Contrasting Austrians: Mozart & Bruckner - New York...

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10 Contrasting Austrians: Mozart & Bruckner 2009 – 2010 New York Philharmonic Alan Gilbert: The Inaugural Season

Transcript of Contrasting Austrians: Mozart & Bruckner - New York...

New York Philharmonic

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Contrasting Austrians: Mozart & Bruckner

2009 – 2010New York Philharmonic

Alan Gilbert: The Inaugural Season

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The 2009–10 season — Alan Gilbert’s first as Music Director of the Philharmonic — introduces his vision for the Orchestra, one that both builds on its rich legacy and looks to the future and reflects the diver sity of his interests. He sees the Orchestra as a place that both celebrates the greatest of the classical repertoire and nurtures today’s composers and tomorrow’s music. The season's program­ming reflects his belief in the importance of artistic collaboration, his commitment to raising audience awareness and understanding of music, and his interest in making the Philharmonic a destination for all.

“I’d like to develop a special kind of rapport and trust with our audience,” Mr. Gilbert says. “The kind of belief that would make them feel comfortable hearing anything we program simply because we programmed it. Looking ahead, I hope my performances with the Orchestra will consist of our tightly combined human chemistry, a clear persona that is both identifiable and enjoyable.”

About This SeriesIn Alan Gilbert: The Inaugural Season, the New York Philharmonic breaks new ground by being the first orchestra to offer a season’s worth of recorded music for download. Offered exclusively through iTunes, this series brings the excitement of Alan Gilbert’s first season to an international audience.

The iTunes Pass will give subscribers ac­cess to more than 50 works, comprising new music (including New York Philhar­monic commissions) and magnificent selections from the orchestral repertoire, performed by many of the world’s top artists and conductors. The subscrip­tion also features bonus content, such as Alan Gilbert’s onstage commentaries, and exclusive extras, including additional performances and lectures.

For more information about the series, visit nyphil.org/itunes.

Alan Gilbert: The Inaugural Season

Executive Producer: Vince Ford

Producers: Lawrence Rock and Mark Travis

Recording and Mastering Engineer: Lawrence Rock

Performance photos: Chris Lee

Alan Gilbert portrait: Hayley Sparks

Major funding for this recording is provided to the New York Philharmonic by Rita E. and Gustave M. Hauser.

Christoph von Dohnányi’s appearance is made possible through the Charles A. Dana Distinguished

Conductors Endowment Fund.

Programs are supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural

Affairs, New York State Council on the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Instruments made possible, in part, by The Richard S. and Karen LeFrak Endowment Fund.

Steinway is the Official Piano of the New York Philharmonic and Avery Fisher Hall.

New York Philharmonic

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New York Philharmonic

Christoph von Dohnányi, ConductorGlenn Dicterow, Violin (The Charles E. Culpeper Chair)Cynthia Phelps, Viola (The Mr. and Mrs. Frederick P. Rose Chair)

Recorded live December 10–12, 2009,Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts

MOZART (1756–91)

Sinfonia concertante in E-flat major for Violin, Viola, and Orchestra (K.364/320d) (1779) 31:23Allegro maestoso 13:27

Andante 11:34

Presto 6:22

GLENN DICTEROW, CYNTHIA PHELPS

BRUCKNER (1824–96) Symphony No. 4 in E-flat major, Romantic (1874/1878–80; ed. R. Haas, 1936) 1:08:15Moving, not too fast 18:52

Andante quasi Allegretto 16:41

Scherzo and Trio: Moving — Not too fast, on no account dragging 11:15

Finale: Moving, but not too fast 21:27

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Notes on the ProgramBy James M. Keller, Program Annotator

Sinfonia concertante in E-flat major for Violin, Viola, and Orchestra (K.364/320d)Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

The genre of the symphonie concertante (often referred to by the Italian term sinfo­nia concertante) was particularly associ­ated with Paris in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, although its popularity spilled over to other musical centers. The symphonie concertante served as a show­piece for multiple soloists — often using combinations that strike us as improbable — and, in its classic form, the orchestra was usually made to play the part of a not very interactive accompanist. Mozart, of course, had a way of breaking molds, and in his Sinfonia concertante for Violin, Viola, and Orchestra (the Italian term for the genre is commonly used when referring to this piece) we do find a certain measure of subtle interaction between the soloists and the orchestra. Yet, Mozart was also an astute mimic, and it is clear from this score that he grasped the “rules” that governed the form.

