On 19 September, the BSO and its Music Director Andris Nelsons open their 2024/25 season with an opening night gala concert at Symphony Hall. Beginning with Carlos Simon’s “Festive Fanfare and Overture”, the programme will include La Valse by Maurice Ravel and Camille Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals featuring soloists Lang Lang and Gina Alice, who recorded the work with Andris Nelsons and the Gewandhausorchester last year. Further soloists are mezzo-soprano Susan Graham, in a selection of songs from “Chants d’Auvergne” by Joseph Canteloube, and Keila Wakao, who will make her BSO debut playing the violin solo in Ravel’s Tzigane.

The season opening weekend also includes a Concert for the City, featuring a packed programme with the BSO, the Boston Pops, and local Boston performers. Andris Nelsons will conduct the BSO in a repeat rendition of Carlos Simon’s “Festive Fanfare and Overture”, as well as the second movement from Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6.