Christmas with The 5 Browns
Sunday, December 1, 2024 at 4pm

This performance will include a 15-minute intermission.

Desirae Brown
Deondra Brown
Stephen Beus
Gregory Brown
Melody Brown

Four Movements from the Nutcracker Suite
Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky/Jeffrey Shumway

I. Miniature Overture

II. March

III. Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy

IV. Russian Dance

The 5 Browns

For Unto Us A Child Is Born (from Messiah), Op. 609 No. 11
George Frederic Handel/ Carl Czerny

Melody, Desirae, and Deondra Brown

Carol of the Bells
Mykola Leontovych/Jeffrey Shumway

The 5 Browns

Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring
J.S. Bach/Myra Hess

Stephen Beus

Still, Still Still
Traditional/Mack Wilberg/The 5 Browns

The 5 Browns

Résponds moi, Danse Cubaine, Op. 50
La Gallina, Dance Cubaine, Op. 53
Louis Moreau Gottschalk

Desirae and Deondra Brown

Danse Macabre
Camille Saint-Saens/Greg Anderson

The 5 Browns

-INTERMISION-

Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity (from The Planets)
Gustav Holst/Greg Anderson

The 5 Browns

O Holy Night
Adolphe Adam/Jeffrey Shumway

Deondra and Desirae Brown

A Carol Symphony
Victor Hely-Hutchinson/Kevin Olson

The 5 Browns

Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming
Traditional/Melody Brown

Melody Brown

Skater’s Waltz
Leon Waldteufel/First Piano Quartet

The 5 Browns

Mariä Wiegenlied (Mary’s Lullaby), Op. 76 No. 52
Weihnachtstraum (Silent Night), Op. 17 No. 9
Max Reger

Gregory Brown

Sleigh Ride: A Holiday Excursion for Five Pianos
Leroy Anderson/Greg Anderson

The 5 Browns

For the five of us, Christmas has always been a time of gratitude and reflection; for delicious home-cooked foods, festive music, and being with the people we love most. Every Christmas Eve, we bring our little families together for a feast, a party, and the exchange of a few gifts. Sometimes the gifts are homemade, and sometimes they’re silly, sentimental, or practical. But above all, the night is always about being together (or on video chat for any of us separated by distance) and feeling the warmth of love and family at the holidays.

When we created this program of some of our favorite festive music, we really wanted to try and capture the warmth, fun, and peace of these yearly Christmas Eve parties. So whatever your personal holiday traditions may be, we hope you feel a little bit of the joy we do while digging into a homemade pie, the laughter or tears of love we feel while opening the gifts we’ve given each other, or the peace we feel while listening to Silent Night by the soft light of a Christmas tree.

The 5 Browns – Desirae Brown, Deondra Brown, Stephen Beus, Gregory Brown, and Melody Brown–all attended The Juilliard School in New York, where they were joined by the Browns’ youngest brother Ryan (now retired from the stage). The quintet enjoyed its first wave of critical attention in February of 2002, when People magazine dubbed them the “Fab Five” and they were featured on Oprah and 60 Minutes. The 5 Browns have released eight albums that have collectively spent over 30 weeks at No.1 on Billboard magazine’s Classical Album Chart. The New York Post has proclaimed: “[F]ive pianos and 50 fingers add up to the biggest classical music sensation in years.”

The quintet has garnered extensive coverage from media outlets ranging from The Tonight Show, Good Morning America, The Today Show, and The View, to CNN, Fox and Friends, Public Radio’s Performance Today, and The New York Times.

The 5 Browns have performed in hundreds of the world’s great concert halls, including Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium (New York), the National Center for the Performing Arts (Beijing), Suntory Hall (Tokyo), the Kimmel Center (Philadelphia), Laeiszhalle (Hamburg), Orchestra Hall (Chicago), Zaryadye Concert Hall (Moscow), and the National Concert Hall (Taipei). Individually and collectively, they have soloed with the National Symphony Orchestra; the Chicago, Philadelphia, Vancouver, New Jersey, Dallas, and St. Louis Symphony Orchestras; and various other orchestras throughout the US and internationally.

The 5 Browns’ music—and the siblings’ child advocacy work—are the subject of the award-winning documentary film, The 5 Browns: Digging Through the Darkness, which was chosen as a “Critic’s Pick” by the New York Times.

A highlight for the quintet was a commissioned five-piano concerto written by famed composer Nico Mühly. Under the direction of Maestro James Conlon, the concerto premiered at the Ravinia Festival with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

The 5 Browns are thrilled to welcome one of their generation’s most electric pianists as a permanent member. Gold medalist at the Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition and frequent soloist in concert halls around the world (including Carnegie Hall and Wigmore Hall), Stephen Beus has performed with The 5 Browns during four previous seasons. The Copenhagen Post labeled Beus as “Spectacular…it was like he placed the orchestra in the middle of a gigantic centrifuge and pushed start.” He brings impeccable technique, effortless musicality, and an unquenchable joy for music in every performance.

The 5 Browns are exclusive Steinway Artists.

Park Avenue Artists

Bob Romney, Chairman
Community Leader

Gary Fabian, Treasurer
Chief Financial Officer
Kind Lending

William Parker, Secretary
Professor Emeritus Physics and Astronomy
University of California, Irvine

DIRECTORS

Eugene Choi
Betty Martinez Franco
Harason Horowitz
Terry Jones
Mike Kerr
Jennifer Klein
Dr. Tiffany Ana López
Bonnie Lubock
James Mai
Sherry L. K. Main
Jerry Mandel, Ph.D.
Christopher Ramsey
Richard and Cheryll Ruszat
Kathleen Treseder, Ph.D.
Stuart Winston
Anu Worah

HONORARY

Larry Agran
Mayor, City of Irvine
 
Howard Gillman, Ph.D.
Chancellor
University of California, Irvine

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National Choreographers Initiative 2026
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Update as of 7/14/26

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