The Cleveland Orchestra Will Embark on an International Tour in Spring 2020 as Part of a 10-Concert Tour 

For the first time, The Cleveland Orchestra will embark on a 10-concert international tour that includes a visit to the United Arab Emirates. The orchestra recently announced a slew of international concerts as part of a tour spanning the globe that will include locations like Paris, Abud Dhabi, and Linz. 

Though this is the orchestra’s 20th international tour with Music Director Franz Welser-Möst, it is the orchestra’s first visit to the United Arab Emirates. Further, the orchestra’s performance in the Abu Dhabi Festival will mark the first-ever appearance of a United States orchestra in the festival. 

Throughout the concert, The Cleveland Orchestra will appear with soloists like violinist Julia Fischer, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and baritone Simon Keenlyside, along with a side-by-side performance with the American Ballet Theatre for an interpretation of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet.

The tour, which will take place in March and April in 2020, will feature three European Cities—Vienna, Paris, and Linz—as well as four distinct connects just within the United Arab Emirates. 

The concert programs will feature the juxtaposition of works by Sergei Prokofiev and Franz Schubert, composers separated by a century, but composers shared gifts for melody and deep layers of musical meaning.

Other musical works will include Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony and Dvořák’s Cello Concerto with Yo-Yo Ma.  The ensemble will be joined in Europe by frequent Cleveland Orchestra collaborator Julia Fischer for performances of Prokofiev’s First Violin Concerto. In Abu Dhabi, the concerts and performances feature baritone Simon Keenlyside singing a selection of arias, a special collaboration with American Ballet Theatre for staged performances of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet with choreography by Kenneth MacMillan, and Dvořák’s cello concerto.

The Cleveland Orchestra, no stranger to international tours, continues to be a proud ambassador for Ohio, carrying its breadth of local arts and cultural understandings across the globe. 

“Nearly every season over the past half century, The Cleveland Orchestra has toured internationally,” says André Gremillet, The Cleveland Orchestra’s President and CEO.  

“We are extraordinarily proud to represent Cleveland and Northeast Ohio around the world.  Touring remains an essential part of our season both from an artistic and an audience development perspective. It is always a great pleasure for us to be back in Vienna and Paris, and we are honored to be the first orchestra from the U.S. to play the renowned Abu Dhabi Festival. Music truly is a universal language that transcends cultures and connects us all.”

The 2020 International Tour is part of the Orchestra’s 102nd season and the 18th year of the ensemble’s acclaimed partnership with Franz Welser-Möst.  This is the Orchestra’s 53rd international tour, and its 20th presented with Welser-Möst; the ensemble has played nine concerts in Paris under his baton, and 41 in Vienna.  Most recently, The Cleveland Orchestra toured Asia in spring 2019 — with first-time performances in Macao, Shenzhen, Wuhan, and Nanjing, along with return visits to Beijing, Shanghai, and Taipei.

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