Thalia Symphony: Hope
$25 ($20 student/senior); pay-what-you-can tickets from $2
Georges Bizet — L'Arlésienne Suite No. 2 ("IV. Farandole")
Joe Hisaishi — Sinfonia ("I. Pulsation" & "II. Fugue")
Ralph Vaughan Williams — Symphony No. 5 in D major
Thalia Symphony under the direction of Joseph Pollard White presents an afternoon of uplifting, hopeful music leading into the holiday season.
French composer Georges Bizet's charming music for the play L'Arlesienne ("The Girl from Arles") was written in 1872 just 3 years before his famous opera Carmen (and his own death in 1875). The music transports us to the South of France with all its warmth, light, and color.
Japanese composer Joe Hisaishi achieved international recognition for his scores to the Studio Ghibli films (Castle in the Sky, Spirited Away, My Neighbor Totoro, and others) that brought contemporary Japanese animation to the world's attention. As wih many of the Studio Ghibli films, his Sinfonia explores the dichotomy between the mechanized and the natural world using both modern 'minimalism' and more traditional melody and harmony.
British composer Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote his Symphony No. 5 during the dark years of the Second World War. Unlike many other pieces written during those years, it does not dwell of suffering or victory. Rather, it looks forward: to reconciliation, peace, and hope.