Saturday, October 24, 2026
7:30 PM
Garde Arts Center: 325 State Street, New London CT

The ECSO opens its 2026–27 season with an evening designed to thrill. Shadows & Spirits embraces the dramatic and the mysterious, pairing two works that pulse with dark energy and theatrical flair.

Concert competition winner violinist Isabella Diaz takes center stage for Prokofiev’s blazing Violin Concerto No. 1, a work of fierce rhythmic momentum and soaring Armenian melody. Prokofiev’s writing is unabashedly cinematic, moving from brooding intensity to exhilarating virtuosity, and Juilliard student Diaz brings all of it to life with commanding stage presence and technical brilliance.

ECSO Concertmaster Stephan Tieszen conjures one of music’s most beloved supernatural scenes: Saint-Saëns’s Danse macabre, in which Death himself plays violin as skeletons rise and dance at midnight. This iconic tone poem is hauntingly beautiful and irresistibly fun, the perfect curtain-raiser for a season full of discovery.

An evening of drama, dazzle, and just a hint of the otherworldly. Don’t miss it.

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