Conrad Tao performs with New Jersey Symphony at adventurous season finale

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The “Rachmaninoff and Shostakovich” program title was as straightforward as it gets. But the pieces were something else.

New Jersey Symphony’s season finale teamed popular and adventurous 20th-century works of the colossal Russian composers, June 5-8 in Newark, Morristown, Princeton and Red Bank. Music director Xian Zhang explored all the shades between romantic and progressive of Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony and Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 (reverently known as the Rach 2) with guest pianist Conrad Tao.

It was a fitting end to a wide-ranging 2024-25 season, the Symphony’s 102nd, which looked to broad and mystical horizons through a mix of monumental masterworks and new…