Now in his seventh season as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic, Alan Gilbert is also a favored guest with many of Europe’s preeminent orchestras. This spring, he expands his European reach yet further, making his London Symphony Orchestra debut with a pair of programs that couple the music of Scandinavia – long one of his fields of expertise – with Russian concertos that showcase star soloists Joshua Bell (April 3) and Daniil Trifonov (April 7). Back at the Philharmonic, the Grammy Award-winning conductor looks forward to co-curating the second NY PHIL BIENNIAL (May 23–June 11), of which highlights include his leadership of premieres by William Bolcom, John Corigliano, Per Nørgård, and the late Steven Stucky(June 10 & 11) as well as of Ligeti Forward, a three-part series with the Ensemble of the Lucerne Festival Alumni at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (June 3–5). A flagship project that marks one of the most significant innovations of his tenure, the NY PHIL BIENNIAL is a kaleidoscopic, citywide new-music immersion that proved a resounding success at its launch two years ago, when the New York Times called it “perhaps the most ambitious and extensive contemporary-music festival yet overseen by an American orchestra.” Gilbert discussed the importance of new music, his achievements to date with the New York Philharmonic, and the challenges facing 21st century orchestras in a recent hour-long conversation with Charlie Rose. Click here to see Gilbert’s interview with Rose in full, and here to see a short excerpt from their discussion.
London Symphony Orchestra debut
Although Gilbert has yet to conduct the London Symphony Orchestra, he is no stranger to the British capital, where his leadership of the New York Philharmonic inspired five-star reviews, and his BBC Prom with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra “blew not just [the audience’s] socks but everything else off” (The Independent). As the Conductor Laureate of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Gilbert has moreover a special connection to the music of Scandinavia. At the New York Philharmonic, his Sibelius “sounded utterly original in the glowing performance [he] drew from his players” (New York Times) this winter, while their multi-season “Nielsen Project” was hailed as “one of the great successes of Alan Gilbert’s tenure thus far” (New York Times).
For his first appearance with the London Symphony Orchestra (April 3), Gilbert pairs Tchaikovsky’s iconic Violin Concerto, featuring superstar violinist Joshua Bell, with three Scandinavian works: Sibelius’s classically economical Third Symphony, the overture to Nielsen’s opera Maskarade, and Exquisite Corpse (2002) by Sweden’s Anders Hillborg. Commissioned for the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic’s 75th anniversary, Hillborg’s work is dedicated to the conductor, and it was he who recorded it for the BIS label. For their second program together (April 7), Gilbert conducts the English orchestra in Nielsen’s mighty Fourth Symphony (“The Inextinguishable”), of which he led a”searing, well-paced, and deeply organic” (Cleveland Plain Dealer) account with the Cleveland Orchestra last week, together with Sibelius’s stirring tone poem En Saga, and Prokofiev’s Second Piano Concerto. For the latter, he reunites with Daniil Trifonov – “without question the most astounding young pianist of our age” (The Times, London) – who triumphantly headlined the New York Philharmonic’s recent Rachmaninoff Festival; when he and Gilbert first collaborated on Prokofiev, they “clearly had chemistry” (New York Times).
Second NY PHIL BIENNIAL
The inaugural NY PHIL BIENNIAL was, Opera News recognized, “a dazzling display of musical innovation.” As New York observed, few besides Gilbert and the Philharmonic could have succeeded in making the festival “at once so cosmopolitan and so New York.” Indeed, the magazine concluded, “by promising to repeat the experiment in 2016, the Philharmonic and its music director Alan Gilbert have turned themselves into a force of permanent revolution.” Gilbert is no less enthusiastic about the second biennial himself. He explains:
“It’s so wonderful to be presenting this second incarnation of the NY PHIL BIENNIAL. What we did the first time, and what we’re trying to do in a new way, is to try to present a snapshot of what we find exciting in the world of contemporary music composition today. … One of the things that I’m very excited that we’re highlighting and exploring is New York, and its place in the world of new music. … One of the things that we get to do at the New York Philharmonic is identify composers who may not have a wide recognition yet. There will be a lot of American music played and a lot of music by younger composers. In a sense we’re taking a risk, but it’s a risk well worth taking.”
