(dramatic orchestral music) - Feel the power of music a it captivates and connects us.

- Music is love.

Music is passion.

- [Sarah] Music belongs to every This is Minnesota Orchestra.

(orchestra tuning up) (audience cheering and applaudin - Good evening!

Good evening and welcome to Orchestra Hall.

What a wonderful audience we hav I am your host Bill Eddins.

We have an exci...

Thank you (audience cheers and applauds) We have an exciting and varied program this evening.

Minnesota Orchestra's first associate concertmaster Susie Park will perform "Altar d the violin concerto by Mexican-b composer Gabriela Ortiz.

The second work... Go ahead.

Yes, absolutely!

(audience cheering and applaudin This is the second work of Gabri the orchestra is performing this season, and tonight, this piece is having its Minnesota Orchestra premiere.

(audience cheering and applaudin In the second half of the progra is the third symphony of Prokofi known as "The Fiery Angel", which showcases music that the Russian composer reused from his opera of the sam But first, the concert opens with "Retratos Australes" by Venezuelan-Chilean composer Miguel Farias, who is here with us at Orchestra Hall tonight for this performance!

(audience cheering and applaudin A warm Minnesota welcome to you, So this program is conducted by Chilean-Italian conductor Paolo Bortolameolli, and here to lead the Minnesota O is our concertmaster Erin Keefe.

(audience cheering and applaudin (audience cheering and applaudin (orchestra tuning up) (audience applauding) ("Retratos Australes: Tirana") ("Retratos Australes: Tirana" co ("Retratos Australes: Tirana" co ("Retratos Australes: Tirana" co ("Retratos Australes: Tirana" co ("Retratos Australes: Minga") ("Retratos Australes: Minga" con ("Retratos Australes: Minga" con ("Retratos Australes: Minga" con ("Retratos Australes: Minga" con ("Retratos Australes: Chinchiner ("Retratos Australes: Chinchinero" continues) ("Retratos Australes: Chinchinero" continues) ("Retratos Australes: Chinchinero" continues) ("Retratos Australes: Chinchinero" continues) (audience cheering and applaudin (audience cheering and applaudin A concatenation of unlikely sounds and rhythms through the three shor movements of "Retratos Australes by Miguel Farias.

It is wonderful to have him here with us tonight and he certainly packs a lot into a very short period of time Thank you, Miguel.

(audience cheering and applaudin Now, the same can be said for our next composer, Gabriela Ortiz, whose brilliant fluorescent violin concerto "Altar de Cuerda" premiere with the LA Philharmonic in 2022 and it was part of Ortiz's 2023 recording with the LA Phil, "Revolucion diamantina", the album that was recently reco with three Grammy awards, including Best Contemporary Classical Composition for Gabriela Ortiz.

And tonight, "Altar de Cuerda" will have its Minnesota premiere courtesy of our colorful, in man first associate concertmaster Su (audience cheering and applaudin Ortiz's fascination with her own Mexican heritage and the region's history i prominent throughout this work.

The first movement, "Mudejar Chi references the people o Mexico City in slang chilango, and it's also a nod to th Andalusian roots of the dedicate the violinist Maria Duenas.

The second movement refers to the open chapels that were a fixture of th 16th-century Mexican churches.

And the third movement, the last one, "Maya-Deco", evokes the architecture of the great Mayan empire.

Throughout the piece is the flair for sound and rhythm that is so much a part of Ortiz's musical language.

Now, in a moment, concertmaster will tune the orchestra.

Then we will welcome back our guest conductor Paolo Bortolameolli and Susie Pa the first associate concertmaste of the Minnesota Orchestra with the Minnesota premiere of "Altar de Cuerda" by Gabriela Enjoy.

(audience applauding) (orchestra tuning up) (orchestra tuning up) (audience applauding) (audience cheering and applaudin ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chila ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Mudejar Chilango" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) ("Altar de Cuerda: Canto Abierto" continues) (violin tuning up) ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco") ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co ("Altar de Cuerda: Maya-Deco" co (audience cheering and applaudin - "Altar de Cuerda" or "String Altar" by Gabriela Ortiz.

Paolo Bortolameolli led the Minnesota Orchestra.

