PORT ANGELES — The power of live music to lift people up together: This will fill the hall on Saturday, Port Angeles Symphony Orchestra conductor Jonathan Pasternack said.

“This is one of those must-see musical experiences,” he said of the concert featuring Gustav Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at the Port Angeles High School Performing Arts Center.

Pasternack, artistic director and conductor, is marking his 10th anniversary with the orchestra. He and his fellow musicians have grown together over this decade, and they’re celebrating with this performance of Mahler’s musical drama.

The Fifth Symphony, Pasternack said, “features the very heights of musical expression. To hear this kind of spectacular symphonic writing, live, and in a great hall, played ardently by our wonderful musicians, will be very memorable.”

Yet the Mahler is not the only reason, Pasternack said.

Saturday’s concert also will bring into the spotlight principal cellist and soloist Traci Winters Tyson, who will play David Popper’s “Hungarian Rhapsody” and Max Bruch’s “Kol Nidrei,” two pieces that resonate deeply in her life.

The evening performance also will include Pasternack’s brief pre-concert talk at 6:30 p.m. Tickets, at $15 to $40, are available at https://portangelessymphony.org, Port Book and News in Port Angeles, and at the door of the Performing Arts Center, 304 E. Park Ave. The symphony’s dress rehearsal at 10 a.m. Saturday is open to the public with all seats at $10.

Mahler’s Fifth Symphony calls for “a massive orchestra,” Pasternack said.

And it will be: Nearly 90 musicians, from across and beyond the Olympic Peninsula, will gather onstage Saturday.

“Mahler pushes the envelope in terms of emotion, dynamics and scope, and also instrumental technique. It’s one of the most difficult pieces in the repertoire for our musicians. But it really gives back tenfold, for the orchestra and the audience,” Pasternack said.

Tyson, for her part, looks forward to making music with a multigenerational ensemble.

“The musical family is a large one,” she said, “and it’s a tremendous honor to play with these fine community members, some of whom I have known for over 40 years” — since she was a girl who chose a relatively big musical instrument.

Herself an orchestra teacher in the Port Angeles School District, Tyson works with youngsters who are where she was years ago.

“Betty Hanson taught me at Franklin Elementary School and made learning the cello so much fun. Ed Grier signed the permission form for me to borrow a district cello over the summer and has been a profound supporter of music in our community. Deborah Morgan-Ellis told my mom to sign me up for private cello lessons with Dorothy Grether … who was so patient with my resistance to playing those challenging scales,” she recalled.

Then there was Phil Morgan-Ellis, Tyson’s music teacher at Stevens Middle School, who told stories about the lives of the composers that helped his students understand the music on a personal level. Today, Morgan-Ellis, a violist, continues to perform with Tyson in the Port Angeles Symphony.

Next came Ron Jones, her teacher at Port Angeles High School. Shortly before she graduated in 1989, Tyson traveled with the Roughrider Orchestra on its first trip to Carnegie Hall in New York City. She has been to the storied venue a total of five times now, as a performer, a chaperone and as a teacher.

Jones “showed me that a living can be made by making music,” said Tyson, who has given concerts across Europe and North America.

“She embraces the inner character of the music she plays and is a consummate performer,” Pasternack noted, adding that Tyson also is an essential leader in the orchestra.

The cello has been a friend and an instrument of healing at various times in Tyson’s life, including now. She has relished practicing Popper’s romantic “Hungarian Rhapsody,” taking liberties with its changing moods. And Bruch’s Kol Nidrei, the other piece she’ll play Saturday, is meaningful to her because of the timing of the concert.

She had been scheduled to perform the piece in the symphony’s 2023-2024 season. But in September 2023, her mother, Lila Winters, became ill with leukemia. Her family focused on her care until her death in January 2024.

Now, “being able to perform music is such an incredible outlet for releasing one’s emotions … When I reflect on the countless emotions a person feels in regards to the loss of a loved one, and all of the love experienced throughout one’s life, Kol Nidrei allows me to emote all of those feelings,” Tyson said. “In this piece, I see beauty, pain, sweet and playful times, anger, hope, gratitude, humility and periods of acceptance.

“My mom gave so much to me all of my life. I’m truly grateful and proud to be her daughter. Performing this piece is my expression of that gratitude.”

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Diane Urbani de la Paz is a freelance writer and photographer who lives in Port Townsend.