Can't Miss It: Saturday

If you want to sell out a symphony hall, you have your choice of ninth symphonies. Possibly if you've written eight symphonies, you're well into the swing of things, but for whatever reason, the ninth tends to rule. That said, we see that most of the tickets left for tonight are in the third tier, where the Symphony jacked the prices last season after figuring out that people preferred the sound up there. Lots of extra $77 seats.

Tonight the Seattle Symphony gives you Dvořák's "New World" Symphony, which we love, but then so does everyone else so it's not a remarkable that we do. It's a "locals-only" evening, with Gerard Schwarz at the podium, and the Symphony's ace up its sleeve, horn-slinger John Cerminaro. Cerminaro can make that brass curtsy and serve tea if he wants. Why one time in Oklahoma...but we digress.

Also on the bill, three excerpts from Act III of Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, and the world premiere of Samuel Jones's Horn Concerto. The Symphony are a Wagner-tested corps, and Meistersinger is one of Wagner's least pompous efforts, so that's a plus. We've obviously never heard his new horn piece, but Samuel Jones is a terrific guy, and looks a bit like Rip Torn.

8pm // Seattle Symphony // Tickets $17 - $97