Quad City Symphony Orchestra

Appreciate having a reduced senior ticket Wish the ice skating was still part of the program!

The opportunity for the QCSO to have Midori here to accompany them was a chance in a lifetime. Not only was the symphony ready for this challenge but also I am sure will relish this opportunity. I for one, as a first time viewer, was awestruck by the delicate grace in which Midori plyed her almost 300 year old violin. Her facial expression showed the emotion she puts in to her art. I as an observer noticed especially the times that she would finish a cadenza and then slowly, with eyes still closed, would smile in knowing she had hit it right on key. Unbelievable.\\! At one point I thought to myself, close your mouth and breath as I was so taken in. Thank you QCSO for this opportunity.

Danced my heart out, Sang with the music and enjoyed listening to the Symphony Play. I have attended this for years. It's a great family event.

This event was amazing - nothing like we have ever heard! I wish everyone could have experienced this event!

The show was well put together. To hear the tribute and the orchestra togeter was amazing. The best part of the concert for me was the sing along. The average age was well up there, and they did a great job with the sing along. I would go see this concert again and again. My wife also thought was a very good concert also.

The show was great. I would have chosen better songs though..."The Song Remains the Same" is great and all...but there are so many way better ones than that. All in all it was totally worth it...especially "Kashmir". The orchestra sounded good. The show itself was good, the band was entertaining and the lead singer really knew his stuff. I never thought anyone would sound like Robert Plant but Robert Plan.... Definitely would come and see the QC Orchestra perform Led Zeppelin any time!!

What a great concert. We are so lucky to have the Quad City Symphony Orchestra. Amazing!!! The guest conductor and his group were outstanding. Especially the screaming vocalist and the lady violinist. Our 25 year old daughter had never heard too much Led Zeppelin music--she is now a fan and is looking forward to purchasing her first Led Zeppelin CD. Looking forward to next year's Spring Pops -- The Eagles!

QC Symphony Spring Pops Music of Led Zeppelin was an amazing night! Everyone enjoyed themselves - me, my 50-something dad and even my 20 yr old sister! I wish I could relive the night over and over again.

I wasn't much of a rock fan until I met my fiance 2 years ago. I have now become familiar with rock legends like Led Zepplin. My fiance loved the concert and loved me for buying the tickets for us. I thought the singer did a good job singing the songs to sound like the originals. I liked the orchastra music. The electric violin was amazing.

My family and I had a great time and yes I said "family" I took my husband and my three young children to the show and we all loved it! My two daughters play violin and they thought that the young lady playing the electric violin was awesome. It was hard at times to hear the vocals because it was so loud but over all it was a fun experience for the whole family to go and see and we had others tells us that they really wanted to go but it was sold out. We are planning on going next year when they have the music of the Eagles.

I enjoyed the concert - the music - the setting - the overall experience. First time symphony goer - will go again. Was surprised by the age range of the ticketholders. Had a great time.

When the event ended I could have easily sat through the concert again. At least I'll be getting the CD. Let's do some more of this - such as the Beatles, Stones, Who, Elton John, or other music!!!!!! I also enjoy the regular season concerts at Augustana. Last year my favorite was the full Beethoven 9th.

The combination of the Orchestra and the Led Zeppelin tribute band was outstanding. It was amazing to see all of the age groups drawn to this concert. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

I REALLY ENJOYED THE SHOW EVEN THOUGH I WAS IN THE 2ND TO LAST ROW. ALLEGRA ROCKED ON THE ELECTRIC VIOLIN. SHE HAD AN AWESOME STAGE PRESENCE! THE GUY ON LEAD VOCALS WAS PRETTY AMAZING TOO. I COULND'T BELIEVE HOW MUCH HE SOUNDED LIKE ROBERT PLANT. ALL IN ALL A GREAT SHOW.

