Saturday, October 4, 2025
7:30 PM
Garde Arts Center, New London

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Voyage of Passion: Elgar and Beyond

Music Director & Conductor Toshiyuki Shimada’s 16^th season leading the Eastern Connecticut Symphony Orchestra will rousingly begin, as usual, with The Star-Spangled Banner. The four other works on the program all had their premieres—in London, Vienna, and St. Petersburg—with the composer conducting. ECSO Instrumental Competition Winner Nicholas Hammel, a master’s candidate at Yale with degrees from the University of Texas and New England Conservatory, will perform Sir Edward Elgar’s Violin Concerto in B Minor, first performed in 1910.Johann Strauss’s Spanish March, composed in the 1830s, is a spirited and stately piece that evokes the flair of Spanish ceremonial style through a Viennese lens. Johannes Brahms’s Haydn Variations, composed in 1873, is also known as the Saint Anthony Variations, since the eight variations are based on a “Chorale St. Antoni” from a piece for winds probably misattributed to Joseph Haydn. Fourteen years later, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov composed his caprice on Spanish themes, Capriccio espagnol, a five-movement suite in which the strings at times imitate guitars. The fourth moment opens with five lively cadenzas, by the trumpets and horns, violin, flute, clarinet, and harp.

You can subscribe today to lock in discounts, complimentary vouchers, and the same seats for each concert. The order form is available here, or you can call the ECSO office at 860-443-2876 to discuss seating options.