Q: How is an ACCESS concert different from all other concerts?
A: Before we play the music, we explore it.

Q: Am I supposed to be learning something?
A: We hope that it will be both illuminating and entertaining.

Q: Will there be a quiz?
A: No. And after the concert you can stay and meet musicians from the Orchestra to discuss the performance and just get acquainted.

Q: Do you need to have a musical background to enjoy an ACCESS concert?
A: No. We are designing these events for a wide range of audience members, from music lovers to those coming to the hall for the first time.

Q: Is this a kind of classical music for dummies?
A: If it helped get you in the door to think so, OK. But now that you’re here, we’d simply like to invite you to think more deeply about music making. We’ll try to explain things clearly and simply, but we’ll also talk with the performers about how they feel about the music. We’ll ask them what secrets they hope to unlock for you.

Q: Besides telling me about it, how else will you explore the music?
A: We’ll do it by playing excerpts or examples of the music. We may use video to capture moments it might be difficult to re-create on stage or visual images to illustrate a point. We may invite you to participate in the same musical processes that are at work in the music, hopefully nothing too hokey or awkward, but something simple that might give you some of the same feelings that we have when we play. We want you to have access to our music, and this is the place for us to experiment with ways of doing that. As the series grows, please tell us what you think is most effective for you. You can e-mail feedback to our animateur, Thomas Cabaniss at tcabaniss@philorch.org.