Jacobsen Woollen

Jacobsen Woollen is a conductor appearing with the Illinois Symphony Orchestra in Springfield, IL, leading a program titled "A Matter of Taste." The concert pairs Mendelssohn's incidental music for A Midsummer Night's Dream, a new orchestral work by Goulet called Chocolats Symphoniques, and Beethoven's First Symphony.

This program is built around contrast and charm. Mendelssohn's A Midsummer Night's Dream music opens with a hushed, floating string chord meant to evoke fairy magic, then moves through scherzo-like scampering passages and a famous wedding march full of brass fanfares. Goulet's Chocolats Symphoniques appears to be a themed novelty piece, likely using orchestral color and playful gestures to suggest something sweet and indulgent, in keeping with the concert's "taste" theme. The evening closes with Beethoven's Symphony No. 1, a work that still leans on the balanced phrasing and courtly manners of the 18th century while hinting, in its sudden accents and driving finale, at the bolder composer Beethoven would become. Listeners can expect a conductor shaping these pieces for buoyancy and clarity rather than weight.