The soloist tonight was the orch first associate concertmaster Su No surprise there is pretty wild applause for her, here at Orchestra Hall, from the and from her colleagues in the Minnesota Orchestra.

Hard to imagine the stamina and required to execute a piece like When I asked Susie about that earlier this week, she made specific reference to the part you just heard, that last coda, which she described as "frenetic, and a mixture of textures rhythms, and violent techniques.

She said, "You just have t keep your focus until the end."

And so she did.

The conductor motioning to the percussion players to stand and the brass as well.

Trumpets and low brass.

And the horn section.

Jaclyn Rainey, the principal hor And the woodwinds, and those players were also playing the glass, the crystal glass that you heard quite well in the middle movement, but at other sections of the piece as well.

(audience cheering and applaudin Susie, just a fierce and exacting player.

Huge heart.

We are so lucky to be able to hear her every week as a member of this orchestra and it's kind of a thrill and I find illuminating to hear what she and her violin when they're put in the spotligh She's been the first associate concertmaster of this orchestra for 10 years and she was persuaded to take the audition by a player who sits to her right, most weeks, that is concertmaster Erin Keefe.

Those two have a friendship and musical bond that goes back many years.

I think you'll hear more about t during intermission tonight.

She's also been a driving force behind the orchestra's attention to broadening their re with the commitment to perform and record music by underrepresented composers, often women and composers of col Exactly what you heard her play Susie grew up in Sydney, Austral Her parents live there now.

I'm sure they're probably watching this concert on Twin Cities PBS or the orchestra's website.

So, Mr. And Mrs. Park, you must be really proud of your She is a gem.

I'm Melissa Ousley in the radio tending to those of yo listening on YourClassical NPR.

If you're watching tonight's con your host is Bill Eddins and he is backstage right now.

Hi there, Bill.

- Good evening, Melissa.

- I have really enjoyed this concert so far, and also, lest we forget tonight's conduct who I guess was seven years old when his father took him to his first live concert and the program include Beethoven's symphony number five and his dad really prepared him.

He introduced him to themes and different parts of that symp and what caught him by surprise was not just hearing it live but how moving it was for him.

- Yeah.

I'm not surprised.

All of us who are in music have those moments in our history in our past, that we just remember as being seminal.

We had this experience in a concert hall with live music and all these people around us and we've gone, "Wow, I need to do this for the rest of my life."

(both chuckling) - Yeah, and I guess Paolo found himself crying, he was so moved, this seven-year and he focused on music from the He went to a couple of schools i and then he came to the US to study at Peabody and at Yale and piano was his instrument, but really the role of the condu you can relate to this, is what caught his attention, and he's a strong advocate for music education and as you just heard through the first half of this p he's got a passion for new music - Right.

I've heard.

Including works by composers we've heard tonight, Miguel Farias and Gabriela Ortiz He's music director of the Opera Nacional de Chile and also the Filarmonica de Sant as well as music director of the Orquesta Sinfonica Nacional Juvenil in Chile.

So, he gets around.

You know, he takes his passion for new music all over the world.

- Yes, he does.

Bill, thank you so much for shar your passion with us tonight.

- Thank you so much, Melissa.

For more about tonight's concert, our guest conductor, the composers, artist bios, including our own Susie Park, the full program notes are poste on minnesotaorchestra.org/blog.

Now, Susie, who just dazzled us with Gabriela Ortiz's violin con has been a feature performer here in Minnesota, even before her appointment as first associate concertmaster She was born and raised in Austr She's performed across the world with a list of top flight musicians as long as my arm.

She has a warm personality, which really comes across in her playing and in person.

Let's learn some more about Susi Thank you.

(gentle violin music) - I'm playing the violin concerto by Gabriela Ortiz, who is a Mexican composer.

This is "An Altar to Strings".

The first movement encapsulates residents of Mexico City, and Ortiz is one herself.

Creating space and conserving en to immersing yourself in learning a piece like this is really important.

It's very compelling, riveting m and not just in that it's fast or it's challenging and wild, but it's also very ethereal and The orchestra's played some of her pieces before, so I've gotten to know the language of her writing a li but this is really a... (chuckles) An immersion course in that language.

(warm orchestral music) I'm Susie Park and I'm the first associate concertmaster of the Minnesota Orchestra.

