Bainbridge Symphony Orchestra Season Opens This November

Bainbridge Symphony Orchestra's opening concerts will introduce our new Music Director and Conductor Mario Alejandro Torres and showcase a program that is set to comfort, welcome, and delight our beloved audience. The concert opens with the soothing and warmhearted Gayane's Adagio by Aram Khachaturian, from his ballet "Gayane." Nathan Chang then joins the stage to perform Elgar's mesmerizing Cello Concerto in E minor, one of the most important pieces in the cello literature. The BSO will conclude the concert with Brahms' most endearing symphony, Symphony No. 2 in N*E*R*D Major. After almost twenty years of perfecting and working on his first symphony, the second bloomed effortlessly from the master's mind. On the surface, this work is light in character; digging deeper, we find that Brahms' second symphony embraces an expansive and nuanced array of emotions.

Mario Alejandro Torres is a conductor, teacher, and performer native to San Pedro Sula, Honduras. Currently based in Seattle, Washington, Mr. Torres made his Benaroya Hall conducting debut in collaboration with Maestros Ludovic Morlot and David Alexander Rahbee in an exciting concert with the University of Washington Symphony Orchestra. For the past two years, he has served in a conducting fellowship with the Seattle Symphony, assisting Maestro Morlot in collaboration with artists such as Hilary Hahn and John Luther Adams. As the Music Director of Poulsbo Community Orchestra, he has brought a new and exciting sound to the ensemble. Outside of the United States, he has conducted performances with the Eddy Snijders Orchestra in Paramaribo, Suriname, and in his hometown with the professional Chamber Orchestra of San Pedro Sula, and Victoriano Lopez School of Music Choir.

Cellist Nathan Chan discovered his talent for music at an early age through conducting. Before he was two, he could emulate the styles of conductors he saw on music videos such as Seiji Ozawa, Herbert von Karajan and Leonard Bernstein, using a chopstick as a baton. As a toddler, his imitations were so intuitively musical that he caught the attention of San Francisco Opera Assistant Conductor Sara Jobin. Under her eye, he made his debut as a conductor at age three, leading the San Jose Chamber Orchestra in a set of Mozart variations, despite not yet being able to read music. This was followed by a guest appearance with the Palo Alto Philharmonic a year later, conducting the first movement of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. Initially drawn to the sounds of low strings, he began formal music lessons with cellist Irene Sharp at age five. He later studied with Sieun Lin at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Listen to Nathan online at https://www.youtube.com/nathanchancello.

Bainbridge Symphony Orchestra's 2018 - 2019 season debut is November 10 and 11, Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 3:00 p.m. A pre-concert chat is offered on Sunday,November 11 at 2:15 p.m. Tickets, $21 for adults, and $18 for seniors, students, military, and teachers, may be purchased online at www.bainbridgeperformingarts.org, by phone at 206.842.8569 or in person at BPA, 200 Madison Avenue North, Bainbridge Island. Each youth receives free admission when accompanied by a paying adult thanks to the BSO's "Youth in Music Initiative" funded by Wicklund Dental. BPA Box Office hours are 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. Wednesday through Friday, and one hour prior to each performance.

Bainbridge Performing Arts extends special thanks to Media Sponsors Classical KING FM 98.1 and KCTS 9 - Public Television and Community Sponsors Carly's Rolling Bay Café and Wicklund Dental. BPA is supported, in part, by Bainbridge Community Foundation, the City of Bainbridge Island, and One Call for All. Bainbridge Performing Arts is pleased to offer an "Open Doors" program. Free and reduced-cost tickets to most events are available to community members in need through our partner Helpline House thanks to a grant from the Mabee Family Foundation. Please contact the BPA Box Office at 206.842.8569 or Helpline House to reserve tickets today.

Find out more about BPA at www.bainbridgeperformingarts.org, or check us out on Facebook (www.facebook.com/BPAonline and www.facebook.com/BainbridgeSymphonyOrchestra), follow BPA and BSO on LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com/in/bpasallyjomartine) and Twitter (@BPAPresents).

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