Keith Lockhart and Boston Pops Orchestra to perform Monday at Broward Center

After 20 years conducting the Boston Pops Orchestra, Keith Lockhart, 55, says he doesn’t plan to step down anytime soon.

Still, he isn’t looking to out-work any of his predecessors — especially Arthur Fiedler, who led the orchestra from 1930 to 1979. “I knew it was a long-term commitment, but I didn’t know exactly what that meant,” Lockhart said during a week of Florida performances.

Monday night, the orchestra checks into the Broward Center for Performing Arts for a concert Lockhart described as a musical “potpourri” that will invigorate listeners.

Lockhart’s enthusiasm for live performance has remained the same throughout the years. Today’s listeners, however, often prefer to consume entertainment and music privately, via the Internet.

“Concerts like what we’re doing in West Palm [Beach] and Fort Lauderdale are really about reminding people that there is no substitute for being right there for the visceral energy of a live performance,” Lockhart said.

Lockhart will pilot the Boston Pops in an evening of Copland, Dvorak, Gershwin, Ellington and Queen, along with pieces by his Pops predecessor, John Williams, the orchestra’s laureate conductor.

Through the years, the Boston Pops has crossed over from light classical to popular music. Dennis Alves, the orchestra’s director of artistic planning, says Monday’s performance will be a night of greatest hits, and a testament to its range as an orchestra.

“The star Boston Pops is our music and our musical library,” Alves said. “We have a library of compositions and musical arrangements that is second to no one in the world. On this tour, we showing off our uniqueness because of our library.”

This story was originally published February 7, 2015 at 11:14 PM with the headline "Keith Lockhart and Boston Pops Orchestra to perform Monday at Broward Center."