New Year's Eve program announced

Looking ahead to our next Star-Lit! Concert, the Houston Symphony will perform on New Year’s Eve. Brett Mitchell will conduct the program featuring:

First Half: Great Party Scenes
Shostakovich: Festive Overture
Ravel: Tzigane with violin soloist, Assia Dulgerska
Grofé: “Mardi Gras” from Mississippi Suite
Strauss, Jr., J.: Overture to Die Fledermaus

Second Half: Great Symphonic Jazz
Nelson, Ron: Savannah River Holiday
Bernstein: Fancy Free - Three Dance Variations (Galop, Waltz, Danzon)
Ellington/Custer: Duke Ellington! (A Medley for Orchestra)
Gershwin: An American in Paris (excerpt)

About Assia Dulgerska...
Violinist Assia Dulgerska recently moved to Houston to join the Houston Symphony following her selection as assistant concertmaster during auditions in January. Assia has been receiving intensive instruction on the violin for more than 2 decades. Beginning in 1984, she spent 14 years at the Plovdiv School of Music in Bulgaria. She did her undergraduate work at Louisiana State University while studying with Kevork Mardirossian, and then went on to study at the Cleveland Institute of Music from 2003-2005. Her teacher during that time was Paul Kantor.

Assia has been a prize winner in several competitions. She performed Tchaikovsky and Brahms violin concerti to twice win the Louisiana State University concerto competition. In 2000, she won first prize in the Music Teachers National Association Collegiate Artist String Competition.

Assia has been an active participant in several festivals. In 2006, she was selected to join the prestigious UBS Verbier Festival Orchestra, an ensemble of outstanding young talent from all over the world. She toured the world with that ensemble, performing with conductors Claus Peter Flor and Herbert Blomstedt and violinist Hilary Hahn. She participated in the Aspen Music Festival for 2 summers, serving as concertmaster of the "Sinfonia" ensemble there in 2004. She has also taken part in the Round Top Music Festival and the Music Academy of the West.