The Rensselaer Orchestra will join forces with The Saint Rose Symphony Orchestra for a special spring concert performance at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, May 1, in the Curtis R. Priem Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC).
The two orchestras will each perform individually and then join together for a finale that will feature nearly 100 musicians onstage together. They will perform Tchaikovsky’s Suite from Swan Lake together.
“This concert will be an excellent opportunity to continue to establish Rensselaer as a part of the broader Capital Region community of musicians,” said conductor Nicholas DeMaison. “I think it’s important for Rensselaer students to work with musicians from outside the campus community. The joint concert will also provide the students in The Saint Rose Symphony Orchestra the unique opportunity to play in the unparalleled setting of EMPAC.”
The concert repertoire will include:
Overture to Der Freischütz – Weber
Symphony No. 2 – Sibelius
Academic Festival Overture – Brahms
Suite from Swan Lake – Tchaikovsky
“It has been a real joy planning this collaboration with Nicholas DeMaison, a wonderful director and musician who is doing great things with the Rensselaer music ensembles. The Saint Rose students are excited about performing at EMPAC and have been preparing music for this event all semester. I am thrilled that they will have this opportunity to perform in one of the premiere concert halls,” said Dr. David Bebe, director of The Saint Rose Symphony Orchestra.
As DeMaison has led the orchestra over the past year, he said the student musicians have grown as a group and are taking on more challenging material, such as the Sibelius piece. “We’ve had a year to build our routine; it feels like more of an organic process now,” he said.
The concert is free and open to the public. Prior to the concert, the Rensselaer Orchestra will hold two open rehearsals at EMPAC, from 6 to 8 p.m. Thursday, April 24, and Monday, April 28, in the concert hall. Members of the public and the Rensselaer community are invited to attend the working rehearsals.