Curated by the Music Director and Esa-Pekka Salonen, the Philharmonic’s current Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence, the 2016 NY PHIL BIENNIAL will be presented in partnership with twelve additional cultural organizations at eight venues across the city. Works by more than 100 modern and contemporary composers, more than half of them Americans, will include four major premieres to be conducted by Gilbert himself.
On June 10, the conductor leads a program pairing concerto premieres by two eminent American composers, both of whom have been recognized with the Pulitzer Prize and multiple Grammy Awards: the world premiere of William Bolcom’s Trombone Concerto, a new Philharmonic commission, and the New York premiere of Conjurer by John Corigliano, whose 9/11 tribute, One Sweet Morning, Gilbert and the orchestra previously premiered and recorded. The following night, Gilbert draws the festival to a close with the U.S. premiereof Symphony No. 8 by Denmark’s Per Nørgård, winner of the Philharmonic’s Marie-Josée Kravis Prize for New Music, together with tributes to two great composers with close associations to the orchestra, who died within weeks of one another this winter. The New York premiere of Second Concerto for Orchestra by Pulitzer Prize-winner Steven Stucky (1949–2016) honors the late American composer with whom Gilbert collaborated on the first New York performances of Symphony, a Philharmonic co-commission. And Messagesquisse dates from the years that Pierre Boulez (1925–2016) himself served as Music Director of the Philharmonic; Gilbert remembers his predecessor not only as the “towering and influential musical figure whose Philharmonic leadership … continues to inspire us to this day” but also as “an unfailingly gracious mentor and friend.”
Reflecting Gilbert’s dedication to collaborating with educational organizations, the biennial also sees the Philharmonic presenting performances by many leading music programs, including the Ensemble of the Lucerne Festival Alumni, comprising recent graduates from the Swiss new-music academy co-founded by Pierre Boulez. Gilbert leads the ensemble in Ligeti Forward, a trio of programs exploring the music of György Ligeti and his legacy at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Hungarian master’s concertos for piano, cello, and violin will be heard alongside music by those he influenced, including Alexandre Lunsqui, Marc-André Dalbavie, Dai Fujikura, John Zorn, and his own students Unsuk Chin and Gérard Grisey (June 3, 4 & 5). Click here to see Gilbert and Salonen discuss the upcoming NY PHIL BIENNIAL.
In the meantime, Gilbert and the Philharmonic continue celebrating the 150th anniversary of Sibelius’s birth with accounts of the Finnish composer’s Seventh Symphony, at home (April 20–22) and on tour in San Diego (May 4) and San Francisco (May 6). They also play his Violin Concerto with Gramophone Artist of the Year Leonidas Kavakos on a program with the New York premiere of Salonen’s Karawane, a Philharmonic co-commission (March 17–19). Further Philharmonic highlights include the world premiere of a new commission from Franck Krawczyk, coupled with Brahms’s Second Symphony and the Schumann Cello Concerto with Principal Cello Carter Brey (April 27–30). The conductor and orchestra play the Brahms and Schumann on tour as well, in Costa Mesa (May 3) and San Francisco (May 7). And as part of the Philharmonic’s Messiaen Week, Gilbert takes up his violin, joining Philharmonic Artist-in-Association Inon Barnatan, Principal Cello Carter Brey, and Principal Clarinet Anthony McGill for Messiaen’s transcendent Quartet for the End of Time at the Metropolitan Museum’s Temple of Dendur (March 13).
For high-resolution photos, click here.
Alan Gilbert: spring engagements
Except where noted, the New York Philharmonic concerts listed below take place at David Geffen Hall in New York, NY.