Mozart had ample exposure to sympho­nies concertantes during his extended visit to Paris in 1778, and after he returned to Salzburg in January 1779 he set about composing two symphonies concertantes. The first, in A major (K.320e), featured a solo group of violin, viola, and cello, but Mozart abandoned it after 134 measures. The other, in E­flat major (K.364/320d), spotlighted violin and viola, and that is

the work we hear in this concert. Several of Mozart’s other symphonic works with multiple soloists are clustered around this time: his Concerto for Flute and Harp (K.299), written just after his arrival in Paris and premiered in May 1778; a lost Sinfonia concertante for Flute, Oboe, Horn, and Bassoon (K.297b), from April 1778; a lost Concerto for Violin, Piano, and Orchestra (K.315f), in late 1778; and the Concerto in E­flat major for Two Pia­nos and Orchestra (K.365), in early 1779.

Compositions for solo violin and viola were popular in Salzburg at the time, and local composers turned out a notable repertoire for the combination. It’s no surprise that Mozart should have selected this dyad for his Sinfo­nia concertante; a few years later, in 1783, he would return to the same combination when he penned two lovely duos (K.423 and 424) to fill out a set of such pieces that his friend Michael Haydn had been commissioned to supply to the city’s archbishop.

The E­flat­major Sinfonia concertante is not mentioned in Mozart’s correspondence, not surprisingly, since he composed it while

living at home and therefore would have had no reason to convey information about it to anyone at a distance. Neither does it figure in other contemporary documents, with the result that we don’t know when or by whom it was first played. The autograph manuscript is lost, though drafts of the cadenzas and of the last nine measures of the first move­ment survive; these help confirm that the first published edition was prepared accurately. In fact, the cadenzas for this piece are the only authentic cadenzas we have for any of Mo­zart’s string concertos, making them valuable beyond the role they play in the piece itself.

This Sinfonia concertante towers above the other compositions Mozart produced at the time, and it can be reckoned among his early masterpieces. The key of E­flat major seems to have resonated with a specific character in Mozart’s mind, implying a confla­tion of majesty and warmth that resurfaces time and again in his compositions that are set in that key, including four piano concer­tos (K.271, K.365, K.449, and K.482), the Serenade for Wind Octet (K.375), the Horn Quintet (K.407), three horn concertos (K.417, K.447, and K.495), a string quartet (K.428), a piano quartet (K.493), the Clarinet Trio (K.499), the Symphony No. 39 (K.543), the Divertimento for String Trio (K.563), a string quintet (K.614), and the opera Die Zauberflöte (K.620). In this Sinfonia concertante, Mozart casts his middle movement in the relative mi­nor key of C minor, one of the rare instances in which he included a minor­key movement in a major­key concerto — or, in this case, a near­concerto.

In ShortBorn: January 27, 1756, in Salzburg, Austria

Died: December 5, 1791, in Vienna

Work composed: summer or early autumn 1779, in Salzburg

World premiere: unknown

New York Philharmonic premiere: February 25, 1917, Walter Damrosch conducting the New York Symphony (which would merge with the New York Philharmonic in 1928 to form today’s New York Philharmonic), Alexander Saslavsky, violin, Samuel Lifschey, viola

Listen for …

The finale of Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante for Violin and Viola opens with an orchestral introduction (the rondo theme), after which the soloists — violin first, then viola — play a tune of ineluctable charm, marked by little skipping figures referred to as “Lombardie rhythms” or “Scotch snaps.” This runs its course and deposits us on the doorstep of a great theme first played by the solo violin.