Hearing the advertisement of The Music of Led Zeppelin, I though to myself, "Now that would be interesting..." and so it was. The QC Symphony Orchestra was my very first symphony I had ever been to, so I was curious on the proper etiquette I needed. It was a symphony, yes, but Led Zeppelin was the band being tributed to. After hearing on the radio that they were expecting people to show up in "regular concert attire", I decided to wear what I always wear to a concert. A t-shirt of a past show, jeans, Vans, a bullet belt, and a leather jacket. I walked in and I was one of the first one's there. After awhile, seats were being filled and I noticed a very elderly couple sit right in front of me, which was probably the coolest thing that they liked Led Zeppelin too. I was still cautious on how to act. I wondered if I should sing along or act as if I was at a formal theatre for a play. Brent Havens and Randy Jackson, of Zebra and Jefferson Airplane, walked out stunning, and explained how things were going to work. After the first few seconds of hearing the first song, I decided I was going to consider it a concert. Although, it was not entirely like a concert. It was better. They may have not had a mosh pit, pyrotechnics, or had an entire crowd screaming at the top of their lungs, but that's what made it so very unique. Randy Jackson's exhilarating vocals sounded so much like Robert Plant's and it just clicked with the QC Symphony Orchestra, and ended up putting on one of the best shows I have ever seen. I heard the intro to "Kashmir" and got a weird sensation suddenly flow through my body. "Kashmir" boomed the Adler and that was when I realized there was a symphony also playing along with the drums, guitar and bass. That made it a million times better because it was like you could feel the rhythm of this incredible song! The floor and upper balcony of fans really got into it. Then a few songs later, they went into my favorite Led Zep song, "Going To California", which calmed the crowd a bit. The last and final song was obviously going to be Led Zeppelin's most renowned hit "Stairway To Heaven." Overall, the sold-out concert was phenomenal. Brent Havens is a genius and I will definitely be attending more of his productions such as the Music of the Doors, the Music of Pink Floyd, and the Music of the Eagles.

A totally unbelievable experience! The bands music was note for note, as if to recreate the Zeppelin experience and the QC Symphony brought an extra layer of intensity that made this an event to remember. Thumbs up to Brent Haven for his composition and Randy Jackson for his exception skills on both vocals and guitar. It was a pleasure to meet the exceptional composer and musicians from the band before the show - real down to earth guys, every one of them. Thanks for a night I will never forget!

I could not have been more pleased, excited, enraptured or emotional. The voices with the fantastic symphony...this is exactly what I had imagined and hoped for.

I really enjoyed the explanation given before the concert. It allowed me to truly understand what was to come. The whole experience was very moving and powerful. Just beautiful.

I have been to a few performances of the QC Symphony, but this was the best concert I have been to yet. It may just be the piece they performed, but it was majestic. A standing ovation and three curtain calls from the audience: well deserved. Experiencing a live performance of Beethoven's Ninth is something that should be on everyone's bucket list!

The guest soloist, Mr. McGill was exceptional. No words would convey the artistry. Could have listened to him the entire evening. The Bruckner piece was thrilling but too repetitive. Much too long.

First time I have ever been to an orchestra. Great show and music!

Music and mood of the evening was great. The special performers were awesome!

I enjoyed the entire program. The orchestra, adult choir and the children's choir were great. The Circes de Symphony were very entertaining. Over all it was an excellent performance that I would recommend.

Music was beautiful! Kids were adorable! Cirque de la Symphonie amazing! Really started the holiday season off right!

My sister and I arrived early, to hear the talk before the concert. Then, before the intermission, the orchestras, choruses, and director gave us a taste of each section of the feast to come, with explanations of what we were hearing. The house lights were kept at a level that allowed us to follow the words in our programs. Then the piece started. And we were just blown away. We both are familiar with the Requiem Mass; the way the poet's words fitted into or denied sections of the Mass was amazing. By the end, we were in tears, as the tenor and baritone sang of resting together, and the choir sang in Lating let them rest in peace. I can see why all these schools came together to do this astounding piece, including the German school.

We saw a performance of this piece in Minneapolis a couple days before and couldn't wait to see the Quad Cities performance. The choirs and orchestras were magnificent and Maestro Smith kept the whole incredible thing together. The soloists were also outstanding. It was hard to imagine how much work and coordination went into producing these events. QCSO is lucky to have Mark Russell Smith as their conductor!

