EDITORIAL:

In less than two weeks, the landscape of the arts in Orange County is going to change dramatically.

On Sept. 15, the new Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall will open officially with its maiden performance, part of a rich first weekend. Opening night will feature the Pacific Symphony and famed tenor Placido Domingo in a world premiere song cycle that is based on Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca’s work. The next night, the symphony will perform in the 2,000-seat hall with violinist Midori, and with the Pacific Chorale it will perform a world premiere work by Philip Glass. Finally, on Sunday, the Mozarteum Orchestra of Salzburg will celebrate the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birth.

But if you are unable to score tickets to the opening weekend, don’t despair. The Orange County Performing Arts Center is celebrating the new hall’s opening for six weeks, which offers more than enough opportunities to get to a show at the hall. The celebration promises to be a memorable one, especially judging from the enthusiastic reaction of concert hall workers last week, who got a sneak peak — and listen — at the hall.

The hall’s opening, which comes along with the performing arts center’s 20th anniversary, will bring Orange County a truly high-class arts venue — a very high-class venue, in fact. The new hall is acoustically cutting-edge, and little time or expense has been spared to ensure that it will provide the best experience for audiences. Orange County, and Costa Mesa specifically, deserve such a fine arts center. It will be exciting to see who else comes to perform there as the center even more firmly etches itself onto the world arts stage.