berlin Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony and led again the Staatskapelle Dresden, Pittsburgh Symphony, Munich Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris and Orchestra di Santa Cecilia. With his RAI Orchestra, he made a tour primarily to the Musikverein Vienna, the Philharmonie in Berlin and to the first Festival of Radio Orchestras in Bucarest. In 2012-2013, he had his debut with the New York Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony and Filarmonica della Scala in Milan. He conducted the Philharmonia, National Symphony Washington, Orchestre de Paris, Swedish Radio and Munich Philharmonic. In 2013-2014 his engagements took him to the Enescu Festival in Bucharest with OSN Rai, to the Bratislava Festival with the Orchestra di Santa Cecilia Rome, debut with the NHK Tokyo on a Japan tour and conducting returns to the Philharmonia, Pittsburgh Symphony, WDR Cologne, NDR Hamburg, Swedish Radio Orchestra and Munich Philharmonic, as well as to opera productions (Puccini's Butterfly and Prokofiev's The Love for three Oranges) at the Maggio Musicale in Florence.

His engagements in 2014 and 2015 bring him back to the San Francisco, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestras, Los Angeles and New York Philharmonics, National Symphony Washington, D.C., Philharmonia at the RFH, Orchestre National de France, as well as Orchestra dell'Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome. He will have debuts with Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal as well as the Wiener Symphoniker and the Konzerthaus Berlin.

On the opera house stage, he will conduct productions of Turandot at Teatro San Carlo Napoli and Jenufa at Teatro Comunale Bologna. In November 2014, he made a tour with his RAI Orchestra to Munich, Cologne, Dusseldorf, Zurich and Basel.

JOSHUA ROMAN has earned an international reputation for his wide-ranging repertoire, a commitment to communicating the essence of music in visionary ways, artistic leadership and versatility. As well as being a celebrated performer, he is recognized as an accomplished composer, curator and programmer.

In a multifaceted 2015-2016 season, Roman will premiere his own Cello Concerto with the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra, and subsequently perform it with ProMusica Chamber Orchestra. In April 2016, he begins a residency with the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, as part of which he will perform the Mason Bates Cello Concerto. Roman premiered this work with Seattle Symphony in 2014, and will perform it with various orchestras throughout the 2015-2016 season. He will pursue his artistic vision both as artistic director of TownMusic at Town Hall Seattle and as artistic advisor of Seattle's Second Inversion. His plans for TownMusic include a presentation of his own song cycle, ...we do it to one another, based on Tracy K. Smith's book of poems "Life on Mars," with soprano Jessica Rivera. He also continues to perform classics of the repertoire, and in February makes his debut with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra playing Dvo?ák's Cello Concerto. Highlights of recent seasons have included a solo performance on the TED2015 main stage, performances with the Columbus Symphony, a program of chamber works by Lera Auerbach at San Francisco Performances with Auerbach and violinist Philippe Quint, and appearances with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra, New World Symphony, Seattle Symphony, Tucson Symphony, Moscow State Symphony Orchestra and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. He premiered Dreamsongs, a cello concerto written for him by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Aaron Jay Kernis, and had two of his own compositions premiered in Washington, D.C. and Seattle. He also served as alumnus-in-residence at the prestigious Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara.

Roman has demonstrated inspirational artistic leadership throughout his career. As artistic director of TownMusic in Seattle he has showcased his own eclectic musical influences and chamber music favorites, as well as promoting newly commissioned works. Under his direction, the series has offered world premieres of compositions by some of today's brightest young composers, and performances by cutting-edge ensembles. He has also recently been appointed the inaugural Artistic Advisor of award-winning contemporary streaming channel Second Inversion, launched by Seattle's KING-FM to cultivate the next generation of classical audiences.

