Las Vegas Philharmonic Celebrates Opening Night Set for 9/9

The Las Vegas Philharmonic will commence its 19th concert season with Opening Night: Don Juan - Cabrera Conducts Strauss, Adams & Brahms on Saturday, September 9, 2017 at 7:30 PM in Reynolds Hall at The Smith Center for the Performing Arts. Music Director Donato Cabrera will host a pre-concert conversation in Reynolds Hall one hour prior to the performance (6:30 PM) for patrons who want to learn more about the history and meaning behind the music to be performed that evening. Following the performance, the Philharmonic will host a champagne, wine and dessert reception on-stage ($50 per person) to toast to the new season.

The orchestra begins with Richard Strauss's Don Juan, a symphonic poem that successfully launched the 24-year old composer's career after its debut in November of 1889. The music brilliantly captures the essence of this notorious lover from its rigorous opening, tender love scene and passionate duel to the death.

Next, the orchestra segues into Common Tones in Simple Time, an ethereal piece composed in 1979 by one of the most frequently performed composers of our time, John Adams. The music demonstrates Adams's Minimalist orchestral style and simulates the feeling of soaring above the landscape. Adams describes it as "a pastoral with pulse."

The performance closes with the grandeur of Johannes Brahms's Piano Concerto No. 1 performed by Mykola Suk, Associate Professor of Music at UNLV. The powerful work combines piano and orchestra with equal prominence and alludes to a few of Brahms's musical influences including Beethoven, Schubert and Schumann.

Suk gained international recognition as the winner of the First Prize and Gold Medal at the 1971 International Liszt-Bartok Competition in Budapest. His career has spanned four continents, with performances in the most prestigious venues from the Great Hall of Moscow Conservatory to Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall and Carnegie Hall in New York City. Suk received his Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in Piano Performance from Moscow State Conservatory and served as Professor of Piano at the Kiev State Conservatory and Moscow State Conservatory prior to moving to the United States.

"The opening concert to our 19th season encapsulates what the Las Vegas Philharmonic is all about," says Music Director Donato Cabrera. "We begin with one the most beautiful and virtuosic pieces ever written for the orchestra, Richard Strauss's tone poem, Don Juan. It shows off every section of our wonderful orchestra and gets the season off to a rousing start! We are celebrating the 70th birthday of America's most famous living composer, John Adams, with a performance of one of his earliest orchestral compositions, Common Tones in Simple Time. The second half of the concert showcases a local piano hero and international talent, Mykola Suk, in Brahms's towering Piano Concerto No. 1. I so look forward to seeing everyone there for this very special (and fun!) concert."

Single tickets include five price levels in Reynolds Hall:. PT Box = $109, A Seating = $105, B Seating = $70, C Seating = $50 and D Seating = $30. Tickets can be purchased online through lvphil.org or The Smith Center Box Office at 702.749.2000.

The Las Vegas Philharmonic will continue to offer shuttle bus services to its Reynolds Hall evening performances from the Anthem Center at Independence Center in Henderson and the Starbright Theater in Summerlin. A roundtrip bus ticket costs $20 per concert and can be purchased in conjunction with the patron's concert tickets.