In the program's second half, audiences will experience a highlight of the current season, Brahms' towering Second Piano Concerto, featuring guest artist Stephen Hough. Performances take place at Orchestra Hall on Thursday, April 12, at 11 a.m. and on Friday, April 13, at 8 p.m. Ticket prices range from $20.25 to $82.25.

On Sunday, March 11, at 2 p.m., Christian Zacharias will give a recital in the Illsley Ball Nordstrom Recital Hall featuring Schumann's Kinderszenen, Haydn's String Quartet in D major and Brahms' Quintet for Piano and Strings in F minor. Zacharias will be joined on stage by select Seattle Symphony musicians, including Elisa Barston and Stephen Bryant on violin, Susan Gulkis Assadi on viola and Joshua Roman on cello.

The Sydney Symphony was established in 1932 and one of its first major projects was to perform the music of Brahms for the centenary anniversary of the composer's birth in 1933. Now, in its 75th year, the Sydney Symphony, under the baton of its Chief Conductor and Artistic Director Maestro Gianluigi Gelmetti, pays homage to its beginnings by launching its 2007 anniversary season with a Brahms Festival, giving the people of Sydney a unique insight into the music of this orchestral genius.

The violin and cello will both take centrestage at this Singapore Symphony Orchestra concert on March 24, where the orchestra will perform Brahms' Double Concerto, with soloists Qian Zhou and Li-wei Qin. The Double Concerto was Brahms' last work for orchestra, written partly as a peace offering to his friend, the violinist Joseph Joachim, with whom he had fallen out.