Roman's cultural leadership includes using digital platforms to harness new audiences. In 2009, he developed "The Popper Project," performing, recording and uploading the complete etudes from David Popper's High School of Cello Playing to his dedicated YouTube channel (youtube.com/joshuaromancello). In his latest YouTube project, "Everyday Bach," Roman performs Bach's cello suites in beautiful settings around the world. He has collaborated with photographer Chase Jarvis on Nikon video projects, and Paste magazine singled out Roman and DJ Spooky for their cello and iPad cover of Radiohead's "Everything in Its Right Place," created for the Voice Project. For his creative initiatives on behalf of classical music, Roman was named a 2011 TED Fellow, joining a select group of next generation innovators who show potential to positively affect the world.

Beyond these initiatives, Roman's adventurous spirit has led to collaborations with artists outside the music community, including his co-creation of "On Grace" with Tony Award-nominated actress Anna Deavere Smith, a work for actor and cello that premiered in February 2012 at San Francisco's Grace Cathedral. His outreach endeavors have taken him to Uganda with his violin-playing siblings, where they played chamber music in schools, HIV/AIDS centers and displacement camps, communicating a message of hope through music.

Before embarking on a solo career, Roman spent two seasons as principal cellist of the Seattle Symphony, a position he won in 2006 at the age of 22. Since that time he has appeared as a soloist with the San Francisco Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Symphony, Mariinsky Orchestra, Alabama Symphony and Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional del Ecuador, among many others. An active chamber musician, Roman has collaborated with established artists such as Andrius Zlabys, Cho-Liang Lin, Assad Brothers, Earl Carlyss, Christian Zacharias and Yo-Yo Ma, as well as other dynamic young soloists and performers from New York's vibrant music scene, including the JACK Quartet, Talea Ensemble, Derek Bermel, the Enso String Quartet and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

A native of Oklahoma City, Roman began playing the cello at the age of three on a quarter-size instrument, and gave his first public recital at age 10. Home-schooled until he was 16, he then pursued his musical studies at the Cleveland Institute of Music with Richard Aaron. He received his bachelor's degree in cello Performance in 2004, and his master's in 2005, as a student of Desmond Hoebig, former principal cellist of the Cleveland Orchestra. Roman is grateful for the loan of an 1899 cello by Giulio Degani of Venice.

The PITTSBURGH SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, celebrating 120 years of music making in the 2015-2016 season, is credited with a rich history of the world's finest conductors and musicians, and a strong commitment to the Pittsburgh region and its citizens. Past music directors have included Fritz Reiner (1938-1948), William Steinberg (1952-1976), Andre Previn (1976-1984), Lorin Maazel (1984-1996) and Mariss Jansons (1995-2004). This tradition of outstanding international music directors was furthered in fall 2008, when Austrian conductor Manfred Honeck became music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony. The orchestra has been at the forefront of championing new American works, and gave the first performance of Leonard Bernstein's Symphony No. 1 "Jeremiah" in 1944 and John Adams' Short Ride in a Fast Machine in 1986. The Pittsburgh Symphony has a long and illustrious history in the areas of recordings and radio concerts. As early as 1936, the Pittsburgh Symphony broadcast on the airwaves coast-to-coast and in the late 1970s it made the ground breaking PBS series "Previn and the Pittsburgh." The orchestra has received increased national attention since 1982 through network radio broadcasts on Public Radio International, produced by Classical WQED-FM 89.3, made possible by the musicians of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. With a long and distinguished history of touring both domestically and overseas since 1900-including 36 international tours to Europe, the Far East and South America-the Pittsburgh Symphony continues to be critically acclaimed as one of the world's greatest orchestras.

HEINZ HALL FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS is owned and operated by Pittsburgh Symphony, Inc., a non-profit organization, and is the year-round home of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. The cornerstone of Pittsburgh's Cultural District, Heinz Hall also hosts many other events that do not feature its world-renowned orchestra, including Broadway shows, comedians, speakers and much more. For a full calendar of upcoming non-symphony events at the hall, visit heinzhall.org