mainstage series
Saturday, February 28, 2026 • 7:30 p.m.
Northshore Concert Hall (15500 Simonds Rd NE, Kenmore)
Harmonia Orchestra & Chorus
William White, conductor
Hsing-Hui Hsu, conductor
Rachel Lee Priday, violin
Program
Jean Sibelius (1865–1957)
Karelia Overture
Carlos Garcia (*1991)
Violin Concerto [world premiere]
— intermission —
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Op. 74 (“Pathétique”)
About the Concert
Everett native Carlos Garcia is a musician who can seemingly do everything: in his young career he has composed music for Marvel films, Disney theme parks and (most impressively of all) Harmonia. Carlos also plays a mean fiddle, and that’s why it’s so exciting to have him collaborate with another major talent (and Harmonia favorite), Rachel Lee Priday, on a new work for violin and orchestra. Music of Sibelius and Tchaikovsky — written in the frozen north but burning with red-hot passion — bookends the program.
- This performance will last approximately one hour and 45 minutes, including one intermission.
- Join music director William White and composer Carlos Garcia for a pre-concert talk beginning at 6:30 p.m.
- Streaming tickets are also available for this concert. Due to technical limitations at the performance venue, the program will not be streamed live, but the video will be made available within 48 hours.
Maestro’s Prelude
Dear Music Lovers,
If you have come to our concert tonight looking for a gripping emotional experience, you have indeed arrived at the right place.
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky — known as the composer of some of the most passionate music in the canon — lays his soul bare in this, his final symphony. With its soaring melodies to searing climaxes, the “Pathéthique” was one of the pieces that first grabbed me as a teenaged classical-music obsessive, and it hasn’t let me go ever since. I consider the defining moment of this piece to be the transition from the red-hot ending of the third movement to the ice-cold dowsing that opens the fourth. I’ll speak more on this subject from the stage, but this is one case where I would ask you very kindly to hold your applause between movements so that we can all share this plangent experience together.
One way in which I identify very strongly with Jean Sibelius is that he too was a Tchaikovsky freak as a young musician. So much so, in fact, that Sibelius’ first symphony is sometimes referred to as “Tchaikovsky’s seventh,” in much the same way that Brahms’ first is sometimes called “Beethoven’s tenth.” (This in spite of the fact that Tchaikovsky actually composed eight symphonies — more about that fact in the program notes.) The Karelia Overture is peak Tchaikovskiana — incidentally, written in exactly the same year as the “Pathétique” symphony — but already Sibelius’ distinct compositional voice practically leaps off the page. I’m delighted that our orchestra’s assistant conductor, Hsing-Hui Hsu, will conduct this work tonight in her latest appearance on our concert stage.
Of course, a concert is never more exciting than when it features a world premiere, so I hope that you have arrived at the hall tonight with a giddy curiosity and a sense of occasion. It was my idea to pair the composer, Carlos Garcia, with the soloist, Rachel Lee Priday, and I have to say, I think it was one of my more inspired notions. Carlos is a fantastic violinist himself and thus the perfect person to write a virtuosic showpiece for an artist of Rachel’s caliber. The last piece that Carlos wrote for us was a huge hit, and I have every confidence that this new work will become an instant favorite with all of you who are lucky enough to be present at its inception.
— William White
P.S. I want to make sure that I make special mention of the fact that tickets are now on sale for our season finale concert, which will take place at Benaroya Hall on Friday, May 8. If you’re a fan of big orchestral works like Tchaikovsky’s sixth, you will not want to miss our performance of Holst’s The Planets and the trenchant choral-orchestral psalms of Lili Boulanger.
Solo Artists
A consistently exciting artist, renowned globally for her spectacular technique, sumptuous sound, deeply probing musicianship, and “irresistible panache” (Chicago Tribune), violinist Rachel Lee Priday has appeared as soloist with major international orchestras, among them the Chicago, Houston, National, Pacific, St. Louis and Seattle Symphony Orchestras, Boston Pops Orchestra, Buffalo Philharmonic and Germany’s Staatskapelle Berlin. Her distinguished recital appearances have brought her to eminent venues, including Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival, Chicago’s Ravinia Festival and Dame Myra Hess Memorial Series, Paris’ Musée du Louvre, Germany’s Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival and Switzerland’s Verbier Festival.
Passionately committed to new music and creating enriching community and global connections, Ms. Priday’s wide-ranging repertoire and multidisciplinary collaborations reflect a deep fascination with literary and cultural narratives. Her work as soloist with the Asia/America New Music Institute promoted cultural exchange, combining premiere performances with educational outreach in the US, China and Vietnam. She has premiered and commissioned works by composers including Matthew Aucoin, Christopher Cerrone, Gabriella Smith, Timo Andres, Leilehua Lanzilotti, Cristina Spinei, Melia Watras and Paul Wiancko. In 2022, she premiered a new concerto, Kuyén, written for her by Miguel Farías, which depicts the Moon in Mapuche mythology, with the UC Davis Symphony.
Recent season highlights have included a duo recital with composer/pianist Timo Andres in Seattle and for the Phillips Collection, exploring the throughlines of American twentieth and twenty-first century violin and piano works, and a third tour of South Africa, where she appeared in recital and performed the José White Lafitte Concerto with the Johannesburg and Kwazulu-Natal Philharmonics. Upcoming and recent concerto engagements include the Portland Symphony, Springfield (MO) Symphony, Pensacola Symphony, Symphony San Jose, South Carolina Philharmonic, and Bangor Symphony.
Rachel Lee Priday began her violin studies at the age of four in Chicago before moving to New York to study with the iconic pedagogue Dorothy DeLay; she continued her studies at the Juilliard School Pre-College Division with Itzhak Perlman. She holds a BA in English from Harvard and an MM from the New England Conservatory, where she worked with Miriam Fried. In 2019, she joined the faculty of the University of Washington School of Music as Assistant Professor of Violin. Ms. Priday has been profiled in The New Yorker, The Strad, Los Angeles Times and Family Circle. She performs on a Giuseppe Guarneri violin (“filius Andreae”).
- Learn more: rachelleepriday.com
Conductor Hsing-Hui Hsu is in her second season as Harmonia’s assistant conductor. She is also the music director and co-founder of the Emerald City Chamber Orchestra, a Seattle-based ensemble specializing in string repertoire. She has been a guest assistant conductor with the Seattle Symphony, and has also guest-conducted the Seattle Collaborative Orchestra, Saratoga Orchestra, Seattle Festival Orchestra and Puget Sound Symphony Orchestra. She was a founding member of the Amazon Symphony Orchestra and served as its music director, collaborating with other arts organizations in the Seattle area as well as charitable organizations such as Mary’s Place. In addition to conducting, she is an active clarinetist. Last season, she served as acting principal clarinetist with the Yakima Symphony Orchestra, where she is also bass clarinetist. She has played with the Pacific Northwest Opera, Sustain Music Project, Tacoma Opera, Seattle Philharmonic, Philharmonia Northwest, Seattle Metropolitan Chamber Orchestra and Puget Sound Symphony Orchestra. She received her Bachelors of Music in clarinet performance from Rice University, where she also served as music director of the Rice Light Opera Society.