Nashville Symphony | Leonard Slatkin, conductor
The season ends where it began: with America, and everything it means to the composers and performers who call it home.
Cindy McTee's Adagio for String Orchestra opens the evening with quiet weight. Written in the aftermath of September 11, 2001, and commissioned by Leonard Slatkin himself when he was Music Director of the National Symphony, it returns here in his hands as a personal reflection on his lifelong commitment to American repertoire.
Copland's Billy the Kid follows. With the wide-open prairies, the gunfights, and the cowboy songs, it's his most vivid portrait of the American frontier. This is a rare performance of the complete ballet rather than the usual suite.
The season closes with Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra,* written by a Hungarian exile who arrived in New York in 1940 with nothing, fell gravely ill, and was convinced he would never compose again—until a conductor appeared at his hospital bedside with a commission and a vote of confidence. What followed, written in under two months, is one of the most joyful and virtuosic works in the orchestral repertoire. Every instrument gets its moment. Every section soars.
It is the exclamation point on our 2026-2027 season: a celebration of 250 years of the United States of America, 80 years of the Nashville Symphony, 20 years at the Schermerhorn Symphony Center, and our nation's relentless musical spirit.
