WATERBURY — Two concert performances will welcome in the new year as the Waterbury Symphony Orchestra performs some of the greatest works of the 20th Century. Pianist Benedetto Lupo, bronze medallist of the Eighth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, will perform Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Concerto No. 3, Opus 30 in D minor with WSO on Saturday, January 15, at 8:15 pm, and again on Sunday, January 16, at 3 pm. Both performances will be at the Fine Arts Center of Naugatuck Valley College.

In addition to the Rachmaninoff, a titan among 20th Century piano concertos, the orchestra will perform Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 9, Opus 70. Shostakovich’s composition celebrates the victorious end of World War II. A fellow musician described the lively symphony as unexpectedly lighthearted, “merry and exuberant.”

In addition, and for a unique change of pace, the percussion section of WSO will feature four musicians who will tackle an unusual contemporary work as they perform John Cage’s Third Construction for Percussion Ensemble. The short oddity, an original presentation of percussive sound, is the third of a series of experimental compositions Cage undertook when he became a faculty member at The Cornish School in Seattle. This work, written in 1941, features such instrumentation as rattles, drums, tin cans, claves, cowbells, a lion’s roar, cymbal, rachet, texponaxtle, quijadas, cricket caller and conch shell.

Tickets for either concert are $40 for preferred seating, with discounts for general admission and senior citizens. For ticket reservations or further information, call operations manager Kathy Green at the Waterbury Symphony Orchestra office, 203/574-4283.

Naugatuck Community College and its Fine Arts Center are at 750 Chase Parkway; signs are posted from I-84.