What about the music?
An inside look with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra
Vivaldi’s Four Seasons
& Philip Glass’s Lincoln Symphony
September 25, 2026 | 7:30PM | CNU’s Ferguson Center for the Arts, Newport News – Get Tickets
September 27, 2026 | 2:30PM | Sandler Center or the Performing Arts, Virginia Beach – Get Tickets
Eric Jacobsen, conductor
Simone Porter, violin
Davóne Tines, bass-baritone
Antonio Vivaldi: The Four Seasons
Philip Glass: Symphony No. 15, “Lincoln”
By Stella Feliberti
The Performers
conductor
Eric Jacobsen
Already well-established as one of classical music’s most exciting and innovative young conductors, Eric Jacobsen combines fresh interpretations of the traditional canon with cutting-edge collaborations across musical genres. Hailed by the New York Times as “an interpretive dynamo,” Eric, as both a conductor and a cellist, has built a reputation for engaging audiences with innovative and collaborative programming.
Eric joined the Virginia Symphony Orchestra as Music Director in 2021, being named the twelfth music director in the orchestra’s 100+ year history. Current and recent projects include recording projects of Dvorak and Coleridge-Taylor with Gil Shaham and Rhapsody in Blue (on banjo!) with Bela Fleck.
Eric is entering his tenth season as Music Director of the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, as he continues to pioneer the orchestra’s programming and community engagement in new and exciting directions. The 24-25 season looks forward to concerts including An Evening with Jamie Bernstein and the World Premiere of Gabe Kahane’s clarinet concerto for Anthony McGill.
Eric is also artistic director and co-founder of The Knights, the uniquely adventurous NYC-based chamber orchestra. The ensemble, founded with his brother, violinist Colin Jacobsen, grew out of late-night music reading parties with friends, good food and drink, and conversation. Current endeavors include a multi-year Rhapsody project as well as a residency at Carnegie Hall. Under Jacobsen’s baton, The Knights have developed an extensive recording collection, including albums with longtime collaborators Yo-Yo Ma, Gil Shaham, Aaron Diehl, Gabe Kahane, and Anna Clyne.
Eric’s musical life started from a very young age surrounded by a musical family, where he discovered his love of pulling a bow across a string as a cellist. He and his brother founded the string quartet Brooklyn Rider and also performed regularly with Yo-Yo Ma as a member of Silk Road, touring around the world. This collaborative spirit and sense of music is something that Eric strives to bring to every concert and project.
A frequent guest conductor, Eric has established continuing relationships with the Colorado Symphony, the Detroit Symphony, the Oregon Bach Festival, and the Dresden Musikfestspiele. Upcoming engagements also include concerts with Classical Tahoe and Grant Park Music Festival, and special performances with Yo-Yo Ma and the Atlanta Symphony and Utah Symphony.
Eric brings joy, storytelling, and a touch of humor to what he describes as “musical conversations” that delight audiences around the world, including those who do not traditionally attend classical music concerts. Jacobsen is married to Grammy-Winner singer-songwriter Aoife O’Donovan and together they have a daughter.
violin
Simone Porter
Violinist Simone Porter has been recognized as an emerging artist of impassioned energy, interpretive integrity, and vibrant communication. In the past few years she has debuted with the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic; and with a number of renowned conductors, including Stéphane Denève, Gustavo Dudamel, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Nicholas McGegan, Ludovic Morlot, and Donald Runnicles. Born in 1996, Simone made her professional solo debut at age 10 with the Seattle Symphony and her international debut with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London at age 13. In March 2015, Simone was named a recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant.
Simone’s recent seasons include extensive US touring with debuts and return visits to orchestras such as Colorado, North Carolina, St. Louis, Oregon, Hawaii, Grand Rapids, Omaha, Quebec, Jacksonville symphonies, Erie Philharmonic, Florida Orchestra and many more. In 24/25 season Porter will return to Nashville and Baltimore symphonies, as well as Santa Rosa, Monterey and Westchester symphonies with a debut with Arkansas Symphony and a visit to Johnson City Symphony in TN. Simone will be artist in residence with the Oregon Symphony starting in the 25/26 season, her first appearance being a performance of Philip Glass Concerto No. 1 with David Danzmayr.
In February 2025, Simone released her debut album ad tendo, which was inspired by the ideas of philosopher Simone Weil and featured all solo violin repertoire including the premiere recording of Reena Esmail’s Drishti.
Internationally, Simone has performed with the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra with Gustavo Dudamel; the Orquestra Sinfônica Brasileira in Rio de Janeiro; the National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica; the City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong; the Royal Northern Sinfonia; the Milton Keynes City Orchestra in the United Kingdom; Orquesta Clasica Santa Cecilia de la Fundacion Excelentia in Madrid; the Opera de Marseille and at the Edinburgh Festival performing Barber under the direction of Stéphane Denève.
Raised in Seattle, Washington, Simone studied with Margaret Pressley as a recipient of the Dorothy Richard Starling Scholarship, and was then admitted into the studio of Robert Lipsett, with whom she studied at the Colburn Conservatory of Music in Los Angeles. Summer studies have included many years at the Aspen Music Festival, Indiana University’s Summer String Academy, and the Schlern International Music Festival in Italy.
