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Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra’s 2026-2027 season will include familiar names and interesting novelties
https://rochesterbeacon.com/2026/01/31/from-emperor-to-et-rpo-sets-its-2026-27-season/
The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra’s 2026-2027 season will include familiar names and interesting novelties.
By David Raymond
Contributing Writer, Rochester Beacon
The familiar events include two RPO holiday-time staples, “The Nutcracker” and the 33rd edition of Jeff Tyzik’s Holiday Pops, and the return of the orchestra’s successful Sunday-afternoon series at Nazareth University.
Among the RPO’s 2025-2026 novelties were two musical festivals—one devoted to Beethoven, the other to dance. The two festival weekends will recur next season, says Andreas Delfs, RPO music director. The unusual two-weekend setup is dictated by the needs of the Eastman School of Music for its own performances in Kodak Hall. It may not be ideal for the RPO, but in Delfs’s words, “we’ve made lemonade from lemons.”
Of next season’s festivals, the first will feature four estimable pianists and four favorite concertos: Olga Kern in Rachmaninoff’s Third; Barry Douglas in Tchaikovsky’s First; more Beethoven, with Jonathan Biss in Beethoven’s “Emperor”; and Marc-André Hamelin in Brahms’s Second.
Those are definitely standard works, but the program setups will be a bit experimental. Each pianist will begin their concert with a solo spot of music by the featured composer; the orchestra will follow, led by Delfs in a less-commonly heard piece by that composer (for example, Biss’ “Emperor” concerto will be prefaced by Beethoven’s Opus 27 Piano Sonata and his Second Symphony).
The second RPO festival weekend, on Feb. 25 and 27, will celebrate music for movies. The orchestra’s classical contribution is a program of Korngold’s violin concerto, a bravura work by a Viennese composer who became a mainstay of Golden Age Hollywood. The Viennese flavor continues with a suite from Richard Strauss’ “Der Rosenkavalier” arranged for a1926 silent film (yes—a silent film of an opera), and more John Williams, with his “ET’s Adventures on Earth,” from the popular movie. Delfs has no qualms about slotting this Oscar-winning music alongside two European masters: “To me, John Williams’ melodies and orchestration are the equal of Strauss and Korngold.”
Delfs describes the season opener (Sept. 25 and 27) as “a nod to the nation’s 250th birthday.” Two American composers are spotlighted: a premiere work by another Eastman graduate, Michael Torke; and a contemporary classic, the violin concerto by John Adams, with soloist Leila Josefowicz, one of the work’s best interpreters. It winds up with perhaps the most famous “American” work, Dvorak’s “New World” symphony.
Another autumn highlight will be a complete performance of Grieg’s incidental music for Ibsen’s “Peer Gynt” (there’s much more than the familiar “Peer Gynt” suites), with narration by actor John DeLancie Jr. of “Star Trek: The Next Generation” fame, on Oct. 10 and 11, and the RPO’s return to the Rochester Fringe Festival on Sept. 19. Delfs says that the RPO’s “Voices of Today” commissioning program, with premieres and recordings of music by prominent American composers, will continue, starting with the new Michael Torke work.
The popular Nazareth University series should fill the school’s Beston Hall for four Sunday-afternoon concerts through the season, featuring a scaled-down ensemble and soloists from within the orchestra. Delfs says that next season will balance “funky concerti” by modern composers (Kevin Puts, Erwin Schulhoff, Michael Daugherty, and Missy Mazzioli) with favorite overtures and symphonies by Haydn, Beethoven, Mozart, Schubert, and others.
Anybody who listened to radio in the 1970s and 1980s will have a soft spot for the music on next season’s RPO Pops Series, curated and conducted by Tyzik. The series will premiere two concerts: “Billy Joel: Piano Man,” with singer and pianist Paul Loren (March 19); and “Southern Rock: The Symphonic Sessions,” presenting songs by Lynyrd Skynyrd, the Allman Brothers, and other blues-based rockers. As always, all the arrangements and orchestrations for the two concerts will be by Tyzik.
“I like to plan a concert around the time of the Rochester Jazz Festival,” says Tyzik, and this spring’s jazz pops concert includes more musical nostalgia with an end-of-season salute to the music of the late Chuck Mangione.
Tyzik played trumpet in Mangione’s band for several years, starting as an Eastman student. The concert includes another Eastman graduate who has achieved fame in the jazz world: soprano saxophonist Alexa Tarentino, as soloist in a concerto written for her by Tyzik, premiered with the Eastman Wind Ensemble and orchestrated by the composer for this occasion.
The series kicks off with “Aretha!”, a British-based tribute to Aretha Franklin, which Tyzik describes as “a big success all over Europe.” The Queen of Soul’s biggest hits will be sung by Shelia, a singer whom Tyzik describes as “a protegée of Quincy Jones and Stevie Wonder”—not a bad pedigree.
Tyzik will also conduct more John Williams movie music for a live-to-picture showing, title to be announced, and he’ll conduct the annual Holiday Pops with the High School Festival Chorale Dec. 18-20.
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