Beethoven’s Eroica at Severance Music Center

SHOSTAKOVICH Violin Concerto No. 2

BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 3, “Eroica”

The Cleveland Orchestra Alan Gilbert, conductor Leonidas Kavakos, violin

The Cleveland Orchestra welcomes back Alan Gilbert, who began his celebrated career here as an assistant conductor in the 1990s, to conduct perhaps the most revolutionary masterstroke of Beethoven’s output: the epoch-making “Eroica” Symphony, a work of staggering audacity that redefined the expressive and structural possibilities of the symphonic form. The program opens with Shostakovich’s final concerto, written for the great violinist David Oistrakh and performed here by the mesmerizing Leonidas Kavakos.

This program’s Concert Preview lectures will be presented by David Rothenberg, Professor of Music, Case Western Reserve University.