medici.tv webcasts NY Phil live in concert from Dresden on May 14
On Tuesday, May 14 at 2pm, EDT, medici.tv will present a free, live webcast of the New York Philharmonic’s concert of 20th– and 21st-century music at Volkswagen’s Die Gläserne Manufaktur, or Transparent Factory, in Dresden, Germany. The sold-out concert, given as part of the orchestra’s EUROPE/SPRING 2013 tour and presented by the Dresden Music Festival, will showcase Magnus Lindberg’s groundbreaking, site-specific work Kraft with the composer himself at the piano, alongside Prospero’s Rooms by Christopher Rouse and Bernstein’s Serenade with Joshua Bell as violin soloist. The webcast will be available to audiences worldwide for the following 90 days.
With video production by the New York Philharmonic, this will be the first Philharmonic concert from Europe to appear on medici.tv, following the success of webcasts of the New York Philharmonic’s historic concert from Pyongyang, DPRK, in February 2008 (the performance was also released on DVD by EuroArts); its 2013 gala concert celebration of Chinese New Year; and the orchestra’s spatial music program Philharmonic 360, a co-production with the Park Avenue Armory in July 2012 that has been seen by more than 65,000 unique viewers to date.
The highlight of the webcast will be Magnus Lindberg’s Kraft, which was given its New York premiere in October 2010 by the New York Philharmonic and Alan Gilbert, during Lindberg’s tenure as the orchestra’s Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence. It offers European audiences a taste of the unusual and adventurous repertoire for which the orchestra has become renowned under Gilbert, who describes the piece as “raucous and theatrical.” In keeping with the composer’s original intent, the orchestra will use repurposed, locally sourced metal: in this case luxury Phaeton car parts, provided by Volkswagen specifically for the concert. In addition to Lindberg himself at the piano, Kraft’s soloists include Philharmonic principal percussion Christopher S. Lamb and associate principal percussion Daniel Druckman, principal timpani Markus Rhoten, and principal cello Carter Brey, as well as Chen Halevi on clarinet and Juhani Liimatainen on electronics.
“Magnus Lindberg’s Kraft is all about power and construction, and therefore it has found a remarkably apt venue in the Volkswagen factory,” said Music Director Alan Gilbert. “We are gratified that our collaboration with medici.tv – which produced our webcasts of other outstanding events, including last year’s Philharmonic 360 at Park Avenue Armory – is allowing us to share this unique experience with as large an audience as possible.”
“Since its New York premiere in 2010, Magnus Lindberg’s Kraft has represented the innovative and exciting journey on which Alan Gilbert is taking the Philharmonic’s musicians and audiences,” said Executive Director Matthew VanBesien. “We are absolutely delighted to have medici.tv as our partner in realizing our dream of sharing this unique event with a worldwide audience.”
Also featured in the program are two American works, including the Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence Christopher Rouse’s Prospero’s Rooms, a Philharmonic commission that received its world premiere in New York by the orchestra in April and will also be heard in Istanbul, Zurich, Munich, and Vienna. The program is rounded out with violinist Joshua Bell performing Bernstein’s Serenade (after Plato’s Symposium), which was described by the composer himself as his most important serious work, and which was recorded by Bell in 2001.
About the New York Philharmonic
Founded in 1842, the New York Philharmonic is the oldest symphony orchestra in the United States and one of the oldest in the world; on May 5, 2010, it performed its 15,000th concert – a milestone unmatched by any other symphony orchestra in the world. The orchestra has always played a leading role in American musical life, championing the music of its time, and is renowned around the globe, having appeared in 431 cities in 63 countries – including its October 2009 debut in Vietnam and its February 2008 historic visit to Pyongyang, DPRK, earning the 2008 Common Ground Award for Cultural Diplomacy. The Philharmonic’s concerts are broadcast on the weekly syndicated radio program The New York Philharmonic This Week, streamed on nyphil.org, and have been telecast annually on Live From Lincoln Center on U.S. public television since the series’ premiere in 1976. The Philharmonic has made almost 2,000 recordings since 1917, with more than 500 currently available. The first major American orchestra to offer downloadable concerts, recorded live, the Philharmonic released the first classical iTunes Pass in 2009–10; the self-produced recordings continue with Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic: 2012–13 Season. The orchestra has built on the long-running Young People’s Concerts to develop a wide range of education programs, including the School Partnership Program, enriching music education in New York City, and Learning Overtures, fostering international exchange. Alan Gilbert became Music Director in September 2009, succeeding Lorin Maazel in a distinguished line of 20th-century musical giants that goes back to Gustav Mahler and Arturo Toscanini.
