2026-2027 | Concert Season 35
-
Dance: The Hidden Language of the Soul
2026-2027 Concert OneSunday, October 25, 2026 | 2PM
Sammamish Hills Lutheran Church
22818 SE 8th Street, Sammamish, WA 98074The Sammamish Symphony opens its 2026-27 with a celebration of dance music, with particular emphasis on compositions that combine folk elements with classical techniques. Country dances by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven share the bill with Bela Bartók's Romanian Folk Dances and two ballet scores that respectively glorify the folk music of Spain and Brazil: Manuel de Falla's El amor brujo and Darius Milhaud's giddy surrrealist ballet Le Bœuf sur le toit, inspired by the composer's love of Brazilian songs and dance rhythms.
-
Holidays in Sammamish
2026-2027 Concert TwoSunday, December 6, 2026 | 2PM
Eastlake Performing Arts CenterThe orchestra will celebrate the joys of the season with its characteristic mixture of holiday favorites (including orchestral settings of We Three Kings and Jingle Bells), a medley of holiday songs from blockbuster movies, excerpts from Engelbert Humperdinck's Christmastime favorite Hansel and Gretel, some Johann Strauss, Jr. to ring in the New Year, and some surprises from the symphonic repertoire. Join us for this heartwarming festival of holiday jubilation.
Program to be announced.
-
A Might Fortress: Mendelssohn’s “Reformation”
2026-2027 Concert ThreeSunday, February 21, 2027 | 2 PM
Eastlake Performing Arts CenterAny excellent orchestra is a storehouse of fine musicianship, and the Sammamish Symphony is proud to bring the talents of two of its finest core musicians to the forefront in this concert. Principal Horn Natalie Worden-Cowe will take center stage for Richard Strauss' Horn Concerto No. 1, and trombonist Geoff Ogle's gifts as a composer will be represented by his Dance Suite for wind ensemble. The program concludes with Felix Mendelssohn's dramatic and inspiring Symphony No. 5, the "Reformation", as brilliant as the composer's "Scottish" and "Italian" symphonies but not nearly as well known.
-
A Night Out with the Sammamish Symphony
2026-2027 Concert FourFriday, March 19 2027 | 7:30PM
Location TBDAn intimate concert presented in an intimate setting, this program will feature the orchestra's winds and brass in a program of delectable works from the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. Chamber works by Franz Joseph Haydn, Donal Michalsky, and Gustav Schreck will commingle in a delightful program that will also feature Charles Gounod's exquisite Petite Symphonie for winds.
-
Overtures and Concertos
2026-2027 Concert FiveSunday, April 25, 2027 | 2PM
Eastlake Performing Arts CenterTwo monumental works for multiple soloists with orchestra — Johann Sebastian Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 4 and Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante — will be performed by our special guests Maria Sampen, violin and Timothy Christie, viola, with Sammamish Symphony flutists Melissa Underhill and Elana Sabovic-Matt. Bookending the concert will be two works of great good humor: Gordon Jacob's parody overture The Barber of Seville Goes to the Devil, and Otto Nicolai's overture to his opera The Merry Wives of Windsor, based on Shakespeare's play about that most rakish of knights, Sir John Falstaff.
-
20th Century Masterworks
2026-2027 Concert SixSunday, June 6 2027 | 2:00PM
Eastlake PerformingA crazy-quilt of 20th-century orchestral music, the Sammamish Symphony's season finale presents works by English, Russian, Australian, and American composers. Aaron Copland's little-known miniature John Henry, based on the folksong about the legendary railroad worker, begins a concert featuring delightful abstractions (Igor Stravinsky's Eight Instrumental Miniatures), a breathtaking evocation of nature (Gustav Holst's A Somerset Rhapsody), a nostalgic backward look at childhood (Percy Grainger's Children's March), and a madcap ballet about a troupe of travelling clowns (Dmitri Kabalevsky's The Comedians). A unique concert, not to be missed.
Concerts from Prior Seasons
2025-2026 | Concert Season 34
2024-2025 | Concert Season 33
2023-2024 | Concert Season 32
-
A Sammamish Family Concert
Saturday, October 21, 2023
2:00PM
Sammamish Hills Lutheran Church -
Holidays in Sammamish
Sunday, December 3, 2023
2:00PM
Eastlake Performing Arts Center -
Humor: Mankind's Greatest Gift
2023-2024 Season Concert Three
Sunday, February 25, 2024
2:00PM
Eastlake Performing Arts CenterThe Sammamish Symphony takes a delightful look at musical humor as exemplified by some major creative figures.
