FEATURING WORKS BY BOCCHERINI, HAYDN AND MOZART AT ALICE TULLY HALL ON JANUARY 15, 2026
Guest Soloist is Rising Soprano Song Hee Lee
Founder and Artistic Director Thomas Crawford leads the American Classical Orchestra (ACO), New York City’s foremost period instrument orchestra, in a performance titled Morning Stars at Alice Tully Hall on Thursday, January 15 at 7:30 pm. The evening features rising soprano Song Hee Lee in Mozart’s Exsultate, Jubilate, alongside Mozart’s Overture for La finta semplice and symphonies by Boccherini and Haydn.
Critics took note of Ms. Lee’s talents in New York last season. Of her performance in Handel’s opera arias “Tornami a vagheggiar” and “Da tempeste,” The Observer wrote that Lee “sparkled,” with her elaborate cadenza ending in a “striking high E-flat.” In Handel’s Giulio Cesare, The New York Times praised how she “molds her bright tone through one of opera’s greatest progressions of arias,” and The Wall Street Journal commented on her “impressive” lamenting arias and her “agility in the ornaments.” In 2026, she will debut with Les Arts Florissants in Paris, Versailles, and Madrid, under the direction of Maestro Christie; and with Les Musiciens du Louvre, led by Marc Minkowski.
Thursday, January 15 at 7:30 PM
Alice Tully Hall
American Classical Orchestra
Thomas Crawford, conductor
Song Hee Lee, soprano
Mozart: Overture for La finta semplice, K. 51
Boccherini: Symphony No. 26 in C Minor, Opus 41, G.519
Mozart: Exsultate, Jubilate, K. 165
Haydn: Symphony No. 6 in D Major, Hob. l:6, “Le Matin”
The evening begins with the overture for Mozart’s opera La finta semplice (The Fake Innocent), his first full-length opera, followed by Boccherini’s Symphony No. 26 in C Minor, one of several he wrote for the King of Prussia, Friedrich Wilhelm II. His symphony on this program is notable for its varied use of solo instruments. The remarkably promising soprano Song Hee Lee is featured next in a performance of Mozart’s timeless Exsultate, Jubilate, an aria he wrote as a teenager for the castrato opera star Veranzio Rauzzini. Already destined for a major career, Ms. Lee starred last season as Cleopatra in the production of Giulio Cesare at Hudson Hall, and sang with The Juilliard Orchestra in L’enfant et les sortilèges led by Louis Langrée, and performed to great acclaim with Juilliard415 led by William Christie. The program concludes with Haydn’s Symphony No. 6, “Le Matin,” a fine example of program music evoking the morning sounds of nature, and the first of three early symphonies he composed for his new employer, Prince Paul Anton Esterházy.
Tickets, priced at $75, $55, and $35, are available at aconyc.org, by calling ACO at (212) 362-2727, ext.4, or by visiting lincolncenter.org or calling CenterCharge at 212.721.6500.
About Thomas Crawford
The American Classical Orchestra’s Artistic Director and Founder Thomas Crawford is a champion of historically accurate performance styles in Baroque, Classical, and Early Romantic music. He founded two Connecticut orchestras: the Fairfield Orchestra and the Orchestra of the Old Fairfield Academy, the period instrument offshoot of the Fairfield Orchestra, renamed the American Classical Orchestra in 1999. With the Fairfield Orchestra, Crawford commissioned numerous works by composers, including John Corigliano and William Thomas McKinley, and collaborated with artists such as Joshua Bell, Vladimir Feltsman, Richard Goode, Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman, André Watts, and Dawn Upshaw. He also conducted the world premiere of Keith Jarrett’s Bridge of Light at Alice Tully Hall, subsequently recorded on the ECM label. An accomplished composer, organist, and choirmaster, Crawford won the prestigious BMI composition award for his organ work Ashes of Rose, which premiered at the American Guild of Organists. A passionate activist determined to bring the beauty of period music to a wider audience, Mr. Crawford received a Learning in the Arts for Children and Youth award from the National Endowment for the Arts, in recognition of the ACO’s dynamic music outreach to New York City schoolchildren. A Pennsylvania native, he holds degrees in organ performance and composition from the Eastman School of Music and Columbia University.
About American Classical Orchestra
Founded in 1984 as the Orchestra of the Old Fairfield Academy, the ensemble was renamed the American Classical Orchestra in 1999. Founder and Artistic Director Thomas Crawford established its new and permanent home in New York City in 2005. It is now the City’s only full-scale orchestra dedicated to performing 17th, 18th, and 19th century music on period instruments. Described as “simply splendid” by The New York Times, ACO players are the foremost in their field, consisting of artists who also perform with such major ensembles as Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Handel and Haydn Society, and the New York Philharmonic. Its principal players are Faculty members at The Juilliard School, and the ACO works closely with students enrolled in the School’s Historical Performance Program. The American Classical Orchestra Chorus, comprised of professional vocalists from the New York metro area, joins ACO for larger productions. By playing music on original instruments and using historic performance techniques, ACO strives to recreate the sounds that audiences would have heard when the music was first written and performed. The Orchestra and its “supremely skilled musicians” (Theater Scene) have won critical praise for its recordings, educational programs, and concerts, including appearances at Alice Tully Hall and in Lincoln Center’s Great Performers series, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and for a sold-out 25th anniversary performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.
For more information, visit aconyc.org.
Image: Song Hee Lee, credit: Jiyang Chen.
