Alan Gilbert’s November 2010 concerts
This month, having just returned from a seven-city European tour, Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic will perform three new programs at four New York City venues. The first program, comprising Mendelssohn’s biblical oratorio Elijah, will receive three performances at Avery Fisher Hall (Nov 10, 11, & 13). Before the last of these, Gilbert and the orchestra head to Carnegie Hall to join guest soloist Midori in Beethoven’s Violin Concerto on a program with John Adams’s Harmonielehre (Nov 12). A week later, Gilbert conducts two concerts in the Philharmonic’s new-music series, CONTACT!, at Peter Norton Symphony Space (Nov 19) and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Nov 20). The CONTACT! concerts feature the world premiere of Magnus Lindberg’s Souvenir (in memoriam Gérard Grisey), which was commissioned by the orchestra. Soon after, Gilbert returns to Europe for performances with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France in Paris (Nov 26 & 27). These include Schoenberg’s Pelleas und Melisande, which will be accompanied by a visual component created by Doug Fitch; Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic collaborated with Fitch on last season’s acclaimed production of Ligeti’s Grand Macabre, and will do so again in June, on a Philharmonic production of Janácek’s opera The Cunning Little Vixen.
Gilbert calls Elijah, “one of Mendelssohn’s greatest pieces, a very dramatic and vivid telling of the biblical story.” Gerald Finley, who sings the oratorio’s title role, previously worked with Gilbert on very different music – John Adams’s opera, Doctor Atomic, the work in which Gilbert gave his own Metropolitan Opera debut two seasons ago. The conductor says of Finley: “His beautiful voice and the way he puts words across are powerful and unique.”
Gilbert has conducted John Adams’s music frequently throughout his career and calls the composer’s Harmonielehre “a landmark orchestral work and a fantastic piece.” The concert is the first of two that Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic present at Carnegie Hall this season. The second, on May 5, marks the historic venue’s 120th anniversary and features Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with pianist Emanuel Ax, violinist Gil Shaham, and cellist Yo-Yo Ma.
Magnus Lindberg’s music has figured prominently thus far in Gilbert’s tenure as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic; the composer currently serves as the orchestra’s Marie Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence. Lindberg’s new work, Souvenir (in memoriam Gérard Grisey), is written as a tribute to his late teacher, Gérard Grisey (1946-98). Grisey’s own Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil is on the same program, which opens the second season of the CONTACT! concerts. Canadian soprano Barbara Hannigan, who made her critically acclaimed New York Philharmonic debut last season as Gepopo in Ligeti’s Le Grand Macabre, is the soloist in the Grisey work. The CONTACT! concerts are curated by Lindberg; they were launched in the 2009-10 season as a showcase for emerging and established contemporary composers. The upcoming CONTACT! concerts will be hosted by WNYC’s John Schaefer (Nov 19) and Alan Gilbert (Nov 20) respectively, and the program will be streamed live on Q2, WQXR’s online contemporary music service, on November 24, 27, and 30.
Alan Gilbert: upcoming fall engagements
Nov 10, 11, & 13
New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center (Avery Fisher Hall)
Mendelssohn: Elijah
With Carolyn Sampson, soprano; Alice Coote, mezzo-soprano; Allan Clayton, tenor; Gerald Finley, bass-baritone; New York Choral Artists / Joseph Flummerfelt, director
Nov 12
New York Philharmonic at Carnegie Hall
Beethoven: Violin Concerto (with Midori, violin)
John Adams: Harmonielehre
Nov 19
CONTACT! (New York Philharmonic’s new-music series) at Symphony Space, NYC
Magnus Lindberg: Souvenir (in memoriam Gérard Grisey) (world premiere)
Gérard Grisey: Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil (with Barbara Hannigan, soprano)
Nov 20
CONTACT! (New York Philharmonic’s new-music series) at Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC
Magnus Lindberg: Souvenir (in memoriam Gérard Grisey)
Gérard Grisey: Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil (with Barbara Hannigan, soprano)
Nov 26-27
Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France; Paris, France
School concert, Nov 26
Schoenberg: Pelleas und Melisande
Family concert, Nov 27, matinee
Schoenberg: Pelleas und Melisande
Concert, Nov 27, evening
Zemlinsky: Sechs Gesänge after poems by Maurice Maeterlinck, Op. 13 (with Yvonne Naef, contralto)
Schoenberg: Pelleas und Melisande
Dec 9, 10, & 12
NDR Symphony Orchestra, Hamburg; Germany
Hamburg, Dec 9: Mahler: Symphony No. 6
Lübeck, Dec 10: Mahler: Symphony No. 6
Hamburg, Dec 12: Mahler: Symphony No. 6
Dec 17
CONTACT! (New York Philharmonic’s new-music series) at Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC
Julian Anderson: The Comedy of Change (U.S. premiere)
James Matheson: new work (world premiere)
Jay Alan Yim: new work (world premiere)
Dec 18
CONTACT! (New York Philharmonic’s new-music series) at Symphony Space, NYC
Julian Anderson: The Comedy of Change (U.S. premiere)
James Matheson: new work (world premiere)
Jay Alan Yim: new work (world premiere)
Dec 28-30
New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center (Avery Fisher Hall)
Vivaldi: Concerto for Four Violins, Op. 3, No. 10
Aaron Jay Kernis: a Voice, a Messenger (world premiere, New York Philharmonic commission)
Hindemith: Horn Concerto
Christopher Rouse: Oboe Concerto (New York premiere)
Ravel: Boléro
Dec 31
New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center (Avery Fisher Hall)
Tchaikovsky: “Polonaise” from Eugene Onegin
Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1 (with Lang Lang, piano)
Tchaikovsky: The Nutcracker, Act II
(broadcast on Live From Lincoln Center on PBS stations)
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© 21C Media Group, November 2010