PORT ANGELES — Multi-award-winning Spanish pianist Josu de Solaun will make his way from Madrid to the Olympic Peninsula this week to join the 75-member Port Angeles Symphony to play Beethoven. It’s a piece he says starts like a Greek tragedy, turns almost beatific, then veers into rustic Hungarian dances and, by the finale, gives a taste of Italian opera.
This musical experience is Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto, part of the full symphony orchestra’s final concert of the 2024-25 season on Saturday. Artistic director and conductor Jonathan Pasternack will raise his baton at 7:30 p.m. at the Port Angeles High School Performing Arts Center, 304 E. Park Ave., for a little extra celebration, this being his 10th anniversary season with the orchestra.
Tickets to see the concert, which will feature musicians from Sequim, Port Angeles, Port Townsend and beyond, can be purchased at https://portangeles symphony.org and at the door. Admission includes the 6:30 p.m. pre-concert talk featuring Pasternack and cellist Candace Brower, who will discuss the evening’s music.
The public also is invited to the symphony’s final dress rehearsal at 10 a.m. Saturday; tickets to the working rehearsal are available on the website and at the door.
“Josu is one of the great artists living today, and it’s just such a treat whenever you get to hear him,” Pasternack said of Saturday’s guest soloist.
He knows from plenty of experience. De Solaun first performed with the Port Angeles Symphony Orchestra in April 2016, about six months after Pasternack became conductor and music director. The two men have collaborated in concerts and recordings here and in Europe; in the Czech Republic, they recorded an album together, “Totentanz,” that received a nomination last year for an International Classical Music Award.
Saturday’s concert will be de Solaun’s fourth with the Port Angeles Symphony; after his spring 2016 debut playing Rachmaninoff’s Third Concerto, aka the Rach 3, he returned in February 2020 and March 2023 to play Strauss, Liszt and Dvorak.
The Beethoven is handpicked by de Solaun for Saturday. After decades of playing in concert halls around the world, this work still captivates him.
Beethoven somehow weaves the full spectrum of human experience into a single piece, de Solaun said.
There’s boundless energy. There’s emotional depth. Life’s contradictions play out in the music, and “every performance feels like rediscovering its layers,” de Solaun said.
In addition to Beethoven’s piano concerto, the Port Angeles Symphony will perform Shostakovich’s 10th Symphony, an epic statement about the triumph of art over oppression.
“It’s tremendous music to hear live, with all of the power and emotion a large orchestra can bring,” Pasternack said.
“It has even more meaning,” he added, “when you understand about the composer’s experience trying to be true to himself as a creative artist in the former Soviet Union.”
Music, especially live, has great power to heal and inspire, Pasternack said — and in light of this, he looks forward to collaborating with de Solaun and with the whole symphony orchestra.
This concert is a special one, he noted, for another reason: It is the final Port Angeles Symphony performance for principal oboist Anne Krabill. Krabill, well-known across and beyond the North Olympic Peninsula, plans to retire from the orchestra after 27 years.
“It’s truly the end of an era,” Pasternack said.
“I am proud,” Krabill said, “to have been part of so many wonderful performances,” especially with the fellow musicians she admires.
“Each of the players in the orchestra is giving hundreds of hours per season rehearsing, playing concerts, practicing and driving. It is a tremendous combined effort,” she said.
The oboist, originally from Canada, joined the Port Angeles Symphony back when she was running a business and had four young children at home in Port Townsend.
“I missed many significant moments with my family in those years. I now have six young grandchildren, and I don’t want to miss any of their special times,” she said.
“I will miss being part of the magnificent symphonic sound,” Krabill said, “and I commend my colleagues for their dedication to the Port Angeles Symphony.”
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Diane Urbani de la Paz is a freelance writer and photographer who lives in Port Townsend.
Principal oboist Anne Krabill plans to retire after 27 years with the Port Angeles Symphony after her concert on Saturday. (Diane Urbani de la Paz/For Peninsula Daily News)
