Downey Symphony returns Oct. 23 - here are the details

DOWNEY – Downey audiences are looking forward to the Downey Symphony Orchestra’s first concert of the fall season Oct. 23 at the Downey Theatre.

The evening begins with the tenth anniversary performance of the jazzy Downey Overture, a piece written by Oscar Navarro. As a graduate music student at USC’s Thornton School of Music, Navarro lived in Downey and commuted, so it incorporates the hustle and bustle of the freeways with an atmosphere of dance.

“Downey Overture,” said Navarro, “is a Latin-American fusion with which I have wanted to link my birth country, Spain, and California, the land that, as a result of the two years I lived there, has left a permanent imprint on my heart. It is joyful, energetic and written with all my enthusiasm and dedication.”

The Downey Overture had a double premiere, in Alacante, Spain and in Downey, and has been widely played, at Carnegie Hall, and by groups as various as the North Texas Wind Symphony and the Boston Philharmonic in their summer home, Tanglewood, in the Berkshires.

“Our opening program came together for me very quickly,” said Sharon Lavery, music director for the Downey Symphonic Society and conductor. “I knew I wanted to bring back violin virtuoso Strauss Shi because he was such a dynamic performer and our Downey community loved him the last time he performed with us. So that was a no-brainer!”

With Max Bruch’s Violin Concerto Number 1, Shi will repeat his dazzling appearance of two years ago when he was acclaimed with a standing ovation. The Concerto ranges from constantly moving orchestra parts, keeping the movement alive and helping it flow, to fiery cadenzas, improvised ornamental solos while the orchestra rests, keeping time.

After the dance theme, the fireworks return and the piece ends with a huge accelerando, leading to a fiery finish that gets higher as it gets faster and louder and eventually concludes with two short, yet grand, chords.

The major work of the evening will be Anton Dvorak’s 9th Symphony 9 in E Minor, From the New World. Astronaut Neil Armstrong took a tape recording of the New World Symphony along during the Apollo 11 mission, the first Moon landing, in 1969.

Written in 1892, after a trip across America, the piece displays the Czech composer’s take on the hope and promise of a new beginning for the Old World. Dvorak said that the music of native Americans and Black people would be the real source on which to base an American national style.

The music pulses with the sounds Dvorak heard here: the beat of the tomtom, around a campfire, and the bittersweet longing in spirituals. The words to “Goin’ Home” were written later to fit the Largo movement melody. This famous main theme in D-flat major is first played by a solo cor anglais (English horn), accompanied by muted strings.

Dvorak’s longing for his Bohemian home is expressed in a Czech polka; the strains of Swing Low, Sweet Chariot emerge in the first movement; and then there’s that unmistakable boogie-woogie walking bass just before the final chords. Both tuba and piccolo are scored, for the Second Movement only.

“These beautiful and varied themes are the product of the soil,” said Dvorak. At the premiere in Carnegie Hall, the piece was met with thunderous clapping. This was one of the greatest public triumphs of Dvořák’s career.

An art exhibit entitled Keys will be on display in the new gallery in the Theatre. Curated by the Downey Arts Coalition, the theme symbolizes how we are always trying to find hidden meanings in something or someone, like playing hide-and-seek with art.

Selected artists’ names will be featured in the printed program that will also have a tribute to First Chair bass player Mark Artusio.

A new feature will be the theatre’s glass elevator, constructed during the renovation when the Theatre was spruced up with funds from Measure S. It rises from the Plaza on the outside of the building, and the second-floor view of the city from the elevator is spectacular. The Theatre is truly handicapped-accessible now.

Patrons are required by the theatre and the City of Downey to wear masks during the concert. Refreshments will be available outdoors on the patio before the performance and during intermission, and masks can be removed while outside.

Tickets for season and single performances are available now at the box office and at the Downey Symphony website. Performances start at 8 p.m. Student tickets are as low as $10.

“We want young people to be able to join us too,” said Lavery.