Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra is settling in with Music Director Jaime Martín. This month, the orchestra announced its 2020–2021 season, its second with Martín. On the program: a little bit more of everything.
LACO expands its orchestral series to eight programs in 2020 and 2021, and Martín conducts six. The orchestra plays two performances of each, Saturdays at Glendale’s Alex Theatre and Sundays at UCLA’s Royce Hall. It’s a Beethoven year, and the composer is a running theme throughout the series. The Ninth Symphony opens the season, Oct. 3–4, and the Fifth Symphony closes it, May 15–16, 2021.
Conductor Laureate Jeffrey Kahane joins Martín and the orchestra as soloist in Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto, Nov. 14–15. It’s one of two appearances Kahane makes this season; he plays piano for LACO’s In Focus chamber series, which also features Martín on flute, program details to be announced.
LACO reaffirms a commitment to the new music with three world premieres from composers Ellen Reid, Andrew Norman, and Peter Shin. Reid currently serves as LACO’s creative advisor and composer-in-residence, a role formerly held by Norman.
The work with composers continues in the orchestra’s SESSION programs, which pair LACO musicians with composer-curators. Juan Pablo Contreras, whose Lucha Libre! premieres with the orchestra next month, curates the fall installment of SESSION, and Jessie Montgomery oversees the spring program — dates for both to be announced.
It’s also the “Season of the Violin,” with four soloists joining the orchestra in 2020 and 2021. Big names, like Gil Shaham in Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto (Jan. 30–31, 2021), feature alongside U.S. debuts by Nemanja Radulović and Ellinor D’Melon. Tereza Stanislav returns with Bach’s A-Minor Violin Concerto on a Bach-and-sons program, Oct. 24–25, conducted by Julian Wachner. Roderick Cox is the other guest conductor this season, with a program of Wagner, Britten, and Beethoven, Feb. 20–21, 2021.
Tickets for LACO’s 2020–2021 season are available online or by phone at 213-622-7001.
