An Intimate & Surprising Twist on the Concert Experience

WSO Connect
An Intimate & Surprising Twist on the Concert Experience

By Erica Reid

From its inception, WSO Connect was created to bring audiences and musicians closer together. Initially created as an innovative solution to the Covid-19 pandemic, WSO Connect began as a way to deliver digital content in a time when in-person performances were not possible. Once WSO concerts fully returned to the stage, the Wichita Symphony has continued to expand upon the central mission of this program: connection.

Beginning in 2025, WSO Connect will bring audiences and musicians closer than ever before through a groundbreaking series of intimate performances in new and interesting spaces. The reimagined series began in July with a collaboration between Brazil’s Alejandro Brittes Trio and a quartet of Wichita Symphony musicians. “Going into it, I wasn’t sure we had an audience for accordion-led South American music paired with a string quartet,” says Executive Director Tim Storhoff. “It was a new kind of collaboration in a new space, but we sold it out, and I think that speaks to how hungry people are for musical experiences they can’t get anywhere else.” Storhoff calls the results “extraordinary,” adding, “Nearly everyone walked out asking, ‘When can we do that again?’”

To support the intimacy and freshness of the WSO Connect series, July’s inaugural performance took place at Somewhere Works, which proudly calls itself “an open and welcoming hub for artistic expression, learning, and growth.” This dynamic black box space is a bedrock of Wichita’s greater music community. “Based on a show of hands, this was nearly the entire audience’s first visit to Somewhere Works,” says The SHOUT Wichita. “It’s a nice place to hear chamber music, with seating on three sides of the stage, theatrical lighting, and a sophisticated sound system.”

WSO Connect’s second landmark event, Alexi Kenney: Shifting Ground (Oct 4), blends contemporary musical performance with dazzling projected visuals. Kenney, an acclaimed violinist, weaves together work by contemporary composers with solo violin pieces by J.S. Bach to create something wholly new and Baroque-inspired. “I try to get away from the idea of calling it a Bach recital,” says Kenney. “What I'm more interested in is how Bach's music interacts with seemingly disparate music written in the present day.”

Shifting Ground incorporates visual components from new media artist Xuan. “Xuan's extraordinary work is all expressed in a video medium which shows different states of matter,” explains Kenney. “You'll see close-ups of broken glass, crystallized ice, ink suspended in water. Xuan's film complements and expands upon the loneliness that is inherent in a solo violin recital, and makes us ponder how we cope with loss and attempt to heal from it.”

Shifting Ground premiered in 2023 and has toured several locations including the Ojai Festival. (“Vertically, horizontally, altogether: the music cohered and shone in every direction,” claims the Cleveland Plain Dealer.) Alexi Kenney: Shifting Ground will take place at Friends University, in Sebits Auditorium within the Riney Fine Arts Center. In 2024 Sebits Auditorium underwent a ~$1 million renovation, including technological enhancements that make this comfortable space ideal for this dynamic multimedia performance.

The final performance of the 2025 WSO Connect series (Oct 26) is a solo piano recital by Grammy Award-winning pianist Michelle Cann, well known for championing the music of trailblazing women composers of Chicago’s Black Renaissance, most notably Florence Price. This powerful event takes place at the Century II Performing Arts & Convention Center, but with a bold twist: the audience will share the stage with Cann. This unique staging places the piano at the front of the stage with the audience seated facing the auditorium — a complete pivot from the traditional concert point-of-view, fulfilling WSO Connect’s goal of bringing concertgoers closer to the music for a greater sense of intimacy and an all-too-rare perspective on the talent and artistry of today’s most sought-after musicians.

“With WSO Connect, we want to give people something fresh and bring them together around live music in ways they might not expect,” says Storhoff. “From a guest soloist in an intimate setting to collaborations that open up new ways of hearing something familiar, the goal is to spark curiosity about what classical music can be and how it connects with people today.”

For tickets and details about upcoming WSO Connect events, visit: https://wichitasymphony.org/events/wso-connect