I grew up in Sydney, Australia.

Sydney is a beautiful, beautiful and I'm very lucky to have grown up in such a sunny and warm climate.

When I was two, my fathe brought home a 16th-size violin and he took me to a violin teach and she said I was too little, but to bring me back in a year.

And so, exactly a year later, I and that's how I began m journey as a little violinist.

I loved playing the violin.

I'm incredibly lucky to have had very supportive parents who were involved heavily in my musical education.

They valued it so much, and so I loved learning.

Because they loved music, I think that passion and love wa imprinted on me.

A big part of who you become as is strongly influenced by the kind of people your teachers and your mentors a I was not only taught music and technique and violining, but also structures for being a good person, discipline and how that is part growing and developing yourself as a human, and kindness and generosity.

My first main violin teacher, Christopher Kimber.

Mr. Kimber used to play with the Boston Symphony and he's Australian, but he was trained in America.

He studied with Oscar Shumsky and Galamian, and so I was really lucky to study with him and be part of the Galamian line I moved to America as a teenager when I was accepted to the Curtis Institute of Music for my bachelor's degree and then I lived in Boston for a few years to get my postgraduate studies at the New England Conservatory.

And then after that time, I went to live in New York City and that was a lot of fun.

(Susie chuckles) But I was playing a lot of chamb I was playing with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

I was doing freelancing, I was traveling a lot, playing a bit with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

I started playing with the Minnesota Orchestra in 2015 and my first concerts were the Cuba Tour in May of 2015.

And that was such a powerful experience and it was an amazing way to be folded into the family of this orchestra.

So, yeah, I'll never forget that It was really a dream.

Erin and I have known each other for a long time, so we're old friends and I think the benefits that come with that kind of relationship is that you can be very honest with each - Susie and I met when we were i I was one year ahead of her, so I met her, her freshman year and we were in the same studio, and in my last year, we played in a quartet together for the whole year, which was re I am the luckiest person alive to be sitting in with Susie Park She is like a true artist.

It's really a rare blend of arti and her playing is meticulous.

She notices everything.

She's so sensitive.

She's got radar like crazy.

And so I love sitting in with so who I trust inherently in all th I think we make a great team, maybe because of our shared teac and we went to many of the same and so we sort of have the same musical upbringing, which I think is is pretty rare to have two people on the same stand that are that similar.

She brings this depth of sound and more than anything, energy.

(dramatic violin music) - My instrument was made in 1740 in Piacenza, Italy.

And so obviously it's been around for a long time and played by many people.

This instrument's papers lists some of the previous owners.

Gyorgy Pauk, who is a wonderful, famous Hungarian violist who recently passed away, and he said to me, "This is the instrument that I did all of my...

The hard work of my caree happened with this instrument, where I, you know, did the competitions and the concerts that helped bring me to..." You know, where he later went.

It reminded me in that we're merely caretakers of instruments like these and it (dramatic violin music continues I really enjoy being part of a s that you're immersed in.

And I would like to think that our string sound is quite warm and rich, and sumptuous and deep.

(warm orchestral music) Growing up in the tradition, or at least studying with teachers who valued sound production, quality of sou I think that's informed my sensi my appreciation for just a sound that you wanna be h I love to express whatever emotion, character, fee and I love to share that with an because I feel so much when I pl and I think that it's so powerful, so important.

So, it's such a gift to be able to share that and communicate that with people around you and feel a connection that way, that you're experiencing somethi And I think that's just one of the most beautiful things you can experience in life.

(Susie chuckles) And doing it with people around you who are friends and you know, it's truly a honor to do that as your work.

(warm orchestral music continues - Susie mentioned that she loves musical expressions of emotion and character with an audience.

After all, it's audiences that bring performances to life.

To further reflect on the joy and meaning audiences bring to the Minnesota Orchestra, here are principle percussion Br principle bass Kristen Bruya, and principle trombone Douglas W with a love letter to you, our a (bright orchestral music) - When we rehearse in the hall, there's obviously no audience.

There's a lot of reverberation.

We hear a lot of sound coming off of that back wall, and then it comes to us.