My wife and I attended the Saturday evening performance of the Holiday Pops. While the music and the choirs were excellent as always, we both found the addition of the circus performers to be a complete distraction. It seemed to us that the performers flying over the audience and the clown's juggling had absolutely nothing to do with the music or the holiday theme. We were quite disappointed and left at intermission. We both hope that in the future, performances will be better suited to the excellence of the music provided to put us all in a holiday mood.

Great night with the symphony. Some of the clothing worn by the Cirque de Symphony were inappropriate.

Everything was wonderful. It was a packed house and the crowd was handled very well.

I knew I was in trouble when it took 45 minutes for the conductor to explain what we were about to hear. The performers appeared to be competent and well rehearsed, but the piece itself was a discordant mess that was about as painful to sit through as fingers on a chalk board. I guess next time if I don't know the work being performed then I better not go.

Absolutely amazing! The sights and sounds filled our senses and got us in the holiday spirit. We REALLY enjoyed the show!

What an amazing performance by the orchestra and the choirs. I would highly recommend to anyone.

A great night and concert. Beethoven was best and I really went to slooshy a bit of the Ludwig Van, but all was very good. I remember Frank Zappa as a great composer and musician and I think he might have come close to Bancks. I truly mean that as a compliment.

The music of the symphony was beautiful, expressive for all threes pieces. The duet of violin and viola was good but I wouldn't rush to see them again.

Bottom line, this was FANTASTIC. The history behind it, as well as the overall composition was by far the best oratorio I've ever seen. Mark Russell Smith does a fantastic job (as usual) bringing the symphony and choir to life, and the soloists were INCREDIBLE. It was so great, I went to see it a second time the next night at Augustana College. My only critique would be the "intro" at the beginning. While I understand the importance of learning the history of the piece, I wish they wouldn't have given us "examples," because I feel like it spoiled it for me.

I was overall disappointed in the concert. I would have liked to hear more Christmas music done by the symphony and with the two choirs. While Debbie Boone is a good singer and an accomplished artist, I did not pay to see a "Debbie Boone" concert. Her venue of music is not what I am interested in hearing

What a great evening for our 40th wedding anniversary. We've never been to the symphony before. It was awesome. Loved the guest conductor. She was very entertaining to watch. You could feel her passion. The line to pick up our tickets moved a little slow but that gave me time to people watch.

The only thing amiss was the fact that with our seating we could only see half of the screen of pictures.

The Quad City Symphony Orchestra was splendid, the music selection was terrific and Alondra De La Parra, the guest conductor was unbelievable. What a great evening of musical entertainment.

First half felt more like a pitch for her new CD. Not enough Christmas. We went a couple years ago to the one with the skaters. That one was awesome.

The concert was absolutely amazing. The guest conductor was fun to watch and the music was flawless. The first half was Rimsky-Korsekav's Scheherazad and I heard several people comment how can they possibly top that in the 2nd half of the program. The second half was just as enjoyable with a guest classical guitarist and Bolero. Three standing ovations in one day. At the end the Conductor had the audience engaged swaying and jumping to the beat of the percussionists. Truly a big-city performance in the Quad Cities.

Title says it all. We were disappointed in that 80% of this Holiday Pops was a Debby Boone concert. I'm sure Debby Boone fans were satisfied, but if you attended this event thinking it was going to be at least a 50/50 Holiday Pops/Debby Boone event, you were wrong. Overall for a Pops event, it was just too slow with Debby Boones performance. I can say this since we have attended the past 5-6 of these yearly Pops concerts. That high center screen is located in a poor place, as most lower bowl patrons view is blocked by the lights above the stage and the upper bowl patrons view is blocked by several cables & wires. These iWireless events need 2 screens, one on each side of the stage.

We enjoyed the concert, especially the second half.

This concert was magnificent! The best I have ever participated in. It was emotional, dynamic, awe-inspiring, and breath-taking. There was not one part of any of the pieces that could have been made better. Concertmaster Candidate Greenholtz' Scheherazade solos were gripping. Tears flowed from concert beginning to the end. It was truly a wonder to behold. Thank you.

