The Symphony of the Potomac, a primarily volunteer orchestra based in Montgomery County, Maryland is pleased to announce its upcoming season offering four exciting concerts of celebrated and timeless masterworks. Led by acclaimed Music Director Joel Lazar, the approximately seventy musicians of the ensemble are accomplished musicians from diverse professional and educational backgrounds who are dedicated to providing accessible and enriching performances of classical music for audiences in the greater Washington, DC metropolitan area. All performances will be held at the 500-seat concert hall in the beautiful and state-of-the-art Cultural Arts Center in vibrant downtown Silver Spring, Maryland.

The 2010-2011 season opens on Sunday, October 31,2010 at 2 pm with beloved works of the Classical era. Violinist Marc Ramirez and violist Olivia Hajioff of the duo marcolivia will perform Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Sinfonia Concertante for violin and viola. The two musicians have presented concerts together at the Kennedy Center, the Ravinia Festival in Chicago, the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, and have collaborated with Leon Fleisher, Awadagin Pratt and Edgar Meyer. Also on the program is Mozart’s overture to his opera La Clemenza di Tito and Ludwig van Beethoven’s joyous Symphony No. 7.

On Sunday, February 13, 2011 at 3 pm, the Symphony of the Potomac will perform an all-orchestral concert of Scandinavian masters. The concert opens with the overture to Carl Nielsen’s comic opera Maskarade. Next, the orchestra presents Edvard Grieg’s incidental music to Henrik Ibsen’s Peer Gynt. Concluding the program is the epic Symphony No. 2 of Jean Sibelius.

On Sunday, April 17, 2011 at 3 pm, Ricardo Cyncynates, Assistant Concertmaster of the National Symphony Orchestra will perform Johannes Brahms’ monumental Violin Concerto with the Symphony of the Potomac. Mr. Cyncynates, who is a native of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil has played extensively as a soloist and chamber musician throughout the United States, Europe, and South America. The orchestra will also present Antonin Dvorak’s romping Scherzo Capriccio and Robert Schumann’s overture to Friedrich Schiller’s Die Braut von Messina (The Bride of Messina).

The Symphony of the Potomac concludes its season on June 5, 2011 at 3 pm with performances of compositions by the Romantic avant-garde. The concert will begin with Hector Berlioz’s exuberant Roman Carnival overture. Pianist Alon Goldstein, who has been described by the Philadelphia Inquirer as possessing an “extremely cultivated, refined command of the keyboard,” joins the Symphony of the Potomac to play Franz Liszt’s Piano Concerto No. 2. The program also includes Liszt’s symphonic poem Les Préludes and the prelude to Richard Wagner’s opera Tristan und Isolde.

Tickets to Symphony of the Potomac concerts are $15.00 at the door and $10.00 plus a small service charge online. Persons ages 18 and under will be admitted free. The Montgomery College Cultural Arts Center at Silver Spring is located at 7995 Georgia Avenue. For more information and to purchase tickets, please visit the Symphony of the Potomac’s website at www.symphonypotomac.org.