This weekend the Dallas Symphony Orchestra has a somewhat unusual program with what is becoming the usual result: fine music-making under the direction of Jaap van Zweden. The composers represented include Mozart, Wagner (the unusual one) and Debussy.

Music from Valencia, the homeland of architect Santiago Calatrava, celebrated his Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge across the Trinity River Sunday night. Performing was the Lone Star Wind Orchestra.

With 11 months still to go, Thursday night’s concert by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra is easily in the running for one of the year’s best.
The program included two masterpieces — Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto and Schubert’s Symphony No. 9 — and two musical stars — principal clarinetist Gregory Raden and conductor Jaap van Zweden.

In a welcome shift, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra added Sibelius’ Symphony No. 5 and Rautavaara’s atmospheric “Manhattan Trilogy” to Sibelius’ Violin Concerto, introducing a superb new artist in the process.

Vivaldi’s popular “Four Seasons” has a new companion by Philip Glass. “The American Four Seasons” was introduced to Dallas on Thursday night by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. It proved to be an appealing alternative.

Mendelssohn forgot to write a cellphone part in his Overture to “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” so someone corrected that oversight on Thursday night with an electronic obbligato insertion.

The Houston Grand Opera’s new production of The Barber of Seville is a classic example of gilding the lily. Houston has introduced a multitude of embellishments that serve more than anything just to irritate.

The Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s audiences have become accustomed to supercharged programs led by music director Jaap van Zweden. This weekend’s concerts demonstrate that the magic can be there even when Van Zweden isn’t.

The Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s Mendelssohn experiment winds up this afternoon with music both grand and obscure. There’s been enough of the former over the past two weeks to make up for any disappointment over the latter.

At the halfway point, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s Mendelssohn festival is definitely a hit. The high point Sunday was a magnificent performance of the composer’s “Scottish Symphony.”