Yucatán Symphony Orchestra home again for 26th season

Yucatán Symphony Orchestra is home again for 26th season. Photo: Courtesy
The Yucatán Symphony Orchestra is home again for its 26th season. Photo: Courtesy

Mérida, Yucatán — Seven musicians will perform for the first time with the Yucatán Symphony Orchestra (OSY) for its 26th season, which premieres on Friday, Sept. 9.

Alejandro Posada, from Colombia; and Marc Moncusí, from Spain, are both conductors. Trumpet player Mauro Kuxy and flutist Miguel Ángel Villanueva are both from Mexico.

Audiences will be introduced to Polish pianist Marian Sobula, Ukrainian violinist Mykyta Klochkov and Russian-Spanish violinist Elena Mikhailova as new-season guests. They will be joined by two who have previously performed with the OSY: Russian pianist Alexei Volodin and Mexican conductor Jesús Medina.

But the guest soloists and conductors are not the only news about the nine-program autumn season.

The orchestra is coming back home, to the Teatro José Peón Contreras, after a six-month closure due to restoration. And the final program will be held on three consecutive days instead of the usual Friday-and-Sunday schedule.

Guest conductors Alejandro Posada, left, from Colombia; and Marc Moncusí, from Spain, join the OSY this season. Photos: Courtesy
Guest conductors Alejandro Posada, left, from Colombia; and Marc Moncusí, from Spain, join the OSY this season. Photos: Courtesy

Also, the eighth program will have only one date, because it will be the National and International Piano Contest “José Jacinto Cuevas” Yamaha final.

For the season premiere, as an homage to this country — which celebrates 206 years of its Independence on Thursday — the OSY has chosen six works from four Mexican composers: Arturo Márquez, Blas Galindo, Silvestre Revueltas and José Pablo Moncayo, whose “Huapango” is considered the second Mexican national anthem, will close the program.

The Yucatán Symphony Orchestra is home again for 26th season. Photo: Courtesy
The Yucatán Symphony Orchestra is home again for its 26th season. Photo: Courtesy

There will be more works from Mexican composers this season: Eduardo Angulo’s “Voces de la naturaleza (Nature’s Voices)” will be played by guest flutist Miguel Ángel Villanueva (sixth program) and Mario Lavista’s “Ficciones (Fictions)” will open the seventh program.

The United Sates will be represented by two iconic musicians: Leonard Bernstein and John Williams. For the second half of the seventh program, the OSY has chosen the Symphonic Dances from “West Side Story,” one of his most — if not the most — best-known musicals in Latin America, and the overture that Williams composed for the 1972 John Wayne film “The Cowboys.”

Teatro “José Peón Contreras in Mérida, Yucatán. Photo: LGM Studio
Teatro “José Peón Contreras in Mérida, Yucatán. Photo: LGM Studio

European composers

But, of course, it will be mainly a season of European-born composers, including Beethoven, whose nine symphonies were performed the previous season. There will be works, among others, by Austrian Johann Nepomuk Hummel, whose Trumpet Concerto in E Flat major will be played by Mauro Kuxy; Sergei Prokofiev, chosen to be performed by Alexei Volodin (Piano Concerto No. 3); Frederic Chopin, by Marian Sobula (Piano Concerto No. 1); German Max Bruch, by Mykyta Klochkov (Violin Concerto No. 1), and Jean Sibelius, who will be featured in two programs: the second, when his Symphony No. 2 will be performed, and the seventh program, when Elena Mikhailova will play her Violin Concerto in D minor.

Mikhailova performed last January in Mérida, at the Olimpo Cultural Center, as a Merida Fest guest.

And, sure, there will be Mozart and Tchaikovsky. In fact, both composers were chosen for the final program: Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker Suite” will be played before two Mozart works: Symphony No. 35 “Haffner” and Coronation Mass. In the last piece, the Yucatán Opera Workshop, directed by María Eugenia Guerrero, will perform along with the OSY.

The Symphony’s 26th season, as Juan Carlos Lomónaco writes in the printed program, will be “a universe of beautiful music.”


Tickets for the OSY’s 26th season, which runs through Dec. 11, are on sale. Visit the Symphony website or the box office at the Teatro Peón Contreras.

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