Joseph Haydn's "Surprise" Symphony (No. 94) is a longtime audience favorite due to its famous rude awakening to those who nodded off during his slow movements.
Gioachino Rossini, whose operatic output contains some of the medium's funniest scores and librettos, is represented by the overture to Il Signor Bruschino, which contains some unexpected percussive effects from the orchestra's string section.
Peter Schickele, the mastermind behind the works of P. D. Q. Bach, is the party responsible for Quodlibet, a mélange of themes gleefully stolen from everything from Beethoven symphonies to "Tea for Two."
Our special guest artist, soprano Stacey Mastrian, will present a bouquet of humorous songs spanning several centuries, with a few surprises thrown in for good measure.
-
Unique Sounds
2023-2024 Season Concert Four
Sunday, April 28, 2024
2:00PM
Eastlake Performing Arts CenterIn a distinct departure from the usual sounds of a symphony concert, the Sammamish Symphony presents four composers whose quests for new sonorities led them down unique and appealing paths.
Darius Milhaud was the first European composer to compose a masterpiece, The Creation of the World, blending classical forms with American jazz. Heinrich von Biber's Battalia is an unbelievably forward-looking work from 1673 which uses a variety of surprising techniques to describe a group of soldiers preparing for battle.
Giovanni Gabrieli's fascinating and opulent Renaissance works for multiple brass choirs still speak to audiences centuries later. Our guest soloist Jack Reed will afford a rare opportunity to hear a solo percussionist: Emmanuel Séjourné's Concerto for Marimba and Orchestra
-
"This Blessed Plot, This Earth, This Realm, This England"
2023-2024 Season Concert Five
Sunday, June 9, 2024
2:00PM
Eastlake Performing Arts CenterMusic Director Adam Stern, self-described as "an unashamed Anglophile", has programmed a season finale indulging his great love for English music.
The rollicking overture to Aristophanes' The Wasps by Ralph Vaughan Williams will cap a program that includes music by Vaughan Williams' best friend Gustav Holst (of Planets fame), the Impressionist Frederick Delius, the composer-pianist John McCabe (represented here by music from his opera based on C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe), and the budding talent George Butterworth, whose career was tragically cut short when he perished in the final days of World War I.
These diverse voices will paint a picture of England in all its powerful and poetic glory.
2022-2023 Concert Season 31
In a program of considerable variety, the Sammamish Symphony opens its 2022-23 season with music from three different centuries and five different countries. Joseph Haydn's Overture to an English Opera kicks off a concert combining music for the stage, the screen, and the concert-hall. Guitarist Michael Partington is the soloist in Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco's Guitar Concerto No. 1, a work written for the legendary Andrés Segovia. We also celebrate the 150th anniversary of the great English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams with a performance of his Two Hymn-Tune Preludes. Rarities by Morton Gould and Emil Hartmann round out this gala season opener.
The Sammamish Symphony continues its tradition of festive holiday programs with a blend of music for the season, beloved classical bonbons, and some jolly surprises. Come and celebrate the joys of the season by giving yourself the gift of live music!
IEver since its 1928 premiere, Kurt Weill's Threepenny Opera has been one of the most oft-performed works of 20th century musical theater. We present an instrumental suite from this timeless masterpiece, which includes its most famous song, Mack the Knife. The concert is rounded out by music of the Italian Baroque (Locatelli), the early Romantic period (Schubert), and the music of old Vienna (Josef Strauss). The concert concludes with two effervescent and lighthearted suites by Igor Stravinsky.
The first of the Three B's, and a perpetual nominee for Greatest Composer of All Time, Johann Sebastian Bach continues to inspire musicians and audiences with the power, the beauty, and the sheer technical brilliance of his music. Join us as we present a wide-ranging concert of Bach's works in several forms. The Sammamish Symphony's principal flute, Melissa Underhill, will be featured in a performance of Bach's Sonata in E minor in a new transcription for flute and orchestra.
The Sammamish Symphony ends its 2022-23 season with a program comprised of works by the three greatest composers of the Classical period. Mozart's overture to his early opera Lucio Silla, essentially a mini-symphony, provides the introduction to Beethoven's vivacious Piano Concerto No. 2 with guest soloist Laure Struber. The concert concludes with one of Haydn's magnificent late symphonies, No. 90 in C Major.