Branford Marsalis will perform at the Szczecin Philharmonic to top off the concert season!

This season’s finale concert will see the Szczecin Philharmonic’s Symphonic Orchestra perform with one of the all-time greatest saxophone players – Branford Marsalis! On Friday, 14 June, the artists will play the famous “Escapades” by John Williams. The programme will also include compositions by Aaron Copland and Richard Strauss. Ticket sales are now open.

The Szczecin Philharmonic invites you to this anniversary season's finale concert. Such an occasion calls for a musician of world stature, so we are very pleased to announce that the Golden Hall concert will feature one of the greatest saxophonists of all time –  three-time Grammy Award winner Branford Marsalis.

“He will perform John William's Escapades for Alto Saxophone and Orchestra from the film score of Steven Spielberg’s Catch Me if You Can starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hanks. Originally written as a suite, the composition quickly developed a life of its own outside the film,” said Katarzyna Plater-Zyberek, Spokeswoman for the M. Karłowicz Philharmonic. 

Branford Marsalis started his musical education playing the clarinet but quickly switched to the saxophone. Today, he is a master virtuoso of the sax, performing in both jazz and classical settings. Marsalis regularly plays with leading US orchestras, such as the New York Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Chicago Philharmonic and the North Carolina Symphony, as well as European orchestras. He performs works by such classical composers as Debussy, Glazunov, Ibert, Mahler, Milhaud and Vaughan Williams.

“The concert programme will also include works by Aaron Copland, who is considered the pioneer and father of contemporary American classical music. We will hear two of his pieces – Fanfare for a Common Man and Quiet City. Leonard Bernstein hailed the former the world’s biggest hit, while the latter is regarded, alongside Barber's Adagio for Strings and Ives’s The Unanswered Question, as one of the most meditative works in the history of American music,” Plater-Zyberek added. 

The evening will close with Richard Strauss’s Symphonia domestica, Op. 53 – the much-loved staple of orchestras all over the world. The 2023/2024 season’s finale concert will be significant for one other reason: it will see Maestro Rune Bergmann’s last performance as the Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Szczecin Philharmonic. Bergmann is stepping down after a tenure of eight years (since 2016).

Experience the season finale with BRANFORD MARSALIS in the Golden Symphonic Hall on 14 June, 7 p.m. Tickets cost PLN 220-250 and are available online and at the Philharmonic’s ticket office.