The mission of Festival City Symphony, the oldest performing symphony orchestra in Milwaukee, is to educate the community and extend the reach of classical music with reasonable pricing and informative formats that embrace people of all ages.
FCS showcases area professional musicians in its two concert series: Symphony Sundays—Classical Music for All Ages and Pajama Jamborees—Classical Pops Concerts for Children and Families. Each season, FCS performs four Symphony Sundays concerts on Sunday afternoons, plus three Pajama Jamborees on select Wednesday evenings. FCS’s casual, family-friendly classical concerts have entertained audiences for more than 80 years! View our full schedule of Symphony Sundays concerts and Pajama Jamborees. Purchase individual tickets by calling the Pabst Theater Box Office at 414-286-3205 or visiting pabsttheater.org.
Take a spectacular journey with Milwaukee’s Festival City Symphony and Music Director Carter Simmons as the 2019-2020 season opens with Modest Mussorgsky’s Russian masterpiece Pictures at an Exhibition, orchestrated by French composer Maurice Ravel. Paired with music of warmer climes and Spanish brilliance, this captivating concert will transport the listener on a musical promenade.
Festival City Symphony and Music Director Carter Simmons invite you to experience a concert of works by two Frenchmen who changed music forever. The mysterious, provocative, and beautiful music of Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel uses all the colors of the orchestra to depict stories and myths from the ballet and concert stage. From enchanted woods to an Empress’s Garden, this music will open a world of sound for you.
Festival City Symphony will begin its Pajama Jamboree season with a FREE Holiday Pajama Jamboree concert on Wednesday, December 4, 2019, at 7:00pm in the Bradley Pavilion of the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts. The concert will feature traditional holiday favorites, including performances by the Whitefish Bay High School Choir. To help celebrate the season, the concert will conclude with FCS’s traditional holiday sing-along.
FCS encourages attendees to bring a nonperishable food donation for Milwaukee’s HUNGER TASK FORCE.
Jeannie Yu Featured in “Rhapsody and Romance: Legends of the Piano” Concert May 5, 2019
Jeannie Yu was awarded first prize in the Frinna Awerbuch Piano Competition, the Flint Symphony International Concerto Competition, the Portland Symphony International Concerto Competition, and the Kingsville Piano Competition. She earned the prestigious Gina Bachauer Memorial Scholarship Award, a full scholarship for a Master’s Degree program at the Juilliard School where she earned a Bachelor’s Degree. She was awarded an accompanist …
Todd Levy Featured in “Copland and Levy: American Masters” Concert March 31, 2019
Principal clarinet of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra and participant in the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, three-time Grammy Award-winner Todd Levy has performed as a soloist at Carnegie Hall, the Mostly Mozart Festival, with the Israel Philharmonic, and at the White House; as chamber musician with members of the Guarneri, Juilliard, Orion, Miro, and Miami …
Program Notes: “Legends and Masters” Symphony Sundays – May 13, 2018
Festival City Symphony: May 13, 2018 | Notes by Roger Ruggeri © 2018 Carl Maria von Weber November 18, 1786; Eutin June 5, 1826; London Overture to “Der Freischütz” Derived from German legend, Weber’s opera, Der Freischütz, is filled with Teutonic superstition and diabolical elements. Pacts with the devil, magic bullets, eerie forests and mystical incantations were all part of this …