It was a wonderful concert. I wondered about the program, but the two showpieces were like thick slices of great, warm, chewey bread. In between the slices was this wonderful concoction of the Rodrigo concerto -- a great meal!

Quite honestly I felt that the concert featured Debbie Boone way too much. I came wanting to hear a lot of great Christmas Music and get into the spirit. I really wanted to hear more from the Presbyterian Choir and felt the sound when they did preform was way to low. I really did not come to hear about Rosemary Clooney, Debbie's Family, nor there tours together. Just my opinion, I'm sure many enjoyed Debbie.

I really enjoyed and was touched by the music and the overall quality of the symphony. Having a front row seat was a completely different experience, directly feeling the vibrations and watching the artists become engulfed in the music they were playing. Just wonderful! Thank you, QCSymphony and Mark!

This was the first time I was able to go when the choir sang and it was wonderful.

The Holiday Pops have long been a family tradition. The symphony, sanctuary choir and children's chorus never fails to impress. This uear's guest artist, Debby Boone, was wonderful and I thoroughly enjoyed her performances in both the first and second half of the show. However, the sanctuary and children's choirs were underutilized

Having never been to a Quad City Symphony concert before, I was pleasantly surprised by the talent and emotion displayed by these fine musicians! I will most definitely be purchasing another ticket for their next show!!

What a wonderful night! The weather was great, the music was fantastic! Who could have asked for more? The orchestra was superior and to add the Beatles singing was magnificent! The music brought back memories and for a moment I thought I was back in the sixty s again. We are so lucky to have such a fun event in the Quad Cities. I can t wait for next year s Pops!

The symphony was awesome. The movement chosen for the concert was fantastic. It had so many varied ups and downs and highs and lows.

An amazing display of musicianship by Midori. Truly incredible - I was blown away. As usual, the Symphony sounded fantastic as well.

A STUNNING PERFORMANCE BY ONE OF THE WORLD'S BEST. HOW MANY ARTISTS (IN ANY REALM) ARE IMMEDIATELY RECOGNIZED WITH A SINGLE NAME?

It has been years since I've been to the symphony. My 14 year old son saw the article in the newspaper and wanted to go. I made no hesitation to get tickets to support his interest. We were not disappointed! The video / symphony combination was so different and, yet, so intriguing. We all really enjoyed it.

The music of Samuel Barber, written for whom? Its episodes of knife-stabbing dissonance in the higher registers make me acutely uncomfortable. Perhaps an intensely painful passage is a clever device in musical theory. Perhaps a large chunk of alum in an entree is a clever means to awaken a diner's attention, but it does not please. The orchestral Strauss was very pretty. And as the maestro noted, it wove together seamlessly the sounds of all the orchestral sections. The playing impressed even this ignoramus. The passage of theme among the sections was almost unnoticeable. Such a large number of short works was a little frustrating, generating so many starts and stops. A symphony pleases this listener better. The soprano was a little thin up in the second balcony. She likely has a very pretty tone, but the music given her did not aim at prettiness.

The Quad Cities Symphony Orchestra is a diamond in the ruff. What an outstanding performance from a world-class orchestra. BRAVO!

The tickets for this were a gift to my husband and I splurged on getting us closer to the orchestra. The video and music combined for a superlative experience --- The Planets is his most favorite piece and he's always been deeply interested in planetary exploration. When we lived in Maryland, we spent as much time as we could at the National Air & Space Museum and the satellite feeds from Mars were always our first stop. He commented that it was absolutely worth whatever the tickets cost to have been in the audience!

Two very fine musicians played difficult music to an appreciative audience in a strange room. Stravinsky and Prokofiev followed by Beethoven is not typical programming anywhere but especially rare in the Quad Cities. Marian Lee, piano, and Naha Greenholtz, violin, performed with knowledge, sympathy and grave beauty the works of these three composers, each an edgy iconoclast in his own time. The Figge lobby was probably never designed as a concert hall and the acoustics favored the piano's sonics to that of the violin. Nevertheless, the performers played with great respect for each other and formed a sound that was both contemporary and sympathetic to the time period of the compositions. The emotional force of all three pieces left no room for dreamy reverie, demanding attention to the wealth of bristling and profound ideas. The fine musicianship and the engrossing complexity of the compositions will stay with me for a long time.