It’s hard to quantify just what makes a theme “great”: the inevitability of its con-tours, its malleability in the face of develop-ment — so many things can play a role. This passage’s first two sonorities bespeak gran-deur, and from there the melody stretches higher to reach a peak before plummet-ing back down again in a genial tumble of triplets. Then the viola repeats what the violin has just uttered. This episode recurs later in the movement, but this time with the viola in the lead, and again it makes an extraordinary impression.

The theme is simple, yet one may find embedded in it the perfect expression of late 18th-century mores: nobility is wedded to wit, dignity to buoyancy. For a moment we are transported to an 18th-century aristo-crat’s drawing room. The conversation is clever and cultured, but suddenly all heads turn as one of the assembled eminences — a Voltaire, perhaps, or a Franklin — imparts an observation that towers above the surround-ing babble, and then brings the proceedings back to earth with an irrepressible chortle.

Instrumentation: two oboes, two horns, and strings, in addition to the solo violin and viola.

Cadenzas: Glenn Dicterow and Cynthia Phelps perform Mozart’s cadenzas.

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Notes on the Program (continued)

Symphony No. 4 in E-flat major, RomanticAnton Bruckner

By the time he reached the period of his Fourth Symphony in 1874, Anton Bruck­ner had staked a firm place in Austrian musical life. He had distinguished himself especially as an organist, an almost peer­less improviser on that instrument by all reports. In 1855 he had sought out the best harmony and counterpoint teacher he could find, Simon Sechter, to help him remedy what he perceived as his deficien­cies in those areas, and after six years of what was largely a correspondence course (Sechter was in Vienna, Bruckner in Linz) he moved on to pursue similar enrichment in the fields of orchestration and musical form from another esteemed pedagogue, Otto Kitzler. Bruckner also grew increas­ingly infatuated with the music of Wagner, and in 1865 he traveled to Munich (at Wagner’s invitation) to attend the premiere of Tristan und Isolde, the first of several Wagner premieres he would witness.

On a personal level, Bruckner was grow­ing all the while into a sort of eccentric personality, an odd mixture of naïveté and political awareness, an obviously gifted figure who alternated between absolute conviction and self­doubt, who was gener­ally successful in his undertakings but who entered into unknown professional waters with the greatest reluctance. He also developed the curious habit of proposing marriage to teenaged girls and then being miffed when they turned him down; this

In ShortBorn: September 4, 1824, in Ansfelden, Upper Austria

Died: October 11, 1896, in Vienna

Work composed: January 2–November 22, 1874; revised January 18, 1878– June 5, 1880; further revisions effected in 1886 are not reflected in the edition used in this performance.

World premiere: February 20, 1881, Hans Richter conducting the Vienna Philharmonic in the 1880 version

New York Philharmonic premiere: March 30, 1910, Gustav Mahler, conductor

trait, which would follow him through to his advanced years, was partly responsible for a mental collapse that landed him in a sanato­rium for three months in 1867.

The following year, after much shilly­shally­ing, he finally moved to the musical capital of Vienna, where he succeeded his teacher Sech­ter as professor of harmony and counterpoint at the Vienna Conservatory, where he also took on organ pupils. The University of Vienna welcomed him to its faculty, too, although the powerful music critic Eduard Hanslick, already on the university’s staff, did everything he could to prevent it. Hanslick would become a thorn in the composer’s side, gleefully condemning practically every note Bruckner wrote — pre­sumably the better to promote the music of Johannes Brahms, the perceived rival to Bruckner whom Hanslick adored.

