Alan Gilbert Conducts NY Premiere of 'In Seven Days,' 1/6 - 1/8

Music Director Alan Gilbert will lead the New York Philharmonic in the New York Premiere of Thomas Adès's multimedia In Seven Days (Concerto for Piano with Moving Image), Thursday, January 6, 2011, at 7:30 p.m., Friday, January 7, at 8:00 p.m., and Saturday, January 8, at 8:00 p.m. The score, which the composer will perform at the piano in his Philharmonic debut, is synchronized with Israeli artist and filmmaker Tal Rosner's kaleidoscopic imagery, projected onto six large screens. Mr. Adès calls it a "video-ballet in seven movements" that follows the story of creation. The program will also include Mozart's Symphony No. 40, and Mahler's Kindertotenlieder, with baritone Thomas Hampson.

"Thomas Adès is a modern-day master composer," noted Alan Gilbert. "I got to know him and his music when I conducted The Tempest - a wonderful opera he wrote. We did it in Santa Fe when I was music director there, and his music is incredibly powerful, incredibly intense. In Seven Days involves a video element, and a significantly difficult piano part, which Tom will play himself."

These performances of Mahler's Kindertotenlieder, which Mr. Gilbert has performed previously with Thomas Hampson, come during the 150th year of Mahler's birth and the 100th anniversary of his death. "It's a fascinating collection of songs," explained Mr. Hampson. "The poems are taken from over 400 poems written by Friedrich Rückert on the death of two of his children. Mahler took five of the poems and put them into a cyclical arrangement that tells a story of grieving to redemption - kind of like a requiem. It's a marvelously penetrating, deeply metaphysical set of poems, and in
Mahler's hands, in some ways, one of the closest identifications we can find of his personal spiritual beliefs."

Single tickets for these performances start at $32. Tickets for Open Rehearsals are $18.
Pre-Concert Talks are $7; discounts are available for multiple concerts, students, and groups (visit nyphil.org/preconcert for more information). All other tickets may be purchased online at nyphil.org or by calling (212) 875-5656, 10:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., Monday through Saturday, and 12:00 noon to 5:00 p.m. on Sunday. Tickets may also be purchased at the Avery Fisher Hall Box Office or the Alice Tully Hall Box Office at Lincoln Center, Broadway at 65th Street. The Box Office opens at 10:00 a.m. Monday through Saturday, and at noon on Sunday. On performance evenings, the Box Office closes one-half hour after performance time; other evenings it closes at 6:00 p.m. A limited number of $12.50 tickets for select concerts may be available through the Internet for students within 10 days of the performance, or in person the day of. Valid identification is required. To determine ticket availability, call the Philharmonic's Customer Relations Department at (212) 875-5656. [Ticket prices subject to change.]

Related Events:

? Insights Series Event
"Kindertotenlieder: Mahler's Requiem?"
Wednesday, January 5, 2011, 6:30 p.m.
Thomas Hampson, speaker and baritone
The renowned baritone Thomas Hampson - last season's Leonard Bernstein Scholar-in-Residence and The Mary and James G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence - discusses the deeper meaning of Mahler's song cycle, and what this work reveals about the composer's philosophy of life. Mr. Hampson will sing excerpts from Kindertotenlieder and other works.
Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse, Rose Building, 65th Street at Amsterdam Avenue
Tickets $20; $15 for New York Philharmonic Patrons

? Musical Suppers
Following the concert on January 7, André Soltner, the legendary chef/owner of the famed Lutèce, will create a menu for a New York Philharmonic Musical Supper that includes dishes reminiscent of those that earned the restaurant its prestigious reputation. The Musical Suppers are hosted by food writer and critic Mimi Sheraton. The next one in the series takes place on January 28, and will feature a menu by Alain Ducasse. Tickets are $225 per person in addition to a concert ticket. Purchasers of two or more dinner dates will receive personally autographed copies of cookbooks
by the chefs, as well as Mimi Sheraton's The German Cookbook. For information, call (212) 875-5656 or visit nyphil.org.

? Pre-Concert Talk
New York Philharmonic Program Annotator James M. Keller will introduce the program one hour before each performance in the Helen Hull Room, unless otherwise noted. Pre-Concert Talks are $7; discounts available for multiple concerts, students, and groups. Attendance is limited to 90 people. Information: nyphil.org or (212) 875-5656.

? On the Music: The New York Philharmonic Podcast
Elliott Forrest, Peabody Award-winning broadcaster, producer, and weekend host on Classical 105.9 FM WQXR, is the producer of this podcast. These award-winning previews of upcoming programs - through musical selections as well as interviews with guest artists, conductors, and Orchestra musicians - are available at nyphil.org/podcast or from iTunes.

? National Radio Broadcast
This concert will be broadcast the week of January 17, 2011,* on The New York Philharmonic This Week, a radio concert series syndicated nationally to more than 300 stations by the WFMT Radio Network. The 52-week series, hosted by actor Alec Baldwin, is generously underwritten by The Kaplen Foundation, the Audrey Love Charitable Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Philharmonic's corporate partner, MetLife Foundation. The broadcast will be available on the Philharmonic's Website, nyphil.org. The program is broadcast locally in the New York metropolitan area on Classical 105.9 FM WQXR on Thursdays at 9:00 p.m. *Check local listings for broadcast and program information.

