WSS Classics 1 : Mendelssohn's Muse

Simone Porter - Violin
Andrew Grams - Conductor
Winston-Salem Symphony

Rachmaninoff Symphony No. 3, 1st movement
Mendelssohn Violin Concerto
Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition (arr. Ravel)

Music Director candidate Andrew Grams leads off the Winston-Salem Symphony’s 2022-23 season in a curated showcase of the Romantic Era’s most towering figures and beautiful masterpieces. Grams is joined by violinist Simone Porter, who makes her Winston-Salem debut with Mendelssohn’s tender and fierce Violin Concerto. The concert opens with a movement from Rachmaninoff’s picturesque and emotional Third Symphony, an ideal pairing with the majestic Pictures at an Exhibition. Inspired by a friend’s posthumous exhibit of artworks, Mussorgsky wrote a set of musical paintings for piano that was later arranged for orchestra by Maurice Ravel and will close this concert with the mighty “Great Gate of Kiev.”