Despite the lack of critical support, it was during his first few years in Vienna that Bruck­ner finally flowered into a dedicated composer of symphonies. He had, in fact, completed a “Study Symphony” in B­flat major and his

Symphony No. 1 in C minor while still living in Linz, but the artistic stimulation of Vienna appears to have helped release the vigorous flow of ensuing works: the D­minor Symphony that he later withdrew (and which is occasionally revived, under the curious rubric “Symphony No. 0”) in 1869; the Symphony No. 2 in C minor in 1871–72; the Symphony No. 3 in D mi­nor in 1872–73; the Symphony No. 4 in E­flat major in 1874; and the Symphony No. 5 in B­flat major in 1875–76. Apart from the “Study Symphony” and “No. 0,” each of these would undergo consider­able revision, with work on various stages of various pieces often occupying the composer at the same time. The chronol­ogy of Bruckner symphonies is accord­ingly hard to pin down.

Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony is the only one of his nine to which he gave a subtitle. Although Bruckner was not essentially a Romantic composer — not, at least, in the sense that figures such as Weber, Schumann, Mendelssohn, and Wagner embodied the ideals of the aesthetic movement called Romanticism — his Romantic Symphony does evoke Teutonic Romanticism in its allusions to the hunt and, by extension, to its brilliant spotlighting of the instruments most as­sociated with that pursuit, the horns.

In this performance, we encounter this symphony in a version that includes the so­called “Hunt” Scherzo, replacing the scherzo Bruckner originally composed for this work. Even apart from that move­ment, the horns are so often prominent

as to practically define the sonic world of this piece.

Edition: prepared by Robert Haas, published in 1936 by the International Bruckner Society.

Instrumentation: two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, and strings.

A Paean to Romanticism

Quite a few years after he composed his Fourth Symphony, Bruckner penned a scenario for it. Although this descrip-tion seems to have been an afterthought crafted to justify the subtitle rather than a “plot” that inspired the composition of the work, it remains interesting all the same, coming as it does from a bastion of “absolute music” at a time when “program music” was in full flower. Here’s how he described the first movement:

Medieval city — dawn — morning calls sound from the towers — the gates open — on proud steeds the knights ride into the open — wood-land magic embraces them — forest murmurs — bird songs — and thus the Romantic picture unfolds.

The second movement, a “rustic love-scene” in which “a peasant boy woos his sweetheart, but she scorns him.” The Scherzo, “The Hunting of the Hare,” and its Trio section, “Dance Melody during the Huntsmen’s Meal.” And the Finale, a “Folk Festival.”

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New York Philharmonic

ViolinsGlenn Dicterow

Concertmaster The Charles E. Culpeper Chair

Sheryl Staples Principal Associate

Concertmaster The Elizabeth G. Beinecke Chair

Michelle Kim Assistant Concertmaster The William Petschek Family Chair

Enrico Di CeccoCarol WebbYoko Takebe

Minyoung ChangHae­Young Ham

The Mr. and Mrs. Timothy M. George Chair

Lisa GiHae KimKuan­Cheng LuNewton MansfieldKerry McDermottAnna RabinovaCharles Rex

The Shirley Bacot Shamel Chair

Fiona SimonSharon YamadaElizabeth ZeltserYulia Ziskel

Marc Ginsberg Principal

Lisa Kim* In Memory of Laura Mitchell

Soohyun Kwon The Joan and Joel I. Picket Chair

Duoming Ba

Marilyn Dubow The Sue and Eugene Mercy, Jr. Chair

Martin EshelmanQuan GeJudith GinsbergMyung­Hi Kim+Hanna LachertHyunju LeeDaniel ReedMark SchmoocklerNa SunVladimir Tsypin

ViolasCynthia Phelps

Principal The Mr. and Mrs. Frederick P. Rose Chair

Rebecca Young*Irene Breslaw**

The Norma and Lloyd Chazen Chair

Dorian Rence

Katherine GreeneThe Mr. and Mrs. William J. McDonough Chair

Dawn HannayVivek KamathPeter KenoteBarry LehrKenneth MirkinJudith NelsonRobert Rinehart