Simone Porter performs on a 1740 Carlo Bergonzi violin made in Cremona Italy on generous loan from The Master’s University, Santa Clarita, California.
bass-baritone
Davóne Tines
Heralded as a “singer of immense power and fervor” and “[one] of the most powerful voices of our time” (Los Angeles Times) “the immensely gifted American bass-baritone Davone Tines has won acclaim, and advanced the field of classical music.” (The New York Times). This “next generation leader” (TIME Magazine) is a path-breaking artist at the intersection of many histories, cultures, and aesthetics. His work blends opera, spirituals, gospel, and anthems, as a means to tell a deeply personal story of perseverance and human connection.
The Creators
Antonio Vivaldi
Fast Facts:
- Antonio Vivaldi was an Italian composer and virtuoso violinist born in 1678. He is now regarded as one of the great Baroque composers.
- Vivaldi composed in a variety of genres including instrumental concertos, sacred choral works, and operas. Yet, he is most known for his output of violin concertos, writing over 200 of them in his lifetime.
- He was ordained as a priest in 1703 at age 25, starting his theological studies at 15. His status as a priest and his fiery red hair earned the composer the nickname “The Red Priest.”
- Vivaldi spent a large portion of his life as a teacher and conductor at the Pio Ospedale della Pietà, an orphanage for girls. Here, he composed, taught, and conducted the girls in musical ensembles. It was for these students that Vivaldi wrote all his violin concertos.
- Vivaldi was known for his flamboyant vanity. He boasted that he could compose a concerto faster than it could be copied.
Philip Glass
Fast Facts:
- Philip Glass is an American composer and pianist born in 1937. He is most known for composing in a minimalist style, built through repetitive phrases and shifting layers.
- Though now known as a minimalist, Glass preferred to be called a composer of “music with repetitive structures.” His works include the reiterations of brief, elegant fragments that are weaved in and out of an “aural tapestry,” immersing listeners into sonic twists, turns, and developments.
- Glass has composed a wide variety of works including 15 operas, chamber operas, musical theatre works, 15 symphonies, 12 concertos, 9 string quartets, chamber pieces, and film scores. His works have gained acclaim as he has won multiple Grammy Awards, Academy Awards, a BAFTA Award, and a Primetime Emmy Award.
- In 1967, Glass created the Philip Glass Ensemble: a seven-member group of keyboards and a variety of woodwinds that were amplified and fed through a mixer.
- Glass’s music has been featured on many movie soundtracks including The Truman Show, The Hours, and The Illusionist.
The Pieces
Vivaldi
The Four Seasons
Listen to Vivaldi’s Four Seasons by Janine Jensen at the International Kamermuziek Festival:
- Vivaldi wrote this group of four violin concerti between 1718-1723 while the composer was the court chapel master in Mantua.
- Each of the concerti musically realize each season of the year. With each concerto, there is a related sonnet written by the composer himself to illustrate the intended spirit of each season. In addition to this, Vivaldi added musical elements to echo the sonnets with barking dog sounds, chirping birds, or bubbling brooks.
- During the Baroque period, many pieces left space for performers to add their own personal flair through ornamentation or small improvisatory flourishes. Vivaldi’s Four Seasons is no exception as many performers will add their own flourish to each movement.
- The first concerto is “Spring,” which illustrates joyous bird songs, bubbling brooks, goats napping, barking dogs, and shepherds dancing to droning bagpipes. Next is “Summer,” evoking not the pleasant summer breeze but the “heat of the burning sun,” focusing on the languid heat, buzzing flies, and summer thunderstorms. Following is “Autum,” which is filled with peasants dancing, followed by a drunken slumber, finally to be awakened by the sound of hunting horns and running dogs. Lastly is “Winter,” painting the scene of desolate cold, slippery ice, cozy fireside naps, and falling snow.
Glass
Symphony No. 15, “Lincoln”
- Glass wrote his 15th Symphony “Lincoln” in 2026 with its premiere happening in July 2026 by the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood.
- The piece was inspired by Abraham Lincoln’s 1838 “Lyceum Address” that warns against the rise of mob violence and threats to the rule of law and the government itself. It also portrays the life of the President himself, taking inspiration from his later speeches including his Farewell Address in 1861, the Emancipation Proclamations in 1863, and his final address in 1865.
- The symphony is for solo baritone and orchestra. Rather than the traditional 4 movements, this symphony consists of 8 individual movements that focus on the Lyceum address, an autobiography, slavery, the end of the Civil War, and his Farewell Address. Within these movements the solo baritone alternates between sung and spoken text.
Glossary
Minimalism
A musical aesthetic and style that started in the mid-20th century focused on creating music through limited or minimal musical material. It usually employs repetitive phrases, steady drones, and recycling of smaller phrases or musical units.
Symphony
A large four movement work written for full orchestra.
Concerto
A work for a solo instrument accompanied by orchestra, usually in three movements.
Premiere
The first time a piece is performed in concert.
Dicussion Question
Music is full of contrasts such as dynamics (loud and soft), tempos (fast and slow), range (high and low), and instrumentation (string instruments and brass instruments), just to name a few. There are also a lot of contrasts between styles of music such as the Baroque style of Antonio Vivaldi and the contemporary style of Philip Glass. Discuss the similarities and differences in the two styles.