Elegant To Epic: Saint-Saëns And Shostakovich by Saint-Saëns, Shostakovich, From (2025/2025), Conductor Rafael Payare, Jacobs Music Center, San Diego, United States

Considered one of the finest pianists of today, Jean-Yves Thibaudet takes the Jacobs Music Center stage to perform his acclaimed interpretation of Camille Saint-Saëns' final piano concerto, written while he was vacationing in Cairo, Egypt. Then Rafael Payare and the Symphony tackle Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 7, Leningrad. The first performance of the Leningrad took place in August 1942, a year into the 30-month blockade of the city by Axis powers, and was broadcast throughout the city as a show of defiance against German forces. Since then, the symphony has become a powerful international symbol of human resistance to brutality, barbarism and injustice.