The Mr. and Mrs. G. Chris Andersen Chair

CellosCarter Brey

Principal The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Chair

Eileen Moon*The Paul and Diane Guenther Chair

Qiang TuThe Shirley and Jon Brodsky Foundation Chair

Evangeline Benedetti

Eric BartlettThe Mr. and Mrs. James E. Buckman Chair

Elizabeth DysonMaria KitsopoulosSumire KudoRu­Pei YehWei Yu

BassesEugene Levinson

Principal The Redfield D. Beckwith Chair

Orin O’BrienActing Associate Principal The Herbert M. Citrin Chair

William BlossomThe Ludmila S. and Carl B. Hess Chair

Randall ButlerDavid J. GrossmanSatoshi OkamotoLeonid

Finkelshteyn++

FlutesRobert Langevin

Principal The Lila Acheson Wallace Chair

Sandra Church*Renée SiebertMindy Kaufman

PiccoloMindy Kaufman

OboesLiang Wang

Principal The Alice Tully Chair

Sherry Sylar*Robert Botti

English HornThomas Stacy

The Joan and Joel Smilow Chair

ClarinetsMark NuccioActing Principal

The Edna and W. Van Alan Clark Chair

Pascual MartinezForteza

Acting Associate Principal The Honey M. Kurtz Family Chair

Alucia Scalzo++Amy Zoloto++

E-Flat ClarinetPascual Martinez

Forteza

Bass ClarinetAmy Zoloto++

2009–2010 SeasonALAN GILBERT Music DirectorDaniel Boico, Assistant ConductorLeonard Bernstein, Laureate Conductor, 1943–1990Kurt Masur, Music Director Emeritus

BassoonsJudith LeClair

Principal The Pels Family Chair

Kim Laskowski*Roger NyeArlen Fast

ContrabassoonArlen Fast

HornsPhilip Myers

Principal The Ruth F. and Alan J. Broder Chair

Erik Ralske Acting Associate Principal

R. Allen SpanjerHoward Wall

TrumpetsPhilip Smith

Principal The Paula Levin Chair

Matthew Muckey*Ethan BensdorfThomas V. Smith

TrombonesJoseph Alessi Principal The Gurnee F. and

Marjorie L. Hart Chair

Amanda Stewart*David Finlayson The Donna and

Benjamin M. Rosen Chair

Bass TromboneJames Markey

TubaAlan Baer Principal

TimpaniMarkus Rhoten

Principal The Carlos Moseley Chair

PercussionChristopher S. Lamb

Principal The Constance R. Hoguet Friends of the Philharmonic Chair

Daniel Druckman* The Mr. and Mrs. Ronald J. Ulrich Chair

HarpNancy Allen Principal

The Mr. and Mrs. William T. Knight III Chair

Keyboard In Memory of Paul Jacobs

HarpsichordLionel Party

PianoThe Karen and Richard S. LeFrak Chair

Harriet WingreenJonathan Feldman

OrganKent Tritle

LibrariansLawrence Tarlow Principal

Sandra Pearson**Sara Griffin**

Orchestra PersonnelManagerCarl R. Schiebler

Stage RepresentativeLouis J. Patalano

Audio DirectorLawrence Rock

* Associate Principal** Assistant Principal+ On Leave++ Replacement/Extra

The New York Philharmonic uses the revolving seating method for section string players who are listed alphabetically in the roster.

