The Dana School of Music announces the opening concert of the Dana Symphony Orchestra on Wed., Oct. 10 at 7:30 p.m. at Powers Auditorium, 260 West Federal Street, Youngstown, Oh..
      Led by conductor Stephen L. Gage, the orchestra, which numbers close to 60, will begin with Leonard Bernstein’s popular Overture to Candide in celebration of Bernstein’s 100th birthday.
      Candide was first seen in a pre-Broadway tryout at Boston’s Colonial Theatre on October 29, 1956 (just days after Bernstein’s appointment as co-music director of the New York Philharmonic had been announced for the following season), and the show opened at the Martin Beck Theatre in New York on December 1.
      The concert will continue with Peter Tchaikovsky’s epic and fateful Symphony No. 5 in E Minor. About the work, Paul Serotsky, MusicWeb contributor wrote: During 1877 to 1890, under the patronage of the wealthy widow Nadezhda von Meck, Tchaikovsky was free to devote himself entirely to composition. Financially secure, he nevertheless found himself on the horns of an artistic dilemma. Fatalistic and highly-strung, Tchaikovsky naturally inclined to the Romantic ideology of expressing the artist’s inner turmoil. Sadly, the immediate reaction to the four-movement Symphony No.5 was, at best, muted. Tchaikovsky felt incredibly dejected, even going so far as to distance himself from it for quite some time. After his death, however, the work grew in popularity, with audiences and critics alike acknowledging Tchaikovsky’s great skill as an orchestrator and his powerful evocation of the idea of fate throughout the symphony. Today, it stands as one of his most loved large-scale creations.
      Tickets are $7 for adults; $6 for students and senior citizens, and free for anyone with a valid YSU ID, and may be ordered by phone at 330-744-0264, at the DeYor Performing Arts Center Box Office or at deyorpac.org
      In 2018-19, the Dana School of Music will celebrate 150 years as one of the region’s finest cultural institutions. William Henry Dana’s visionary “Musical Institute” has produced generations of professional musicians who perform in prestigious orchestras, military and jazz bands, and contemporary ensembles; teach in elite conservatories; and develop future musicians in primary and secondary schools throughout the United States.
      Parking is available in lots adjacent to the DeYor Performing Arts Center. More information is available by calling the Office of Community Engagement and Events at 330-941-2307.