The Alexandria Symphony Orchestra (ASO), in collaboration with Signature Theatre, will present its next concert "Glorious Love, Tragic Love" on Saturday evening, featuring Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" in both traditional and modernized musical interpretations.
Led by Maestro Kim Allen Kluge, the symphony is over 70 musicians strong and will be joined by two soloists, Signature Theatre's soprano Erin Driscoll and tenor Tim Tourbin, who recently performed at the Kennedy Center.
Erin Driscoll was awarded the Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Leading Actress Resident Musical in "Urinetown" and most recently performed Rapunzel in the Theatre's "Into the Woods."
Tim Tourbin was featured at the Kennedy Center's "Sweeney Todd" and "Merrily We Roll Along," as well as at Signature Theatre's Sweeney Todd and Cabaret.
The four musical interpretations include selections from Leonard Bernstein's "West Side Story "which will feature soloists Driscoll and Tourbin, Henry Mancini's "Love Theme to Romeo and Juliet," Tchaikovsky's "Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture" and Berlioz's "Romeo and Juliet."
The Symphony is known to combine its concert presentations with different genres such as dance, theatre, literature, film and the visual arts. This season, ASO collaborates with organizations including Metro Stage, the Little Theatre of Alexandria, the Metropolitan Chorus and the Opera Theatre of Northern Virginia. As a result, the ASO has reached new heights in reaching out to new audiences and fostering relationships with the community.
According to Maestro Kluge, “ ‘Glorious Love, Tragic Love' was created to appeal to a very broad range of musical tastes. Performing these four different interpretations of Romeo and Juliet on the same program will be extremely exciting and entertaining.”
Both soloists are excited about the performance as it will be their first large orchestral concert. Tourbin was included in special features of Barbara Cook’s “Mostly Sondheim” DVD during the Sondheim Celebration in 2002. He has been an avid musical theatre actor. “I’m an accountant by trade and I was a full-time professional actor for about five years and now perform to keep my soul full,” he said.
Driscoll is a musical theatre actress and often performs in shows in the greater D.C. Metropolitan area. "I feel blessed to be paid to do what I love." Quoting a famous saying, "When you wake up in the morning, if it's the first thing you think about and you can't imagine yourself doing anything else, then that's what you're meant to do," she said.