Havana, Cuba.-Music once again proved its ability to join cultures and being an effective diplomatic mechanism in the interesting concert program offered by the Stanford Junior Symphony Orchestra (SJS) in this capital.

The American symphonic band, directed by Anna Wittstruck, assumed a demanding and inescapable repertoire for any group after combining works by classical and contemporary authors.

The concert, held in the Avellaneda Hall of the Teatro Nacional de Cuba, had as a preamble the Chamber Orchestra of Havana, directed by Daiana Garcia, which played impeccably ‘Serenade for strings’, a piece for string orchestra in three short movements, by British Edward Elgar, premiere in 1892.

The SJS later took over the stage and assumed with amazing interpretive solidity the second, third and fourth movements of the Symphony No. 7 by German Ludwig van Beethoven, a monument to human creation that came to light more than two centuries ago.

Our performance has been an example of commitment to the future and hope, said the PhD in Musicology in reference to the tense relationship between the United States and its southern neighbors following the arrival of Donald Trump at the White House.

The SJS is one of the oldest and most respected bands of this kind of its country. Its concert in Havana is the result of the joint work of the Classical Movements company, the Cuban Ministry of Culture and the Cuban Institute of Music.