Updated at 8:31 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 2, 2026
There’s a cacophony of sound as individual musicians from the Colorado Symphony take their seats on the stage of Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium on Sunday morning.
The deep baritone of a trombone tuning up, string instruments playing bits of melody, the high pitch of a flute running up and down a scale.
This is the last stop of the Colorado Symphony’s debut tour in New York City, where they are about to perform with world-renowned violist Itzhak Perlman. The program includes American composer John Adams’ “Frenzy,” which has never been performed in the city.
“I’m a little nervous to perform,” said Seoyoen Min, principal cellist.
She’s from South Korea and grew up watching performances from the iconic hall online. But she had never played there herself until Sunday.
“It’s very much of a dream come true.”
Not only for her. Principal violinist Yumi Hwang-Williams has played Carnegie before.
“We all tend to be a little bit cool about it. We are like, ‘Yeah, we’re going to Carnegie.’ But I know deep down, we’re all just incredibly thrilled,” she said.
Caitlyn Kim/CPR NewsThe Colorado Symphony plays with Gregory Alan Isakov at New York City’s Radio City Music Hall. Jan. 31, 2026.
Hwang-Williams has been with the symphony for over 25 years, and this is the first time she’s toured with “our Colorado Symphony.” The last time the symphony traveled to New York was in 1974, when it was then known as the Denver Symphony.
“We can call it the Super Bowl,” she said. “I mean, it really feels like something that big.”
It’s big because it’s not just a stop at Carnegie Hall. The orchestra also played with Boulder-based indie singer-songwriter Gregory Alan Isakov for two sold-out shows at another venerable music venue less than 10 blocks away: Radio City Music Hall. In 2016, Isakov released an album with the symphony.
“It just feels so good to be here with the Colorado Symphony,” Isakov told the crowd on Saturday. “It feels really like home in New York.”
At the end of the last show, resident conductor Christopher Dragon threw his baton into the crowd after taking a bow with Isakov and the rest of his band.
This tour showcased the range and skill of the Colorado Symphony as well as how far the orchestra, which has a strong professional reputation, has come in the broader musical world.
“You don’t get to go to these venues unless you’re starting to gain really large recognition as one of the premier performing ensembles,” explained Michael Thornton, principal horn player.
He had never played in Radio City, a 6,000-seat venue, which is more than twice as large as the symphony’s home at Boettcher Concert Hall in Denver. “And so this is a very big step for the orchestra in terms of the way that we’re perceived in the world.”
Music director and conductor Peter Oundjian added that, if you look at any internationally regarded orchestra, “It’s the fact that they go out and are acknowledged in other cities, in other countries that really gives the community this sense of confidence and pride in their home orchestra.”
Orchestral music as a team sport
Oundjian said the musicians care a lot about all kinds of music, and these concerts reflect that.
“We’ve entered a stage now in the 21st century where we have to be relevant to everybody. If we just want to play from Bach to John Adams and only in the sort of art music repertoire, then how can we expect to have a large audience?” he explained.
Orchestral music can be a lot of different things, from movie scores to collaborations with rock and pop artists. And this tour had both. The Carnegie set included John Williams’ theme for “Schindler’s List,” which Perlman actually performed on for the original movie score. On the other hand, the symphony lent a richness and depth to the sound of Isakov’s folk music. And this diversity of range helps the symphony reach new audiences, both inside and outside of Colorado.
“They’ll come along, and then they get very excited by just the sight of seeing a hundred people in complete coordination,” Oundjian said. “It is the greatest example of human cooperation that you could ever imagine, that a hundred people play with one expression in one rhythm. And I think that’s sensational.”
Courtesy of Image by Amanda Tipton PhotographyMusic Director Peter Oundjian conducting the Colorado Symphony with Itzhak Perlman.
Daniel Wachter, president and CEO of the Colorado Symphony, is a business guy. He called it diversifying the audience.
“Classical music has a little bit of a stigma, a bit of a barrier. And I like the idea that this takes barriers down,” he explained. “They think they don’t like classical music, but then they watch a ‘Star Wars’ movie, or they see Gregory Alan Isakov on stage and say, ‘Oh, that’s not classical music. It’s beautiful.’ But there is a symphony orchestra, and that makes people curious to probably come to classical music. So we see a migration.”
Oundjian said the idea for doing a New York City tour came from artistic director Tony Pierce.
“Tony saw this opportunity. Carnegie happened to be free on Feb. 1 in the afternoon, and Radio City was free on Friday night. And Greg Alan Isakov is somebody we’ve worked with a lot,” Oundjian said.
And Oundjian’s own mentor, Perlman, was also available. That show sold out.
As for the concert with Isakov, it sold out in a matter of minutes. So a second night was added.
“This tour is not a money maker for us,” Wachter said. “I look at it as an investment, as an investment into the motivation and the morale building of the orchestra and the team, as an investment into our reputation as a symphony orchestra.”
And like with Colorado sports teams, some fans traveled for this “away game.”
Joan Disler of Littleton attended shows at both venues.
“They should have been playing here long ago,” she said. “They are as good, if not better, than any musicians that I know here in New York.”
There may be more touring in the symphony’s future, too. Their home stage in Denver is expected to undergo renovations in a few years, and the Colorado Symphony may hit the road again during that time.
Editor’s note: A previous version of this story misstated Peter Oundjian’s title.