Honorary Membersof the SocietyPierre BoulezStanley DruckerLorin MaazelZubin MehtaCarlos Moseley

New York PhilharmonicGary W. Parr Chairman

Zarin Mehta President and Executive

Director

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The Music Director

In September 2009 Alan Gilbert began his tenure as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic, the first native New Yorker to hold the post. For his inaugural season he has introduced a number of new initiatives: the positions of The Marie­Josée Kravis Composer­in­Residence, held by Magnus Lindberg, and Artist­in­ Residence, held by Thomas Hampson; an annual three­week festival; and CONTACT!, the New York Philharmonic’s new­music series. He leads the Orchestra on a major tour of Asia in October 2009, with debuts in Hanoi and Abu Dhabi; on a European tour in January–February 2010; and in performances of world, U.S., and New York premieres. Also in the 2009–10 season, Mr. Gilbert becomes the first person to hold the William Schuman Chair

in Musical Studies at The Juilliard School, a position that will include coaching, con­ducting, and hosting performance master classes.

Highlights of Mr. Gilbert’s 2008–09 season with the New York Philharmonic included the Bernstein anniversary concert at Carnegie Hall, and a performance with the Juilliard Orchestra, presented by the Philharmonic, featuring Bernstein’s Kad-dish Symphony. In May 2009 he conducted the World Premiere of Peter Lieberson’s The World in Flower, a New York Philhar­monic Commission, and in July 2009 he led the New York Philharmonic Concerts in the Parks and Free Indoor Concerts, Presented by Didi and Oscar Schafer, and four performances at the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival in Colorado.

In June 2008 Mr. Gilbert was named conductor laureate of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, following his final concert as its chief conductor and artistic advisor. He has been principal guest conductor of Hamburg’s NDR Symphony Orchestra since 2004. Mr. Gilbert regularly conducts other leading orchestras in the U.S. and abroad, including the Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco sym­phony orchestras; The Cleveland Orches­tra; Munich’s Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra; Amsterdam’s Royal Concert­gebouw Orchestra; and Orchestre National de Lyon. In 2003 he was named the first music director of the Santa Fe Opera, where he served for three seasons.

Alan Gilbert studied at Harvard Univer­sity, The Curtis Institute of Music, and

The Juilliard School. He was a substitute violinist with The Philadelphia Orchestra for two seasons and assistant conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra from 1995 to 1997. In November 2008 he made his acclaimed Metropolitan Opera debut conducting John Adams’s Dr. Atomic. His recording of Prokofiev’s Scythian Suite with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance.

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Christoph von Dohnányi

is recognized as one of the world’s

preeminent orchestral and opera conductors. His

appointments have included opera directorships in Frankfurt and

Hamburg; principal orchestral conducting posts in Germany, London, and Paris; and his 20­year tenure as music director of The Cleveland Orchestra, where he led 1,000 concerts and 15 international tours. He has also held the position of chief conductor of the NDR Symphony Orchestra (NDRSO), in Hamburg, since September 2004.

This season, in North America, Mr. von Dohnányi leads performances with the New York Philharmonic and the Boston and Chicago Symphony Orchestras. Last season he became honorary conductor for life of London’s Philharmonia Orchestra, which he leads this season in Madrid, Cardiff, Paris, and London. Highlights of recent seasons include a series of concerts with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic; a residency at Vienna’s Musikverein with the Philharmonia Orchestra, which he also led on a United States tour; and a tour to China with the NDRSO. Mr. von Dohnányi recently made his first appearance with The Cleveland

Orchestra since he assumed the title of music director laureate of that orchestra in 2002. He also led the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at Ravinia and the Boston Sym­phony Orchestra at Tanglewood, and he conducted performances of Beethoven’s Fidelio at Lyric Opera of Chicago.

Mr. von Dohnányi conducts frequently at the world’s great opera houses, including London’s Covent Garden, Milan’s Teatro alla Scala, the Vienna Staatsoper, and those in Berlin and Paris. He has been a frequent guest conductor with the Vienna Philharmonic at the Salzburg Festival, leading the world premiere of Hans Wer­ner Henze’s Die Bassariden and Friedrich Cerha’s Baal.