Credit Suisse is the Global Sponsor of the New York Philharmonic. Christopher Rouse is the Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence. Guest artist appearances with the New York Philharmonic are made possible through the Hedwig van Ameringen Guest Artists Endowment Fund. Programs of the New York Philharmonic are supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
About the Dresden Music Festival
Over the course of its 35-year history, the Dresden Music Festival has established itself as a distinguished cultural institution that attracts an audience to the city on the River Elbe from far beyond Germany’s borders. Each May and June, renowned orchestras, soloists, and ensembles come to perform at beautiful venues in Dresden’s historic center and surrounding neighborhoods, filling the city with music for the three weeks of the festival.
Jan Vogler has served as artistic director of the Dresden Music Festival since the 2009 season. In this position he promotes tolerance, bringing people together in Dresden from all over the world through the power of music. He has made it his mission to raise international awareness of festival and “to establish Dresden as one of the most prestigious festival cities.” To this end, recent festivals have taken a musical journey across the globe with stops in the New World, “Russlandia,” Asia, and the “Heart of Europe.” In the 2013 season, the Music Festival turns its focus to the British Isles, exploring their manifold artistic voices.
The upcoming concert and webcast are presented with the friendly support of Volkswagen’s Die Gläserne Manufaktur
About medici.tv
Critical praise accrues to medici.tv with each passing month. The Toronto Star called the site “a seismic shift in the world of classical music,” and the Baltimore Sun said: “This is an amazing site for lovers of classical music.” According to Alex Ross’s blog, The Rest Is Noise, “The hits keep coming at medici.tv,” while offering “treasures aplenty” was how Gramophone editor-in-chief James Jolly put it, naming medici.tv as one of the web’s best classical experiences.
Since its official launch in May 2008, medici.tv has gained international recognition, bringing together a community of 120,000 music and arts lovers from 182 countries – who have watched over 20 million videos to date. In addition to offering live concert hall events that music lovers can experience on their computers and entertainment systems, medici.tv now offers a free application (available at the Apple App Store and for the Android) that makes it possible to experience world-class artistry on iPads, iPhones, and the Android. Consumers of Samsung Smart TVs can now (since March 1, 2013) access the medici.tv application in 170 countries worldwide, on the 2011/2012 and all future models.
In addition to webcasts of more than 100 live concerts each year, medici.tv has partnered with the world’s top artists and music institutions to offer subscriptions that give music lovers the opportunity to watch more than 1,000 video-on-demand programs. They include concerts, operas, recitals, documentaries, master classes, artist portraits, and archival material by such legendary musicians as Maria Callas, Glenn Gould, Yehudi Menuhin, David Oistrakh, Sviatoslav Richter, Mstislav Rostropovich, Arthur Rubinstein, Georg Solti, and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau.
Reference opera productions have also been added to the medici.tv library, including Don Carlo at London’s Royal Opera House starring Rolando Villazón and The Fairy Queen at Glyndebourne conducted by William Christie. Also new to the library is archival footage of Leonard Bernstein, Herbert von Karajan and Vladimir Horowitz, alongside master classes by Alfred Brendel and James Conlon.
medici.tv, in partnership with Rolex, is produced by Museec, with the support of MEDIA and CNC.
Watch medici.tv concerts on the iPhone with the free medici.tv App.
© 21C Media Group, April 2013