Jason Vieaux

Jason Vieaux is an American classical guitarist who appears with orchestras across the country as a concerto soloist. Listeners can expect a season built substantially around Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez, the best-known work written for guitar and orchestra, paired with staples of the symphonic repertoire such as Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, and Smetana.

Vieaux's upcoming programs center on Joaquín Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez, a piece prized for the way the solo guitar, an instrument with a naturally quiet voice, threads through and answers a full orchestra rather than overpowering it. Expect a famous slow middle movement built around a long, aching melody first stated by the English horn and then taken up by the guitar, along with outer movements that borrow the strummed rhythms of Spanish popular music. Because the guitar cannot compete with orchestral volume, performances like these depend on close listening between soloist and conductor, with the orchestra pulling back to let the guitar's plucked notes carry. The surrounding programs, from Beethoven symphonies and overtures to Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony and Smetana's Vltava, place the guitar concerto as the intimate centerpiece of otherwise large-scale orchestral evenings.