CSO + Jonathan Rush with Rachel Barton Pine

Conductor Jonathan Rush, a protégé of Marin Alsop and last summer’s Lead Seminario Conductor, joins the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for Hector Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique and more. A graduate of Peabody Conservatory, Rush grew up steeped in gospel and other roots-based genres. “What I bring is something so different,” he said. “My foundation was gospel. I’m not just going to bring classical, I’m going to bring soul … the whole music world that makes up Jonathan Rush. People my age, we have something to offer, and it’s completely different.”

Chicago native and recurrent CSO collaborator Rachel Barton Pine takes the stage with Rush and the orchestra for the CSO premiere of José White Lafitte’s Violin Concerto in F-sharp Minor plus Niccolò Paganini’s La Campanella. The Washington Post described her as “an exciting, boundary-defying performer.” Pine “displays a power and confidence that puts her in the top echelon.”