Grand Rapids Symphony’s Gerber SymphonicBoom Series is full of sights and sounds you’ll never see or hear anywhere else.
The series that has brought entertainers from Clay Aiken to Bugs Bunny to town returns to the Grand Rapids Pops with two all-time favorite shows you won’t to miss.
The Gerber SymphonicBoom’s two-concert series welcomes back the popular Cirque de Noël in December followed by the return of Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions in January 2018.
See world-renowned aerialists, acrobats, contortionists and jugglers at Cirque de Noël, and relive the adventures of Pikachu and his friends in Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions.
Cirque de la Symphonie’s Cirque de Noël, which first appeared in DeVos Hall in 2009 and has returned every year since, now is a Grand Rapids holiday tradition.
Following Cirque de la Symphonie’s 2014 show in Grand Rapids, Melanie Karr described it on Facebook as “brilliant.”
“It wasn’t what we thought it would be but very entertaining anyway,” said Sara Glaser Wolfsen, of Fremont on Facebook after last year’s show in DeVos Hall.
Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions, which has been performed by orchestras including London’s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, is only two years old. But the show produced by Princeton Entertainment already has reached places such as Abu Dhabi, and it’s on its way to Paris next season.
Last time Pokémon was in town, composer and associate executive producer Chad Seiter called the Grand Rapids Symphony “easily one of the best orchestras in America” with “some of the loudest French horns I’ve ever heard.”
Cirque de Noël, back by popular demand, returns to DeVos Performance Hall for its eighth annual show. Associate Conductor John Varineau leads performances at 7:30 p.m. Dec. 21 and 8 p.m. Dec. 22.
Watch Olympic athletes, world record holders, and gold-medal winners perform on stage, above the stage and even above the audience, accompanied by familiar classical melodies and holiday tunes.
“I get to listen to great music while others watch the show,” quipped Music Director Laureate David Lockington during a past performance.
Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions, which took Grand Rapids by storm last season, returns with big-screen images, plus the surround sound of the Grand Rapids Symphony, performing musical arrangements, timed to the visuals from recent and classic Pokémon video games.
The show, which returns to DeVos Performance Hall at 8 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 6, 2018, spans the entire Pokémon franchise with memorable musical highlights handpicked by Pokémon film composer Junichi Masuda plus music from the Pokémon anime series and from films such as “Gotta Catch ‘Em All.”
“Pokémon: Symphonic Evolutions is a spectacular showcase of the memorable music that has been a hallmark of the Pokémon franchise for nearly 20 years,” said J.C. Smith, director of Consumer Marketing at The Pokémon Company International. “The concert series serves as a thank you to fans and an invitation to share our passion for Pokémon by reliving some of our fondest memories with the brand.”