Christoph von Dohnányi has made criti­cally acclaimed recordings for London/Decca with The Cleveland Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic. With the latter he recorded a variety of symphonic works and a number of operas, including Fidelio, Berg’s Wozzeck and Lulu, Schoenberg’s Erwartung, Strauss’s Salome, and Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman. With The Cleve­land Orchestra his discography of more than 100 works includes concert perfor­mances and recordings of Wagner’s Die Walküre and Das Rheingold; the complete symphonies of Beethoven, Brahms, and Schumann; symphonies by Bruckner, Dvorák, Mahler, Mozart, Schubert, and Tchaikovsky; and works by Bartók, Berlioz, Ives, Varèse, and Webern, among many others.

The Artists

New York Philharmonic

Concertmaster Glenn Dicterow

made his solo debut at age 11 with the Los Ange­

les Philharmonic. He has won numerous awards and competi­

tions, including the Young Musicians Foundation Award and Coleman Award

(Los Angeles), The Julia Klumpke Award (San Francisco), and the Bronze Medal in the International Tchaikovsky Competition (1970). He is a graduate of The Juilliard School. In 1967 Mr. Dicterow made his New York Philharmonic debut at the age of 18, and in 1980 he joined the Orches­tra as Concertmaster. Highlights of his an­nual Philharmonic solo performances have included Bernstein’s Serenade, conducted by the composer, on a 1986 American tour; a 1990 Live From Lincoln Center telecast; a concerto at the White House in 1982; and playing for more than 10,000 people at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, in 1999. His solo Philhar­monic appearances last season included Bernstein’s Serenade, conducted by then­Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert at Carnegie Hall; Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1; and Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 1. Mr. Dicterow has also been a soloist with orchestras in North America, from

Los Angeles to Montreal, and abroad, including the Leipzig Gewandhaus and Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestras.

Glenn Dicterow’s discography includes solo and chamber works; he has recorded concertos with the New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and London Symphony Orchestra. He can also be heard in the violin solos of film scores including The Turning Point, The Untouchables, Altered States, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, and Interview with the Vampire.

Mr. Dicterow is on the faculty of Juilliard and the Manhattan School of Music. He and his wife, violist Karen Dreyfus, are founding members of The Lyric Piano Quartet, which is in residence at Queens College.

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Cynthia Phelps enjoys a

versatile career as an established chamber

musician, solo artist, and, since 1992, Principal Violist of

the New York Philharmonic. Her solo appearances with the Orches­

tra have included Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos Nos. 6 and 3 last season; perfor­mances on the 2006 Tour of Italy, sponsored by Generali; and the 1999 premiere of Sofia Gubaidulina’s Two Paths, which the Orchestra commissioned. Her other solo engagements have included the Minnesota Orchestra, San Diego Symphony, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, and Orquesta Sinfónica de Bilbao.

Ms. Phelps regularly appears with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Boston Chamber Music Society, and Brooklyn’s Bargemusic. She has performed with the Guarneri, American, Brentano, St. Lawrence, and Prague string quartets, and The Kalichstein­Laredo­Robinson Trio. She has appeared in the summer music festivals of Marlboro, La Jolla, Santa Fe, Seattle, Bridgehampton, Steamboat Springs, Vail, Schleswig­Holstein, Naples, and Cremona; and at Mostly Mozart and Music at Menlo. She is a founding member of the chamber ensemble Les Amies, a flute­harp­viola

group formed with Philharmonic Princi­pal Harp Nancy Allen and flutist Carol Wincenc.

Ms. Phelps’s honors include the Pro Musicis International Award and first prize in the Lionel Tertis International Viola Competition and the Washington International String Competition. Her television and radio credits include Live From Lincoln Center on PBS, St. Paul Sunday Morning on NPR, Radio France, Italy’s RAI, and WGBH in Boston. Her most recent recording — Air, for flute, viola, and harp, on Arabesque — was nominated for a Grammy Award.

Cynthia Phelps has served on the faculty of The Juilliard School and the Manhattan School of Music.