This was my first orchestra. I went only because I needed to for my music appreciation class and I wasn't really excited about it. But when I got there and was seated I started to become more interested. By the time the lights went down I was fully ready to experience it. And I truly enjoyed it.

This was a concert that began with two wonderful soloists and just kept getting better. Ms. Shafer sings like an angel and Mr. Bordner was incredible. While the Bach was good, the Hertel was even better. The interplay between Mr. Bordner and Mr. Parker was mezmerizing. As we went into intermission I felt this concert could not get any better and was delighted to be so wrong. The choir's first piece actually brought forth an audible gasp from the audience. The persons sitting behind me gave a collective "wow" at the end of this piece and all I could think of was how they echoed my thoughts. The intensity, the diction, the delivery were all WOW. Thank you for bringing such a moving and professionally performed concert to the QC.

Aside from the lady humming behind me, I thoroughly enjoyed the first half. I had already seen TSO twice, so even though I enjoyed the music, the second half was a repeat of songs I have heard before. I felt bad for the youth orchestra. Being that this was their first appearance at a Pops concert, I could not hear them perform. Only watched as they moved their bows. I really, really miss the ice skating. I spoke with an acquaintance the next day and she hated the second half. Said it felt like she was at a rock concert.

I took my sister to Masterworks 4. The first half was delightful and enjoyable; the second half, the Mozart Requiem, was astounding. I have performed in the Requiem chorus, and heard recordings, but this was the first time I listened to a live performance from the audience. My sister hadn't heard it before. She kept whispering "Wow!" after the end, then told me sometimes she almost forgot to breathe, and the hair stood up on the back of her neck as the chorus went into the "Kyrie".

The second half was outstanding!! The upbeat & percussion made it an exciting & uplifting. I would enjoy future concerts like this in the future.

we always enjoy an evening with the qcso. never disappointed. are you ever going to do more of the rock band tribute series?

The entire show was awesome. The choirs were awesome and the orchestrs were great. The Mark Woods Experience was beyond words.

November 20th Holiday Pops was excellent including the ballet and the group Destino. Only thing I would change was the conductor; would have preferred Mark Russell Smith. Guest conductor had boring voice.

The sound system was not great. The conductor was unintelligible for a lot of what he said. We were on the second level. The screen was so high that the lighting equipment interfered with watching it. The photographer had far, far, far too many looks at the entire stage and not nearly enough of the Destino group. There were barely any closeups of the black gentleman and very few of the other singer. Not good quality of the violinist. They were well worth the time to watch and see upclose. Was very disappointed in this. The QC Ballet group merited some up close pictures and there were so few and grainy at best. The children's choir was not photographed nearly enough nor any closeups of their faces and singing and attention. In short, VERY disappointed in the filming of the concert. The sound system could be much better and has been for other concerts. Would like to see more ballet, more children choir and upclose views of everyone, not only the bass players!

Very nice performances by several organizations collaborating for a common cause.

The music selections were very well arranged,with superb conducting and the ever-phenomenal choirs. Addition of qc ballet was a welcome changeup. Audio was not as well mixed as in prior years, with generally missing low frequencies and quiet solos. Lighting design left much to be desired. Overly saturated monochromatic hues made the eyes tired, and the blue audience blast during holy night was pure punishment! Add the LED ad panels popping on and it was better to keep eyes shut and rely solely on the aural pleasure...

A fun tradition to start the Holiday season. The quality of the performance is outstanding! The selection of the music was fantastic! The Bugler's Holiday was enjoyable along with many other favorites: Let there be Peace on Earth, You Raise Me Up

Have attended in the past and believe others in the past were better. Orchestra was great and the dancers added this year from Quad Cities Ballet were fantastic. Choir could have improved greatly,a little boring. Destino made the show,needed more performances by them.

Possibly the best ever in it's 25 years. The combination of the orchestra, children's choir, First Presbyterian choir, Quad City ballet and the visiting artist group Destino was the ultimate in the arts. Truley a Holiday spectacular with something for everyone.... tihs is a must see for all ages.