A Halloween concert with John Williams favourites and spooky orchestral classics, with family activities and trick-or-treating.
The Columbus Symphony is bringing its Halloween Spooktacular to the Ohio Theatre on Sunday, October 25, at 3 PM. It's a concert programmed specifically for kids ages 5 to 12, so if you've got young ones at home, this is one of those rare times you can bring them to a symphony performance without worrying about them sitting perfectly still for two hours.
The music is a mix of the familiar and the atmospheric. You'll hear John Williams favorites, with themes from Star Wars and Harry Potter—the kind of scores most kids already recognize from the screen—alongside spookier orchestral classics like Mussorgsky's A Night on Bald Mountain. The orchestra is led by Music Director Rossen Milanov, and this concert falls within the symphony's 2026-27 season, which marks the ensemble's 75th anniversary.
If you get there early, there's a lot more to do than just wait for the downbeat. Pre-concert activities start at 2 PM in the lobby, a full hour before the music begins. The kids can make paper bag monsters and spooky spiders, visit a string instrument 'petting zoo' to see the instruments up close, and take selfies with the orchestra's mascot, Bee-thoven. There's also a choose-your-own musical tattoo, ghost bowling and limbo, trick-or-treating, and a Halloween costume contest. It's designed to keep them busy and excited before they take their seats.
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Tickets are $10.50 for children and $16.94 for adults, both including fees. The concert is at the Ohio Theatre, 39 E. State Street, and starts at 3 PM, with the lobby activities opening at 2 PM.
