A Midsummer Night's Dream

The North Carolina Symphony is playing at the Meymandi Concert Hall in downtown Raleigh on Friday, January 15, and Saturday, January 16, 2027, both nights starting at 8 PM. Music Director Carlos Miguel Prieto is leading the orchestra in a double bill that pairs Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream Suite—the incidental music he wrote for Shakespeare's comedy—with Richard Strauss's Ein Heldenleben, a sprawling tone poem. The two pieces sit on opposite ends of the spectrum: Mendelssohn's is light and whimsical, while Strauss's is a massive, sweeping work. Hearing them together in one evening gives you a good sense of the range the symphony can cover.

This is part of the symphony's 2026/27 Classical Series, a season Prieto designed himself. Throughout the year, the orchestra is bringing in guest artists like Alessio Bax, Stella Chen, Clayton Stephenson, Vadim Gluzman, and Pacho Flores, with a program that runs through Mozart, Mahler, Tchaikovsky, Gershwin, and Rachmaninoff. These two dates in January are just one stop in that larger season.

If you're not usually one for classical music, there's a way to get your bearings before the concert starts. At 7 PM, an hour before the main performance, the symphony holds Concert Insights—a free 30-minute pre-concert experience where the conductor and any guest artists walk the audience through the highlights of the music. It's a good chance to hear how the pieces are put together so you know what to listen for once the full orchestra takes the stage.

Tickets run from $33.77 to $103.77, and every patron needs one, so you'll want to book ahead. Just a heads-up: children two and under aren't permitted. The hall is at the Martin Marietta Center for the Performing Arts, 2 E. South St., in downtown Raleigh.