The Kamuela Philharmonic Orchestra opens its 13 season with “Triumph and Desire” at 4 p.m. Sunday at Kahilu Theatre in Waimea.
The orchestra, led by Maestro Brian Dollinger, will perform the orchestral masterpiece Symphony No. 5 in E minor, op. 64 by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, which has come to symbolize the composer’s triumph over difficult circumstances. Rounding out the program are the Fanfare La Peri by Paul Dukas, Adagio from Spartacus by Aram Khachaturian, and Suite No. 1 from Carmen by Georges Bizet — musical selections that illustrate the power of love and desire.
Dollinger has brought a concert experience to Hawaii Island that is not only relaxed and family friendly but true to the very nature of great symphonic performances. Each performance includes popular and well-known melodies or entire works that every audience member is sure to recognize.
The concert will begin with a boisterous welcome to the new concert season with a performance of Dukas’s fanfare from his ballet La Peri. Dukas is a composer every listener will know as his music was utilized for the iconic Mickey Mouse cartoon in Disney’s Fantasia — The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. This fanfare will be the perfect start to this performance.
The orchestra will then bring to life some of the most memorable melodies from the opera Carmen by Bizet. Two of the most beloved and recognizable arias in all of the operatic literature — Habenera and Toreador — are featured in this multi-movement work. Bizet’s opera has received much acclaim for the skill with which it displays the emotions and sufferings of its characters. After his death, Bizet’s friend, Ernest Guiraud, compiled the two multi-movement suites of music drawn from this opera.
Khachaturian, a Soviet Armenian composer and conductor, was the author of the first Armenian symphony, as well as concerti, ballet music, and film scores. He is best known for the music he composed for the ballets, Gayane and Spartacus. The ballet score to Spartacus, with its lively rhythms and strong energy, aptly dramatizes the struggles of Spartacus and his wife, but it is the heartfelt Adagio, which the KPO will be presenting in this performance, a love theme which has been used in several films, which has come to symbolize their undying devotion despite any obstacles.
The finale of Triumph and Desire will be the fateful and triumphant Symphony No. 5 by Tchaikovsky. Tchaikovsky’s talent was recognized from an early age, and despite his financial and artistic struggles, anxiety over homosexual tendencies (punishable by death in his time), and a disastrous marriage, with the help of wealthy admirers, he managed to become a very successful teacher, music critic, and composer. The sponsorship of Tsar Alexander I led to the widespread popularity of Tchaikovsky’s compositions, including the 1812 Overture and the opera Eugene Onegin, both in Russia and abroad. His ballets, including Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty, and The Nutcracker became audience favorites and set new standards for the role of music in classical ballet. When his fame as a composer grew outside of Russia, Tchaikovsky conquered lifelong stage fright to become a sought-after international guest conductor. He used his fame to promote Russian music, introducing his own works and those of other Russian composers to wider audiences.
Tickets cost $43/$28/$23 and are available for purchase online at www.kamuelaphil.org or www.kahilutheatre.org, by calling 885-6868, or at the theater’s box office, 67-1186 Lindsey Road in Waimea, from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. Monday through Friday.
Info: Visit www.kahilutheatre.org.