Wed, Sep 23
|Hill Auditorium
Free University Symphony Orchestra Concert @ Hill on Sept 23rd
Join other IN members and enjoy this free student concert at Hill Auditorium! Family and friends welcome. Come by 7:45pm to get seated. Concert begins at 8 pm. We will sit on the main floor, along the left-center aisle, somewhere in front of where the mezzanine overhang ends.
Time & Location
Sep 23, 2026, 7:45 PM – 9:30 PM
Hill Auditorium, 825 N University Ave, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
Guests
About the Event
https://smtd.umich.edu/event/23-september-2026/
The University Symphony Orchestra launches its new season of magical and magnificent music, led by USO Music Director and GRAMMY nominee, Kenneth Kiesler. The evening’s “Music of the Dance” is set in motion with Beethoven’s exuberant and propulsive 7th Symphony, which Wagner called “the apotheosis of the dance.” Featuring pianist Jinzhao Xu, DMA student and winner of the 2026 SMTD Concerto Competition, the concert continues with Saint-Saëns’ stunning and scintillating 5th Piano Concerto, “Egyptian.” The USO’s opening concert reaches its finale with La Valse, evocative and spectacular music by Ravel, who described it as “a dancing, whirling, almost hallucinatory ecstasy, and increasingly passionate and exhausting whirlwind of dancers, who are overcome and exhilarated by nothing but ‘the waltz.’”
Kenneth Kiesler, conductor
Jinzhao Xu, piano (Saint-Saëns)
PROGRAM
Symphony No. 7 in A major, op. 92, Ludwig van Beethoven
Piano Concerto No. 5 in F major, op. 103 “Egyptian”, Camille Saint-Saëns
La Valse, Maurice Ravel
Concert Duration: 1 hour and 40 minutes