Press articles

"Saturday's Symphony program elicits range of emotions"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 4/7/2008

"The Spokane Symphony concert Saturday began in sadness and ended in triumph." continue »

"Concert champions youth and skill"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 3/17/2008

"The Spokane Symphony's concert Saturday at the Martin Woldson Theater at The Fox had a spring in its step. The orchestra, joined at the end of the program by the Symphony Chorale, featured three works written by composers then in their 20s and 30s under the baton of a young conductor with an even younger piano soloist. It was a exhilarating display of youth, imagination and skill." continue »

"Symphony traverses English landscape"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 2/11/2008

"Eckart Preu led the Spokane Symphony in an impressive and beautiful survey of British orchestral music Saturday at The Fox covering the first half of the 20th century. The evening was capped by a magnificent performance of Edward Elgar's Cello Concerto by Alban Gerhardt." continue »

"Splashing finds its place amid instruments"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 1/14/2008

"The Spokane Symphony began 2008 with a splash Saturday in a concert featuring Tan Dun's engagingly theatrical "Concerto for Water Percussion" and Johannes Brahms' monumental Symphony No. 4.

The concert was a test of Spokane concertgoers' sense of adventure. A concerto less than 10 years old and a long work by Brahms asked too much of some – there were rows worth of empty seats as some people, sadly, decided to pass it up. Their loss." continue »

"Concert lets Fox's intimate side glow"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 12/16/2007

"Two weeks ago, the Spokane Symphony showed how impressive the Martin Woldson Theater at The Fox sounded with a huge orchestra in Stravinsky's splashy "Rite of Spring." Some people wondered how it would work with smaller orchestra." continue »

"Weather no match for symphony's 'Spring'"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 12/3/2007

"The Spokane Symphony showed off its new home to subscribers Saturday in the orchestra's first Classics concert in the Martin Woldson Theater at The Fox. As he had in the gala concert that opened the refurbished hall, symphony music director Eckart Preu chose a program that would give the audience a many-sided experience in the hall with a concert that ranged from the elegance of Mozart and Chopin to the raw power of Stravinsky." continue »

"Symphony gives Fox truly grand opening"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 11/19/2007

"Symphony gives Fox truly grand opening

The Spokane Symphony gave a spectacular introduction of its new home to a wildly enthusiastic capacity audience Saturday. The newly renamed Martin Woldson Theater at the Fox proved well worth the wait. The hall looks great in its art deco resplendence, but best of all, it sounds wonderful.

The first of the evening's well-deserved standing ovations went to Myrtle Woldson whose $1 million contribution got the Fox restoration project under way and whose additional $2 million gift made sure the project would be completed. The hall's new official name honors her father, Martin Woldson, a Spokane business magnate who died in 1958.

Music director Eckart Preu chose a program that could scarcely have been better designed to show off the new hall. The orchestra began program proper with Beethoven's Overture to Goethe's play "Egmont." But even from the drum roll and first notes of "The Star-Spangled Banner" that prefaced the concert, the orchestral sound had an in-your-ear presence I have never experienced with this orchestra in any of the other halls where I have heard the group play.

The "Egmont" Overture gave a clear idea of what the orchestra's sound really was: a rich, resonant foundation of cellos and basses, great clarity in the melodic exchanges of the solo woodwinds and in the punctuating chords from the brasses, and high definition playing from the violins." continue »

"Stamford Symphony explores musical surprises"
   Jeffrey Johnson (The Advocate), 11/18/2007

"It might come as a surprise that "The Mozart Effect" for performers includes an awareness that audience familiarity coupled with absolute musical transparency produces its own brand of anxiety. It might also come as a surprise that the "Surprise Symphony" of Haydn also produces this "Mozart Effect." But it should be no surprise that the Stamford Symphony, driven by the "Preu Effect," made the music sound natural and inevitable." continue »

"SSO opens with a hot and cold show"
   Jeffrey Johnson (The Advocate), 11/4/2007

"The Stamford Symphony opened its 2007-08 season Oct. 6 with a program called "Fire & Ice" that opened with a piece by Miguel Del cguila called "Conga-Line in Hell." A metric labyrinth, the chamber orchestra – consisting of single strings and winds tuba, harp, percussion and piano – generated a rich tapestry of sound. Emily Wong played the soloistic piano part with strong dance energy and the woodwind playing, particularly the jazzy clarinet lines played by Jon Manasse, came across with charisma." continue »

"Music nearly tangible at symphony concert"
   Travis Rivers (The Spokesman Review), 9/15/2007

"The Spokane Symphony roared into its 2007-08 season Friday, carried on the rumble of Honegger's "Pacific 231" – one of the most famous railroad pieces in orchestra literature – and closed the concert with the bells and orchestral din of Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition."" continue »