Thursday, March 28, 2024 Mar 28, 2024
71° F Dallas, TX
Advertisement
Classical Music

This Isn’t Your Grandfather’s Symphony: Dallas Symphony Orchestra ‘ReMixes’ Program

The symphony is loosening the collar by launching a new program at dressed-down City Performance Hall. Is this the new future of the DSO?
By Peter Simek |

Any time a lauded American orchestra, especially one which has won accolades around the world and enjoys the leadership of one of the world’s most buzzing conductors, launches a new program entitled “ReMix,” replete with that staggered, irregular capitalization that PR folks believe schemes “youth demographic,” any lover of symphonic music will likely shudder.

Enter the Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s new program: ReMix: A Fusion of Music and Nightlife. Launching at the Dallas City Performance Hall in October, the new program promises a new concert experience that is relaxed and offers music not normally heard in the vaunted Meyerson Symphony Center.

Yes, purists may wretch at the news, but let’s stop and take a look at the upside for a moment. These are difficult days for the orchestra. Symphonies around the country are struggling, and it’s clear the old model doesn’t work as well as it used to. Key to the concerns is a cultural shift. Unlike previous generations, new symphony patrons aren’t stepping to replace the ones dying off. So what’s a symphony to do?

The DSO seems to be trying to figure out a way to loosen the collar a bit. The ReMix program will mix lower price points, shorter performance lengths, earlier start times, the more casual setting of City Performance Hall, and intimate performances that focus on individual performers in the orchestra.

As KERA reports, ReMix is only one of a number of strategies the symphony will be rolling out:

The DSO is already doing some things Detroit has tried – like playing suburban venues without cutting into the number of music lovers coming downtown, which is what many detractors predicted. Taking the music to suburbanites has actually expanded Detroit’s audience, Slatkin says. Another project that Detroit has already implemented — live-streaming concerts online — Martin seriously wants to try. He’s also going to start breaking out of the four-performance format in the DSO schedule. One reason the numbers for the Meyerson ticket sales aren’t rosy is that the orchestra books everything for a four-performance weekend — no matter the work’s popularity, no matter how specialized an audience the DSO knows it’ll likely attract. That’s going to change — with variable weekends, depending on the musical works scheduled.

Here’s the full release:

 

ReMix: A Fusion of Music and Nightlife Dallas Symphony Orchestra launches innovative new concert activity at

Dallas City Performance Hall

Dallas, TX (July 26, 2013) – The Dallas Symphony Orchestra (DSO) launches ReMix, a new concert experience showcasing classical music programming in a more relaxed concert format. ReMix will debut on October 11-12, 2013 at the Dallas City Performance Hall in the thriving Dallas Arts District.

In 2013-14, ReMix features musical selections not typically heard at concerts at the Meyerson Symphony Center and will spotlight orchestra members as soloists as well as exciting guest artists. Made for music-lovers seeking experiences beyond traditional classical events, ReMix will feature affordable ticket prices starting at $19, earlier start times and adult beverages patrons can bring into the concert hall with a chance to meet and mingle with the performers.

“ReMix is another way the Dallas Symphony can engage with audiences – those who frequent Dallas’s vibrant art gallery and nightlife scenes who may be new to our orchestra, and also our regular patrons, who want to experience the Dallas Symphony in new and unexpected ways,” says Dallas Symphony President and CEO Jonathan Martin. “These concerts highlight our phenomenally-talented musicians while exploring cutting-edge repertoire in varied and versatile settings.”

The first ReMix concert October 11-12, 2013 will feature The “DSO Dream Team” of Dallas Symphony Music Director Jaap van Zweden leading an orchestra of strings in Schoenberg’s poetic, deeply expressive tone poem

 

Transfigured Night. Then, DSO principal players take center stage when principal oboist Erin Hannigan performs an oboe concerto (TBD), and principal cellist Christopher Adkins will be the lead voice in the Sinfonia Concertante of Prokofiev.

 

 

ReMix returns on March 7-8, 2014 when conductor Tito Muñoz from New York City’s cutting edge multi-media art cabaret (le) poisson rouge presents “Ástor Piazzolla: Tango to Argentina”, featuring the Dallas Symphony performing Piazzolla’s tantalizing tangos The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires. Here DSO co-concertmaster Nathan Olson will take the lead as soloist.

The Dallas Symphony’s first-ever ReMix concerts are:

 

October 11-12, 2013, 7 PM

Jaap van Zweden, conductor

Erin Hannigan, oboe

Christopher Adkins, cello

Dallas Symphony Orchestra

Oboe Concerto TBD

SCHOENBERG Transfigured Night

PROKOFIEV Sinfonia Concertante

 

March 7-8, 2014, 7 PM
Ástor Piazzolla: Tango to Argentina

Tito Muñoz, conductor
Nathan Olson, violin
PIAZZOLLA The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires (Estaciones Porteñas)

 

Tickets to ReMix start at $19 For tickets and more information, visit www.DallasSymphony.com or call 214.692.0203.

Related Articles

Image
Basketball

Kyrie and Luka: A Love Story

It didn't work last season, but the dynamic duo this year is showing us something special.
Image
Politics & Government

Q&A: Senate Hopeful Colin Allred Says November Election Is ‘Larger Than Our Own Problems’

The congressman has experience beating an entrenched and well-funded incumbent. Will that translate to a statewide win for the Democrats for the first time since 1994?
Advertisement