By Eric Dundon
Starting with a free concert available Thursday, June 3, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra has announced a new slate of digital concerts available to view via slso.org.
Following eight weeks of in-person concerts at Powell Hall this spring led by Music Director Stéphane Denève with ensembles of SLSO musicians, digital concerts will continue throughout the summer. The five-concert set of performances will be released throughout summer 2021 and are available to stream for 30 days through September 25—the start of the orchestra’s 2021/2022 live concert season at Powell Hall.
Filmed in Powell Hall with the SLSO’s new, high-definition camera system and available to stream on-demand on slso.org, these digital concerts provide a new perspective of the orchestra in concerts led by Denève, the SLSO’s new Assistant Conductor Stephanie Childress, and by SLSO musicians themselves.
The summer slate of digital concerts begins with a free concert featuring the SLSO conducting debut of Assistant Conductor Stephanie Childress. She leads works including Benjamin Britten’s Simple Symphony, Antonín Dvořák’s Serenade for Strings, and the first SLSO performances of Sally Beamish’s The Day Dawn. This free concert is available through July 3. Appointed in 2020 and making her performance debut with Denève and the orchestra in March 2021, Childress’ direction of this strings-only program earned rave reviews.
“Childress has an elastic quality about her, cutting a strong yet pliable figure on the podium,” wrote Eric Meyer for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “Throughout the concert, she seemed at home in front of the SLSO — in command, into the music, and having some genuine fun with the musicians and audience alike.”
A second concert will be available for free beginning July 29. This concert features chamber music performances by SLSO musicians of pieces by Gabriela Lena Frank, Jessie Montgomery, and Caroline Shaw, a digital continuation of the SLSO’s annual Equal Play: Celebrating Women Composers community concert, presented by Commerce Bank. Equal Play began in 2018 as a concert presented at Washington University, and later moved to Powell Hall due to the concert’s popularity. The free Equal Play concert will be available through August 28.
Other digital concerts include:
Music Director Stéphane Denève leading favorites including Aaron Copland’s original instrumentation of his Appalachian Spring Suite, Arthur Honegger’s Pastorale d’été, and Camille Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals with pianists Alessio Bax and Lucille Chung in their SLSO debuts. Available on July 15 for 30 days.
Denève leads the SLSO winds in a program that includes Richard Strauss’ Serenade for Winds and a pinnacle of repertoire for winds: W.A. Mozart’s Serenade No. 10, “Gran Partita.” Available on August 5 for 30 days.
Denève leads the SLSO in a program inspired by childhood, with the first SLSO performances of two pieces inspired by the poem Songs My Mother Taught Me, composed for voice and piano by Antonín Dvořák and Charles Ives, and both arranged by Michi Wiancko. The concert also includes Sergei Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf and Igor Stravinsky’s Pulcinella Suite. Available on August 26 for 30 days.
Access to the free concert released today, as well as tickets for additional digital concerts ($15 per concert), are available at the SLSO’s website. Each concert includes program notes and an introduction by Denève, Childress, or SLSO musicians.
Also announced on June 3, weekly SLSO concert rebroadcasts will continue each Saturday at 8:00pm on 90.7 KWMU St. Louis Public Radio. These acclaimed performances are available to stream for 30 days on slso.org/radio.
Eric Dundon is the Public Relations Manager for the SLSO.