For more than four decades, the Plano Symphony Orchestra has brought music to audiences across North Texas. Now, for the first time, some of the music created through and connected to the orchestra is preparing to reach listeners around the world.
The Plano Symphony Orchestra has signed its first recording deal with Grammy Award-winning label Reference Recordings. The album will be recorded Aug. 17–20 at the Meyerson Symphony Center under Maestro Héctor Guzmán, with international distribution planned in more than 25 countries.
But rather than using its recording debut to revisit familiar classical standards, PSO is building the album around commissioned works and composers with ties to the orchestra and North Texas, essentially preserving a piece of its own musical legacy while introducing it to a much larger audience.
It Starts With Plano
That connection is apparent from the album’s opening track: Plano Overture. The piece was written by Marcos Lifshitz, who became PSO’s inaugural composer-in-residence for the 2025–26 season. Plano Overture premiered with the orchestra on Oct. 18, 2025, and will now become part of its first commercial recording.
The album also includes works by Robert Xavier Rodriguez, Xi Wang, Quinn Mason and David Guion, along with Ciana by three-time Grammy winner Branford Marsalis. Marsalis and the Branford Marsalis Quartet will perform alongside the orchestra on Ciana, which was arranged by Lifshitz.
“The Plano Symphony Orchestra is dedicated to bringing new music into the world through presenting world premieres and by the commissioning of local composers to create new pieces of music,” PSO President and CEO Gregory Patterson said in an official statement. “This recording project is the next step in expanding our footprint beyond North Texas and is a milestone for this orchestra and the city of Plano.”
From Local Stage To International Audience
Founded in 1983 as the Plano Chamber Orchestra, PSO has grown alongside the city it calls home. Local Profile has previously covered the orchestra’s role in community traditions, including its performances at the Plano Balloon Festival. The recording represents a different kind of expansion. Reference Recordings works with orchestras including the Kansas City Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and Utah Symphony Orchestra, and its releases are distributed throughout North America and in more than 25 countries.
That means pieces that originated through relationships between PSO and its composers, including one bearing Plano’s name, will move beyond the concert hall and become available to an international audience.
For an orchestra that has spent more than 40 years building its presence in North Texas, its first recording isn’t simply about documenting how it sounds. It’s an opportunity to document and export some of the music it helped bring into the world.
Don’t miss anything Local. Sign up for our free newsletter.