ESYO's season to explore 'Elemental: What Nature Tells Us About The Orchestra'

On Sunday, Nov. 5, the Elgin Youth Symphony Orchestra will open its 2017-18 season, "Elemental: What Nature Tells Us About the Orchestra," with the concert "Earth."

Performances will be 2, 4:30 and 7:30 p.m. in the Blizzard Theatre at Elgin Community College, 1700 Spartan Drive.

Tickets are $25, $20 for seniors or $15 for students.

Reserve your seats at tickets.elgin.edu.

Using music as a lens to understand the human experience, as expressed in masterworks of sound, students are not only challenged to perform great pieces of symphonic music at the highest possible level of technical excellence, but they are also challenged to become "expert noticers" and to explore deeply an essential question.

When Gustav Mahler was sketching his monumental Third Symphony, he penciled in at the top of the first movement "what the mountains tell me."

Composers have always been inspired and challenged by the natural world-not just to imitate it, but seek to understand it and share their understanding in sound.

The concerts will feature the music of Bernstein, Dvorak, Rachmaninoff, Bach, and more.

The award-winning Elgin Youth Symphony Orchestra is one of the largest, oldest, and most esteemed youth orchestras in the nation. Its five orchestras, brass choir, percussion ensembles, and thriving Chamber Music Institute provide nearly 400 students from 70 communities a challenging musical experience while rewarding audiences with thrilling, innovative concerts. Its comprehensive learning environment promotes curiosity, imagination, and critical thinking.

Its 42nd season, "Elemental," uses the music of Bernstein, Dvorak, Bach, and others as a lens to understand organicism, motifs as DNA, and the orchestra as a kind of ecosystem.

Learn more at EYSO.org.