60th Anniversary Concert Season
It Gets Better
University Symphony Orchestra
Petar Dundjerski | Conductor2025-2026 Concerto Competition Winner | Jonah Hansen, cello
February 12, 2026 | 7:30 p.m.
Convocation Hall
Old Arts Building, University of Alberta Campus | 113 Street, 91 Avenue, Edmonton
Shostakovich's masterpiece, his Fifth Symphony, is a product of an environment imbued with fear, defiance and will to survival. It is music that was composed under immense pressure, yet succeeds in stating its subtly political voice clearly and ultimately has given innumerable generations hope and a reason for optimism. Dvořák's Cello Concerto blends feelings of longing, warmth and underlying resolve into a work of undeniable beauty, and will feature Jonah Hansen, the winner of the 2025-2026 University of Alberta Music Department Concerto Competition, as its soloist. Each of these masterworks paints a struggle to break through darkness and into something more hopeful, a hard fought victory through hardship.
