Protocols remain in effect to protect health and safety for all musicians and audience members at all concerts.
Proof of Vaccination and Booster Required • Masks Required • Distancing • Risk Assumption • Exchange Policy
• Children under 6 may attend Holiday Concert if accompanied by a vaccinated adult.
Enhance your concert experience with a sneak preview — Composers come alive and their passions take center stage when ESO Maestro Lawrence Eckerling take you on an insider’s tour of the history and highlights behind the music.
Meet our soloist, Irina Muresanu, at Musical Insights. She and our Maestro Lawrence Eckerling will explore the concert program in depth.
Friday, February 10th at 1:30 pm,
Merion's Crystal Ballroom at
529 Davis St, Evanston.
FREE and open to the public.
Please RSVP to 847-570-7815.
Light refreshments will be served and casual tours of apartments will be available after the program.
Give the gift of music by ordering directly from our website and purchasing a custom gift certificate in any denomination of your choice! Certificates may be redeemed for single ticket or season subscriptions for any of our concerts.
You will receive an electronic gift certificate or we can mail the certificate to you or directly to the recipient.
Are you looking to buy a gift for someone at Amazon? Need to stock up on supplies from Amazon?
Amazon has a special program called Smile, where the company donates a small amount of your purchase to your designated charity. Once you select the ESO as your Smile recipient, just point your browser to smile.amazon.com each time you want to shop at Amazon and the Evanston Symphony will benefit. It won’t cost you a thing!
Thanks, and happy shopping.
The Evanston Symphony Orchestra (ESO) has adopted protocols to protect your health and safety at performances. These policies are in effect as of October 2022 for 2022–2023 ESO subscription series concerts and will be reviewed regularly to follow the latest public health mandates and recommendations.
With sad and heavy hearts, on August 1st the Evanston Symphony announced that David Ellis, the ESO’s General Manager, passed away on July 26, 2022, following heart complications. Our sympathy and care continue to go out to Marcia, his wife, and their sons, Michael, Matthew, and Peter, for the depth and pain of their loss.
David was our General Manager for 18 years. He knew all of our musicians and all of our patrons, including their seat numbers! His knowledge of classical music was second to none and his love of this music was always appreciated at our Musical Insights lectures.
Seeking a Stage Equipment Mover for 10 small local moves!
WHERE?: Moves are in the Evanston/ Skokie/ Wilmette area
Wednesday, August 24th, 6:30 pm — Wallace Bowl, Gillson Park, Wilmette.
The Evanston Symphony Orchestra is teaming up with the Wilmette Sesquicentennial committee to perform another free outdoor pops concert on the lakefront. Bring your whole family for this hour-long concert featuring show tunes, movie music, a hoe-down and Sousa’s Washington Post. We even have a piece arranged by Percy Faith, once one of Wilmette’s illustrious residents. Baker Demonstration School is partnering with us to provide free children’s activities before and during the concert, including an instrument petting zoo. Come along and enjoy the music on our beautiful lakefront.
With great sadness we announce the passing of our former principal clarinetist, Ralph Wilder. Here is a wonderful recording of the first performance Ralph did with the ESO, Calandrelli's Concerto for Jazz Clarinet and Orchestra. We send our sympathies to his family.
Gustav Mahler (1860–1911) wrote his ambitious first symphony while he was a conductor of the Leipzig Opera in Germany in 1888. On the piece’s first page, Mahler wrote wie ein naturlaut, which loosely translates to “as if spoken by nature.”
Right from the start, Mahler’s first symphony is new and spellbinding. The opening multi-octave A played by the strings creates an otherworldly feel. If you listen closely, you may recognize some of the first notes played by the winds, which are similar to the introduction music to the famous Gene Rodenberry series Star Trek.
Considered to be one of the major composers of the 20th century, Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) was also an accomplished pianist and conductor. His musical education began at an early age when his mother–who was a talented pianist herself–taught him piano and took him to opera performances in Moscow. He continued his music education at the St. Petersburg Conservatory completing composition study in 1909, graduating with performance degrees in piano and conducting in 1914.
The Evanston Symphony Orchestra will open our February concert with the Overture from Mozart’s opera, The Marriage of Figaro. It is one of the most recognizable classical tunes ever recorded, is exuberant and joyful, and is sure to delight.
Annual ESO program brings together five arts organizations to kick off the holidays
by Susy Schultz
The Evanston Township High School auditorium was filled Sunday afternoon when conductor Lawrence Eckerling, who is music director of the Evanston Symphony Orchestra, lifted his baton to lead his colleagues in the classic piece Sleigh Ride, which Leroy Anderson actually composed on a hot day in July 1950.