It's actually easier to hear each other on stage when we've got a full audience o But beyond just the logistics of the energy that we pick up from our audience is like, it's hard to describe because they're so engaged and excited to be there.

You pick up on the feel of that, and you just sit up a littl straighter and you just focus, but you're focused in a good way about, like, "Let's do something really impor Let's do something really energetic, exciting here."

(bright orchestral music continu They're wanting that, you delive and it's like a symbiotic relati that is unlike any other.

- The Minnesota Orchestra audien is one of the most engaging and engaged audiences I've ever played for.

At the front of every score, the composer will say, "Here's the makeup of what the o should be for this piece."

And I think in every single score, it should also say, "And 2,000 people in the audienc (chuckles) You know?

Because what is art without an a I am very lucky to be right at the edge of the stage because I get to speak with the audience members on a regular basis, because I'm right there, and I often welcome people to the bass section who are sitting in the chairs that are right next to us.

So that's really fun.

One of the times that I was engaging with people at the edge of the stage, I was "Oh, come up, please put your hand on the bass.

Feel these vibrations."

And it turns out that this woman met each other, in meeting my ba And in me introducing them to this beautiful instrument tha they started talking.

Turns out they started dating and were married within three months.

Which was just like, "What?"

I just, I couldn't...

It brought me so much joy and ha Double bass bringing people together.

(laughs) Who knew?

(gentle orchestral music) - I generally greet audience mem before concerts in the lobby, just to thank people for coming.

Frequently, we'll get in a lengthy conversation and I'll get to find out a little bit about them and they'll find out a little bit about me.

I've made a lot of connections and the stories are important to But one in particular just struc as so interesting and surprising We were about to play Sibelius with Osmo and I had been out in the lobby talking with patrons and I went back through the ring and saw an older gentleman and started talking to him and he told me that he was very excited about hearing Sibelius's first symphon And then he proceeded to tell me his introduction to Sibelius's first symphony.

He was on a submarine in World W The officer in charge of the rec was a big Sibelius fan, and that's where this gentleman initially heard that piece and that turned him into a classical orchestral music lover for his entire life.

And that particular piece was very special to him because that was his firs introduction to orchestral music And I just thought, "Wow, that's You were on a World War I submarine listening to Sibelius, and now you're back here."

I think it was 70 years later.

Everything is better for me, after talking to people in the l I'm more focused.

I'm more into it.

I'm more open to being carried away by the music, than if I didn't talk to patrons It's the weirdest thing.

It's like the best thing that ever happened to me when I started doing it, as far as my career in the orche (dramatic orchestral music) - We'll have busloads of younger show up to our concerts, whether that's they're college-a or sometimes it's high school ki And I always jump at that opport because to come out in the lobby and see this large group of folks who are in their teens or and see their excitement and their enthusiasm about what we were doing is, I mean, it really fuels me.

It's like it feeds my soul as we to see that we actually ar having an impact on these people and they're so excited.

I tell all of them I wa where they were at some point, hoping, thinking, dreaming about getting on stage at some time in And I just try as best as I can to encourage 'em to keep going.

And I think I speak probably for everybody on stage.

When we feel your enthusiasm and your passion for what we do, it makes all of the work and the blood, sweat and tears that we go through to work on this difficult repertoire, all worth it.

So, if you're a member of our audience, thank you.

Really appreciate it.

(audience cheering and applaudin - It's true.

It means the world to make music Now, coming up next, the third symphony of Prokofiev.

It is known as "The Fiery Angel" and you will be forgiven if you think that means it's a work about the end of day It has that name because it features much of the music from the opera of the same name, which Prokofiev worked on from 1919 to 1926, but never saw a stage during his It was eventually premiered in Venice, in 1955.

Being reluctant to let good music lie fallow, Prokofiev reworked his opera as this symphony, which was premiered by Pierre Mo and the Orchestre Symphonique de Paris, in 1929.

"The Fiery Angel", the opera, is actually a love story with overtones of religion and s Something directly reflected in the driving nature of this symphonic music.

Here again is Paolo Bortolameoll and the Minnesota Orchestra for a rare performance of "Symphony No.

3", "The Fiery Angel" by Sergei Prok For "This Is Minnesota Orchestra", I'm Bill Eddins.

Thank you, enjoy and goodnight.

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