Bramwell Tovey opens his first full season as music director with a program of passionate works written by three brilliant composers at the beginning of their careers. Prizewinning composer Quinn Mason describes A Joyous Trilogy, written in 2019, as “the very embodiment of happiness and cheerfulness.” Grammy-nominated pianist Joyce Yang shines in Grieg’s intensely emotional Piano Concerto, completed when the composer was just 24. The program concludes with Berlioz’s heady and evocative Symphonie fantastique. The sonic realization of a young artist’s opium-fueled dreams and the composer’s own romantic obsession, the masterfully orchestrated symphony is one of history’s most influential works.

Internationally celebrated violinist James Ehnes, “a violinist in a class of his own” (The Times), returns to perform Sibelius’s celebrated Violin Concerto under the baton of Bramwell Tovey. Emotionally riveting and breathlessly virtuosic, the concerto is the perfect vehicle for Ehnes’ musicality and flawless technique. Setting the stage for – one can only hope – more Mahler to come, Bramwell Tovey conducts the Orchestra in Mahler’s expansive Fourth Symphony. Mahler compared his work to being “seized with panic and terror” on “the most beautiful day in a sunlit forest.” Laquita Mitchell, a frequent collaborator with Maestro Tovey, wields her lustrous voice in the work’s concluding song, a view of heaven through a child’s eyes.

Rising young conductor Kensho Watanabe returns to Sarasota to lead an intriguing program including two 20th-century masterpieces. In his 1931 Violin Concerto, Stravinsky composed a work with a playful character and light touch in the style of neoclassicism. “Brilliant, dazzling” (Chicago Classical Review) violinist Karen Gomyo shows off Stravinsky’s ingenious integration of challenging solo lines with chamber-like musical textures. Copland’s final, monumental Third Symphony, which ends with his “Fanfare to the Common Man,” is considered by many to be the greatest American symphony ever composed. The program opens with Climb by Jessica Hunt. Written in honor of Beethoven’s 250th birthday, Climb merges Beethoven’s physical struggles with Hunt’s own experience of chronic illness.