Our spring concert, Fairytales!, will tantalize the audience with stories from around the world, brought to life by the powerful voices of Olga Orlovskaya and Albert Niedel, and the spell-binding playing of Andrei Saveliev. Rimsky-Korsakov’s music tells the famous story of Scheherazade, who delayed her execution for 1,000 nights by delighting her husband with half-told witty and entertaining tall tales. Another story is about the mysterious “Mister X,” a dashing circus performer who was hired to marry the Princess Fedora Palinska in Kálmán’s “The Circus Princess.” The original performance included a “pony ballet,” trained dogs, and a goose! In Bounoud’s Mephistophel’s couplets, Faust, an aging scholar, makes a deal with the devil, and in that story, things predictably go from bad to worse. On a happier note, in Listov’s “Ya pomnyu val’sa zyuk prelestny,” two lovers are remembering dancing to a lovely waltz. This intriguing program is wrapped up by the lively “Dance Boheme” from “Carmen.”

The Washington Balalaika Orchestra is a community-based group of musicians that performs music from around the world on traditional folk instruments. It is the largest orchestra of its kind in America, and has been performing in the Greater Washington, D.C. area for 36 years. WBS supports the Ukrainian people and provides humanitarian support for displaced Ukrainian refugees.