Monday, Mar. 1 at 7:30 p.m.

Mei Ann Chen, guest conductor

Beethoven Symphony No. 9

Beethoven's Ninth Symphony is in a category of its own. Conductor Mei-Ann Chen leads the MMSO, Mercer Singers, and Townsend School of Music faculty and alumni in a work that begins in mystery and shadow and builds, over the course of an hour, to the "Ode to Joy," a melody so embedded in the collective memory that the moment the chorus enters, the entire room recognizes it at once. That shared recognition, felt together in a live concert hall, is something recordings simply cannot replicate.