MAMMOTH CAVE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A first-of-its-kind concert Saturday will merge nature and culture as world-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma performs with the Louisville Orchestra and Chamber Choir inside Mammoth Cave.

The immersive experience will start with a stroll through nature, people enjoying the quiet and listening to the birds on a quarter-mile path down into the cave.

"It's one of those moments that, if you're present enough to be aware of it, you just want to sit there and take it all in," said Matthew Stone, executive director of Bluestone Productions, which is helping the orchestra put on the concert.

Once they take the stairs down into the cave, people will gradually begin to hear the music getting louder and louder until they meet the Louisville Chamber Choir and proceed into Rafinesque Hall.

"It's creating those memorable moments, but also moments of impact of grandeur," Stone said. "And what's really been nice about this is it pulls it back to this balance of all of those things but don't overshadow what the cave's already giving us."

IMAGES | Yo-Yo Ma, Louisville orchestra perform at Kentucky's Mammoth Cave

At Rafinesque Hall, down in the cave, people will meet the Louisville Orchestra and Yo-Yo Ma, immersed in the sounds of Mammoth Cave's acoustics.

The tickets for the two performances Saturday were released in a lottery system, and more than 27,000 people entered. Only 1,000 will get this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, 500 in each performance.

"Yo-Yo's generosity in actually wanting to do this," Louisville Orchestra Director Teddy Abrams said. "He could go anywhere. He could call up any orchestra on the planet and say, 'I wanna do a project with you.' And the fact that he has collaborated with us in this way is so overwhelming. It's a huge, huge honor. It's an honor for the entire state."

It's been months in the making, but really goes back years. Abrams said he joked about it with Yo-Yo Ma in 2016 when they were talking in a podcast.

"It started as a wacky idea," Abrams said. "And the fact that we're now standing at the mouth of the cave with all the instruments inside the cave — like deep within the earth — this is not a place where people normally put on concerts, not with this level of complexity."

The concerts fit perfectly with Ma's initiative to find his way back to nature and bridging the gap between community and the environment.

"We're here making music in one of the most spectacular places on the planet and with some of the greatest artists that are doing this," Abrams said.

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