NJSO Presents 2020 Winter Festival, IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Music Director Xian Zhang's love of opera and ballet inspires three weeks of epic works from the stage in the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra's 2020 Winter Festival, January 3-19 in six New Jersey venues. The Orchestra's signature artistic event features music from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet, Mozart's Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro and Wagner's Ring cycle, all conducted by Zhang.

The festival's opening weekend features selections from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet ballet, paired with the NJSO premiere of Clara Schumann's Piano Concerto-featuring returning pianist Inon Barnatan-and "The Moldau" from Smetana's Má vlast (January 3-5 in Newark, Red Bank and Morristown). The January 3 concert opens with the annual featured showcase performance by the NJSO Youth Orchestras' Academy Orchestra.

In a new collaboration, the NJSO welcomes singers from the Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program for scenes from Mozart's Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro. The all-Mozart program also features Concertmaster Eric Wyrick's annual solo appearance with the Orchestra (in the composer's Fourth Violin Concerto); it opens with Exsultate, jubilate, a church solo from Mozart's teenage years (January 9-12 in Englewood, Newark and New Brunswick).

The NJSO premiere of Wagner's The Ring Without Words, arranged by the late American conductor Lorin Maazel, anchors the festival's closing weekend. Simon Trpčeski, who made his NJSO debut on Xian Zhang's first program as music director, returns to New Jersey stages for Lizst's Second Piano Concerto on a program that opens with the Prelude to Act I of Wagner's Lohengrin (January 17-19 in Princeton, New Brunswick and Newark).

NJSO Accent events include Classical Conversations, talkbacks with Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artist Development Program singers, a Prelude Performance by young musicians from the NJSO Academy and a closer look at Wagner's Ring cycle with pianist and musicologist Jeffrey Swann. More information is available at njsymphony.org/accents.

Tickets start at $20 and are available for purchase at njsymphony.org or 1.800.ALLEGRO (255.3476). Student tickets are $10, available at njsymphony.org/students one month in advance.

More information on the Winter Festival and related events is available at njsymphony.org/winterfestival.