This month, Carnegie Hall presents the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) in two performances led by esteemed conductor Bernard Haitink as part of the orchestra's annual visit to Carnegie Hall. The BSO's first program on tonight, February 11 at 8:00 p.m. features Mr. Haitink conducting Steven Stucky's arrangement of Purcell's Funeral Music for Queen Mary and Brahms's Symphony No. 4 in E Minor. In addition, Murray Perahia joins the orchestra for Schumann's Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54.
The following evening, Wednesday, February 12 at 8:00 p.m., Maestro Haitink is joined by mezzo-soprano Susan Graham and the Tanglewood Festival Chorus for an all-Ravel program including Alborada del gracioso, Shéhérazade, and the complete Daphnis et Chloé.
The Boston Symphony's February 11 concert will be aired on WQXR 105.9 FM in New York and on stations as part of the
Carnegie Hall Live broadcast and digital series. Produced by WQXR, New York City's classical music station, and
Carnegie Hall, and presented in partnership with American Public Media, the series is hosted by WQXR's Jeff Spurgeon and APM's Fred Child, and will be available for streaming on
wqxr.org and
carnegiehall.org/wqxr. Select concerts will be archived for on-demand streaming post-broadcast. During each broadcast, WQXR and
Carnegie Hall will host live chats featuring behind-the-scenes insights by the broadcast team, color commentary by the hosts, and interaction with the broadcast / webcast listeners, connecting national and international fans to the music and to each other.
In the more than 40 years he has been performing on the concert stage, American pianist Murray Perahia has become one of the most sought-after and cherished pianists of our time, performing in all of the major international music centers and with every leading orchestra. He is the Principal Guest Conductor of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, with whom he has toured as conductor and pianist throughout the United States, Europe, Japan, and South East Asia. Born in New York, Mr. Perahia started playing piano at the age of four, and later attend
Ed Mannes College where he majored in conducting and composition. His summers were spent at the Marlboro Festival, where he collaborated with such musicians as Rudolf Serkin, Pablo Casals, and the members of the Budapest String Quartet. In subsequent years, he developed a close friendship with Vladimir Horowitz, whose perspective and personality were an abiding inspiration. In 1972, Mr. Perahia won the Leeds International Piano Competition, and in 1973 he gave his first concert at the Aldeburgh Festival, where he worked closely with
Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, accompanying the latter in many lieder recitals. Mr. Perahia was co-artistic director of the Festival from 1981 to 1989. Mr. Perahia has a wide and varied discography.
Sony Classical has issued a special boxed set edition of all his recordings, including several DVDs entitled The First 40 Years. He is the recipient of two Grammy Awards and numerous Grammy Award nominations. Mr. Perahia has also won several Gramophone Awards. Mr. Perahia is an honorary fellow of the Royal College of Music and the Royal Academy of Music, and he holds honorary doctorates from Leeds University and
Duke University. In 2004, he was awarded an honorary Knight Commander of the British Empire (KBE) by Her Majesty The Queen, in recognition of his outstanding service to music.
Susan Graham, one of the world's foremost stars of opera and recital, is a compelling and versatile singing actress. Celebrated as an expert in French music, Ms. Graham has been honored by the French government with the title "Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur." At home and abroad, Ms. Graham has sung leading roles from the 17th to 20th centuries in the world's great opera houses, including Milan's Teatro alla Scala, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Vienna State Opera, Opéra national de Paris, Dresden's Semperoper, and the Salzburg Festival. She has appeared with many of the world's leading conductors and orchestras. Dubbed "America's favorite mezzo" by Gramophone magazine, Ms. Graham captivates audiences with her expressive voice, tall and graceful stature, and engaging acting ability in both comedy and tragedy. Her distinguished discography has included a disc of Charles Ives songs with Pierre-Laurent Aimard which won a Grammy Award, and she received both a Grammy nomination and France's
Maria Callas award for her portrayal of Dido in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. Her complete opera recordings range from Handel's Alcina and Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride to Barber's Vanessa and Heggie's Dead Man Walking. Born in New Mexico and raised in Texas,
Susan Graham studied at Texas Tech University and the Manhattan School of Music, which awarded her an honorary Doctor of Music in 2008. She won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and the Schwabacher Award from San Francisco Opera's Merola Opera Program, as well as a Career Grant from the
Richard Tucker Music Foundation. Ms. Graham was Musical America's 2004 Vocalist of the Year, and in 2006, her hometown of Midland, Texas declared September 5 "
Susan Graham Day" in perpetuity.
With an international conducting career that has spanned more than five and a half decades, Amsterdam-born Bernard Haitink is one of today's most celebrated conductors. Mr. Haitink was for 27 years Chief Conductor of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra; he is now their Conductor Laureate. In addition, Mr Haitink has previously held posts such as Music Director of the Royal Opera, Covent Garden, Glyndebourne Festival Opera, the Dresden Staatskapelle, and Principal Conductor of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Mr. Haitink was appointed Principal Guest Conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1995 and Conductor Emeritus of the orchestra in 2004. Mr. Haitink has recorded widely for Phillips, Decca and EMI with the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic orchestras and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. His discography also includes many opera recordings with the Royal Opera, Glyndebourne Festival Opera, the Bavarian Radio Orchestra, and Dresden Staatskapelle. Most recently, he has recorded extensively with the London Symphony Orchestra for LSO Live, including the complete Brahms and Beethoven symphonies, and with the Chicago Symphony on their Resound label. Mr Haitink's recording of Janá?ek's Jenufa with the Royal Opera received a Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording in 2004, and his Shostakovich Symphony No. 4 recording with the Chicago Symphony was awarded a Grammy for Best Orchestral Performance of 2008. Mr Haitink has received many international awards in recognition of his services to music, including both an honorary Knighthood and the Order of the Companions of Honour in the United Kingdom, a House Order of Orange-Nassau in the Netherlands. He was named Musical America's "Musician of the Year" for 2007.
Now in its 133nd season, the Boston Symphony Orchestra gave its inaugural concert on October 22, 1881. Since then, the orchestra has performed throughout the United States as well as in Europe, Japan, Hong Kong, South America, China, and Russia, and also reaches a worldwide audience through its performances on radio and television, its recordings, and its highly successful web platform at
bso.org. Additionally, the BSO has released many recordings, including four with
James Levine released in February 2009, including a recording of Daphnis et Chloé, which won a Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance. In addition, an acclaimed recording of Mozart's symphonies 14, 18, 20, 39, and 41 was released in July 2010. The BSO has played an active role in commissioning new works from today's most important composers, including Milton Babbitt, Elliott Carter, John Harbison,
Leon Kirchner, Peter Lieberson,
Gunther Schuller, and Charles Wuorinen, and offers a wide variety of educational programs, including the Tanglewood Music Center, the orchestra's prestigious music academy at Tanglewood, and the BSO's summer home in Lenox, Massachusetts. Andris Nelsons has been appointed the 15th Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and will begin in the 2014-2015 season.