March 13
New York, NY
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Temple of Dendur in The Sackler Wing
Musicians from the New York Philharmonic
MESSIAEN: Quartet for the End of Time
Alan Gilbert, violin; Carter Brey, cello; Anthony McGill, clarinet; Inon Barnatan, piano
March 17, 18, 19
New York Philharmonic
SIBELIUS: Violin Concerto (with Leonidas Kavakos, violin)
SHOSTAKOVICH: Suite from The Age of Gold
Esa-Pekka SALONEN: Karawane (NY premiere of New York Philharmonic co-commission with Zurich’s Tonhalle Orchestra, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony, and Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra; with New York Choral Artists / Joseph Flummerfelt)
April 3
London, UK
Barbican Centre
London Symphony Orchestra (debut)
NIELSEN: Maskarade Overture
SIBELIUS: Symphony No. 3
HILLBORG: Exquisite Corpse
TCHAIKOVSKY: Violin Concerto (with Joshua Bell, violin)
April 7
London, UK
Barbican Centre
London Symphony Orchestra
SIBELIUS: En Saga
PROKOFIEV: Piano Concerto No. 2 (with Daniil Trifonov, piano)
NIELSEN: Symphony No 4, Op. 29, “Inextinguishable”
April 20, 21, 22
New York Philharmonic
SIBELIUS: Symphony No. 7
MAHLER: Das Lied von der Erde (with Stefan Vinke, tenor; Thomas Hampson, baritone)
April 27, 28, 29, 30
New York Philharmonic
Franck KRAWCZYK: Après (world premiere of New York Philharmonic commission with the support of the Kravis Prize for New Music)
SCHUMANN: Cello Concerto (with Carter Brey, cello)
BRAHMS: Symphony No. 2
May 3
Costa Mesa, CA
Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall
New York Philharmonic
BRAHMS: Tragic Overture
SCHUMANN: Cello Concerto (with Carter Brey, cello)
BRAHMS: Symphony No. 2
May 4
San Diego, CA
Jacobs Music Center-Copley Symphony Hall
New York Philharmonic
BEETHOVEN: Egmont Overture
BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 7
SIBELIUS: Symphony No. 7
SIBELIUS: Finlandia
May 6
San Francisco, CA
Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall
New York Philharmonic
BEETHOVEN: Egmont Overture
BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 7
SIBELIUS: Symphony No. 7
SIBELIUS: Finlandia
May 7
San Francisco, CA
Louise M. Davies Symphony Hall
New York Philharmonic
BRAHMS: Tragic Overture
SCHUMANN: Cello Concerto (with Carter Brey, cello)
BRAHMS: Symphony No. 2
May 30
The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine
New York Philharmonic
Annual Free Memorial Day Concert
BRAHMS: Symphony No. 2
May 23–June 11: NY PHIL BIENNIAL
June 3
NY PHIL BIENNIAL
Ensemble of the Lucerne Festival Alumni
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Ligeti Forward, Program I
Alexandre LUNSQUI: Three Short Pieces and Kinetic Study 2
Unsuk CHIN: Fantaisie mécanique
LIGETI: Piano Concerto (with Conor Hanick, piano)
June 4
NY PHIL BIENNIAL
Ensemble of the Lucerne Festival Alumni
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Ligeti Forward, Program II
Marc-André DALBAVIE: Axiom
LIGETI: Cello Concerto (with Jay Campbell, cello)
Dai FUJIKURA: ice
June 5
NY PHIL BIENNIAL
Ensemble of the Lucerne Festival Alumni
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Ligeti Forward, Program III
GRISEY: Talea
John ZORN: Remedy of Fortune
LIGETI: Violin Concerto (with Pekka Kuusisto, violin)
June 10
NY PHIL BIENNIAL
New York Philharmonic
William BOLCOM: Trombone Concerto (world premiere of New York Philharmonic co-commission with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra; with Joseph Alessi, trombone)
John CORIGLIANO: Conjurer: Concerto for Percussionist and String Orchestra (New York premiere; with Martin Grubinger, percussion)
June 11
NY PHIL BIENNIAL
New York Philharmonic
Pierre BOULEZ: Messagesquisse
Per NØRGÅRD: Symphony No. 8 (U.S. premiere)
Steven STUCKY: Second Concerto for Orchestra (New York premiere)