The Artists

New York Philharmonic

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New York Philharmonic

The New York Philharmonic, founded in 1842 by a group of local musicians led by American­born Ureli Corelli Hill, is by far the oldest symphony orchestra in the United States, and one of the oldest in the world. It currently plays some 180 concerts a year, and on December 18, 2004, gave its 14,000th concert — a milestone unmatched by any other symphony orchestra in the world.

Alan Gilbert began his tenure as Music Director in September 2009, the latest in a distinguished line of 20th­century musical giants that has included Lorin Maazel (2002–09); Kurt Masur (Music Director from 1991 to the summer of 2002; named Music Director Emeritus in 2002); Zubin Mehta (1978–91); Pierre Boulez (1971–77); and Leonard Bernstein, who was appointed Music Director in 1958 and given the lifetime title of Laureate Conductor in 1969.

Since its inception the Orchestra has championed the new music of its time, commissioning or premiering many important works, such as Dvorák’s Symphony No. 9, From the New World; Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3; Gershwin’s Piano Concerto in F; and Copland’s Connotations. The Philharmonic has also given the U.S. premieres of works such as Beethoven’s Symphonies Nos. 8 and 9 and Brahms’s Symphony No. 4. This pioneering tradition has continued to the present day, with works of major contemporary composers regularly scheduled each season, including John Adams’s Pulitzer Prize– and Grammy

Award–winning On the Transmigration of Souls; Stephen Hartke’s Symphony No. 3; Augusta Read Thomas’s Gathering Paradise, Emily Dickinson Settings for Soprano and Orchestra; and Esa­Pekka Salonen’s Piano Concerto.

The roster of composers and conductors who have led the Philharmonic includes such historic figures as Theodore Thomas, Antonín Dvorák, Gustav Mahler (Music Director, 1909–11), Otto Klemperer, Richard Strauss, Willem Mengelberg (Music Director, 1922–30), Wilhelm Furtwängler, Arturo Toscanini (Music Director, 1928–36), Igor Stravinsky, Aaron Copland, Bruno Walter (Music Advisor, 1947–49), Dimitri Mitropoulos (Music Director, 1949–58), Klaus Tennstedt, George Szell (Music Advisor, 1969–70), and Erich Leinsdorf.

Long a leader in American musical life, the Philharmonic has over the last century become renowned around the globe, appearing in 428 cities in 61 countries on 5 continents. In February 2008 the Orchestra, led by then­Music Director Lorin Maazel, gave a historic performance in Pyongyang, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea — the first visit there by an American orchestra, and an event watched around the world and for which the Philharmonic received the 2008 Common Ground Award for Cultural Diplomacy. Other historic tours have included the 1930 Tour to Europe, with Toscanini; the first Tour to the USSR, in 1959; the 1998 Asia Tour with Kurt Masur, featuring the first performances in

mainland China; and the 75th Anniversary European Tour, in 2005, with Lorin Maazel.

A longtime media pioneer, the Phil­harmonic began radio broadcasts in 1922 and is currently represented by The New York Philharmonic This Week — syndicated nationally 52 weeks per year, and available on nyphil.org and Sirius XM Radio. On television, in the 1950s and 1960s, the Philharmonic inspired a generation through Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts on CBS. Its television presence has continued with annual appearances on Live From Lincoln Center on PBS, and in 2003 it made history as the first Orchestra ever to perform live on the Grammy Awards, one of the most­watched television events worldwide. In 2004, the New York Philharmonic was the first major American Orchestra to offer downloadable concerts, recorded live. Following on this innovation, in 2009 the Orchestra announced the first­ever subscription download series, Alan Gilbert: The Inaugural Season, available exclusively on iTunes, produced and distributed by the New York Philharmonic, and comprising more than 50 works performed during the 2009–10 season. Since 1917 the Philharmonic has made nearly 2,000 recordings, with more than 500 currently available.

On June 4, 2007, the New York Philharmonic proudly announced a new partnership with Credit Suisse, its first­ever and exclusive Global Sponsor.

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