Ode to a Joyous Season!

This weekend, June 15 & 16, the CPO wraps up a brilliantly successful Season with its Classical finale, the appropriately named Ode to Joy. For Calgarians, this means not only Thank you for a Joyous Season of Music, but also Thank you for Ushering in Summer!

Led by Maestro Rune Bergmann, the Philharmonic will begin with a beautiful rendering of Beethoven’s Symphony 1 in C Major and finishes the performance with the glorious Beethoven’s Symphony 9, Ode to Joy. It is a perfect combination. Beethoven would be proud..   

This is one of the most interesting programs the CPO can gift us as an audience. Beginning with an early symphony of Beethoven’s and ending with his masterpiece of complexity and emotion, the audience will be transported by the sound of 100 instruments and an unfathomable number of voices from on high.

We are truly fortunate to be able to experience such a combination of talent:  the music, the architecture, the chorus, the musicians, the soloists, the Maestro, the community of music aficionados, and all in such a beautiful setting as our beautiful city.

I began The Brussa Brava! Legacy Programme in honour of my father, Rex Binmore, and to share my joy of music with others. This weekend’s offering is the culmination of joy and music that I hoped the BB!LP could help effect, and with our brilliant and exuberant Maestro Bergmann leading the Orchestra, it will happen.

Everything has a beginning.  Beethoven had many ideas, and I wonder how many of them we have been lucky enough to hear. Some, like Ode to Joy, we can never hear often enough.  The Brussa Brava! Legacy Program began with just an idea, too, like simple notes on a blank page. As the years passed the program grew in scope and imagination, from first sponsoring Maestro Roberto Minzcuk, to over 85 resident and guest conductors, and finally with Maestro Rune Bergmann, much like Beethoven’s talent and expertise.   

This weekend, they merge.  Ode to Joy is a fitting finale to the Brussa Brava! Legacy Programme’s 10^th Season. My father would be proud.

I hope you will join us in celebrating our city and support the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra as it moves into summer and plans for next Season.

I look forward to seeing you at the CPO this weekend!