75th Season Opener Concert
California Youth Symphony launches its landmark 75th Anniversary Season with an exhilarating program that sets the stage for one of the most ambitious seasons in CYS history! Throughout this extraordinary year, CYS will celebrate 75 years of musical excellence with special guest artists, alumni events, exciting programming, and much more—and we begin the celebration at full speed!
What better way to launch our 75th season than with John Adams’s Short Ride in a Fast Machine? Written in 1986, this electrifying orchestral showpiece is exactly what its title promises: a breathless, high-speed musical adventure propelled by an insistent pulse and layer upon layer of brilliant orchestral color. Adams once described the inspiration for the piece with a wonderfully simple question: “You know how it is when someone asks you to ride in a terrific sports car, and then you wish you hadn’t?” Buckle up—our anniversary season is underway!
CYS then welcomes to the stage Young Artist Competition Winner Sora Corro for Edvard Grieg’s beloved Piano Concerto in A minor. A prizewinner in numerous regional, national, and international competitions, Sora has performed as both soloist and chamber musician and was named a recipient of the National Chopin Foundation Scholarship for 2025–26. Her recent summer studies have included Music@Menlo, the Southeastern Piano Festival, and Juilliard’s Summer Music Program, and she previously appeared as concerto soloist performing Kabalevsky’s Piano Concerto No. 3 in Illinois. From the thunderous cascade of the piano’s famous opening measures to the breathtaking lyricism of its slow movement and the exhilarating Norwegian dance rhythms of its finale, Grieg’s only completed piano concerto has captivated audiences since its premiere in 1869 and remains one of the great treasures of the Romantic repertoire.
We close our opening concert with Sergei Prokofiev’s magnificent Romeo and Juliet, presented in an expanded selection of excerpts from one of the 20th century’s greatest ballet scores. Shakespeare’s timeless tragedy inspired Prokofiev to create music of extraordinary dramatic power and unforgettable orchestral color—from the menacing swagger of the Montagues and Capulets and the youthful exuberance of Romeo and Juliet to the tenderness of their love and the devastating tragedy that awaits them. By turns explosive, haunting, romantic, and fiercely dramatic, Romeo and Juliet provides a spectacular showcase for the CYS Senior Orchestra and a thrilling conclusion to our first concert of this historic season.
Seventy-five years. One extraordinary season. And we’re just getting started! Join Maestro Eylar and the California Youth Symphony as we begin our 75th Anniversary celebration with an unforgettable afternoon of orchestral fireworks, Romantic passion, and some of the most thrilling music ever written for symphony orchestra.
CONCERT HIGHLIGHTS
Leo Eylar, conductor
Sora Corro, piano
Adams: Short Ride in a Fast Machine
Grieg: Piano Concerto in A minor (Sora Corro, piano)
Prokofiev: Selections from Romeo and Juliet
Young Artist Competition Winner
Sora Corro is a sophomore in the Center of Creative Arts program at Irvington High School in Fremont, California. She began piano at the age of 2, and has been studying with Professor Sandra Shen since 2023.
CYS Young Artist Competition
Each spring the California Youth Symphony holds its Young Artist Competition to select soloists for the following season. The Competition is open to pianists and instrumental soloists under age 19. Two young artists will be chosen by a panel of three judges to perform with the CYS Orchestra during the November or March concert series of the following season.
Application form will be available later in the season.
