• Our Next Concert

    The American-French Connection

    Sun., June 8, 2025, 2:30 p.m.

    Holland

    Still

    Ravel
    with Ko-Eun Yi, piano

    Debussy

    Copland

    Ko-Eun Yi, piano

    Buy Tickets

    Learn More

  • Featuring Lawrence Eckerling & Don Cagen

    ESO & All That Jazz

    Sunday, May 4 at 3:00 pm
    Performance & Reception

    Tickets on sale now ($50)

    A fundraising concert and reception to support ESO featuring the jazz and pop talents of Music Director Lawrence Eckerling on piano, and Principal Trumpet Don Cagen on trumpet.

    allthatjazz

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    AKAR AUDITORIUM @The Church
    2715 Hurd Ave. Evanston, IL
  • Save the date:
    LAKESIDE POPS CONCERT

    Free Admission

    Tuesday, August 19, 2025
    7:00 PM

    FREE!

2024-2025 SERIES: Soul & Inspiration

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Musical Insights

Free Pre-Concert Preview Series!

June 6, Friday, at 1:30 pm

Enhance your concert experience with a sneak preview — Composers come alive and their passions take center stage when ESO Maestro Lawrence Eckerling takes you on an insider’s tour of the history and highlights behind the music.

Meet our soloist, Ko-Eun Yi, at Musical Insights. She and our Maestro Lawrence Eckerling will explore the June concert program in depth.

 

The Merion
Friday, June 6 at 1:30 pm,
Merion's Emerald Lounge 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

Treat a friend or relative to the ESO

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.

Theme and Variations

Benjamin Britten

If you think the main themes from Benjamin Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra and Henry Purcell’s Rondeau from Abdelazer Suite are similar, you’re right. Purcell, a Baroque composer, wrote incidental music in 1695 to accompany performances of the play by Aphra Behn, Abdelazer, also known as The Moor’s Revenge. The second movement of the 10-movement suite is one of Purcell’s most recognizable tunes and was the inspiration for Britten’s work.

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Spanish Seduction

Rimsky Korsakov

It’s easy to draw parallels between Emmanuel Chabrier’s Espana and Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s Capriccio espagnol, pieces that the Evanston Symphony Orchestra will perform on February 4 at 2:30 p.m. Both were written about the same time in the 1880s and draw on the music and culture of Spain. But there is another similarity: Neither composer was actually Spanish.

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Shall We Dance?

Dance

Huapango remains the most famous work of José Pablo Moncayo, the Guadalajara native and a pupil of Aaron Copland. While visiting Alvarado in Veracruz, Moncayo was inspired by the folk music he heard. The melodies and rhythms proved difficult for him to capture, as the musicians never performed the folk dance the same way twice. He still managed to complete the composition, which was met with great acclaim; it served as the foundation of a new movement of Mexican nationalism in music, and is considered by some as the unofficial second national anthem of Mexico.

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Royal Inspiration

Castle at Aranjuez

Joaquin Rodrigo, blind since the age of 3 due to diphtheria, moved to Paris at 26 to study with Paul Dukas in 1927. After marrying Turkish pianist Victoria Kamhi in 1933, Rodrigo returned to Paris to study at the Conservatory and the Sorbonne. He came back to Spain only after the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939.

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