Artists

Alan Gilbert became Music Director of the New York Philharmonic in September 2009, the first native New Yorker to hold the post, ushering in what The New York Times called -an adventurous new era? at the Philharmonic. In his inaugural season he introduced a number of new initiatives: the positions of The Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence, held by Magnus Lindberg; The Mary and James G. Wallach Artist-in-Residence, held in 2010-11 by violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter; an annual three-week festival, which in 2010-11 is titled Hungarian Echoes, led by Esa-Pekka Salonen; and CONTACT!, the New York Philharmonic's new-music series. In the 2010-11 season Mr. Gilbert is leading the Orchestra on two tours of European music capitals; two performances at Carnegie Hall, including the venue's 120th Anniversary Concert; and a staged presentation of Janá?ek's The Cunning Little Vixen. Highlights of his inaugural season included major tours of Asia and Europe and an acclaimed staged presentation of Ligeti's Le Grand Macabre.

Mr. Gilbert is the first person to hold the William Schuman Chair in Musical Studies at The Juilliard School, and is conductor laureate of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and principal guest conductor of Hamburg's NDR Symphony Orchestra. He has conducted other leading orchestras in the U.S. and abroad, including the Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco symphony orchestras; Los Angeles Philharmonic; Cleveland and Philadelphia Orchestras; and the Berlin Philharmonic, Munich's Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and Amsterdam's Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. From 2003 to 2006 he served as the first music director of the Santa Fe Opera.
Alan Gilbert studied at Harvard University, The Curtis Institute of Music, and The Juilliard School. From 1995 to 1997 he was the assistant conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra. In November 2008 he made his acclaimed Metropolitan Opera debut conducting John Adams's Doctor Atomic. His recordings have received a 2008 Grammy Award nomination and top honors from the Chicago Tribune and Gramophone magazine. On May 15, 2010, Mr. Gilbert received an Honorary Doctor of Music degree from The Curtis Institute of Music.

American baritone Thomas Hampson enjoys a singular international career as a recitalist, opera singer, and recording artist, and also maintains an active interest in teaching, research, and technology. He has performed in all of the world's most important concert halls and opera houses with many of today's most renowned singers, pianists, conductors, and orchestras. Mr. Hampson has won worldwide recognition for his thoughtfully researched and creatively constructed programs that explore the rich repertoire of song in a wide range of styles, languages, and periods. He is one of the most important interpreters of German romantic song and, with his celebrated -Song of America? project, has become the -ambassador? of American song. Through the Hampsong Foundation, founded in 2003, he employs the art of song to promote intercultural dialogue and understanding.

A significant part of Mr. Hampson's 2010-11 season is dedicated to performances celebrating the 150th anniversary of Gustav Mahler's birth and the 100th anniversary of his death. Recognized as a leading interpreter of the Austrian composer's songs, he began the worldwide celebrations on July 7, 2010 - Mahler's 150th birthday - in Kaliste, Czech Republic, and throughout the season performs Mahler works in many of the world's musical capitals, and sings the composer's songs in a series of recitals in Berlin, Munich, Hamburg, Vienna, Zurich, London, Amsterdam, Paris, Milan, Madrid, and Oslo. His new recording of Des Knaben Wunderhorn with the Wiener Virtuosen - a conductorless ensemble comprised of the principal players of the Vienna Philharmonic - will be released on Deutsche Grammophon in January 2011.

Additional highlights of Hampson's 2010-11 season include season-opening performances in the title role in a new production of Verdi's Macbeth at Lyric Opera of Chicago; three all-Strauss concerts with Renée Fleming and the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Christian Thielemann; selections from George Crumb's American Songbooks performed with The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center; -Song of America? recitals at Duke University and the Minnesota Beethoven Festival; performances and a world-premiere recording of Richard Danielpour's Songs of Solitude, originally commissioned for him and The Philadelphia Orchestra; and the world premiere of William Bolcom's Laura Sonnets, also written especially for him. In Switzerland, he performs at the Zurich Opera in new productions of Verdi's I Masnadieri and Wagner's Parsifal under Adam Fischer and Daniele Gatti, and appears in a series of opera galas.

Born in London in 1971, Thomas Adès held important orchestral positions throughout Britain early in his career, and numerous worldwide festivals have focused on his music, including Helsinki's Musica Nova, Salzburg Easter Festival, Radio France's Présences, and the Barbican's Traced Overhead. He held Carnegie Hall's Debs Composer Chair during the 2007-08 season. Most of Mr. Adès's works have been recorded by EMI, and his music has attracted numerous awards and prizes, including the prestigious Grawemeyer Award (2000), of which he is the youngest-ever recipient. The New York Philharmonic commissioned Mr. Adès's orchestral America (A Prophecy) as one of the Messages for the Millennium, and premiered it in November 1999. Alan Gilbert led the first U.S. production of Thomas Adès's Tempest in 2006, when he was music director of the Santa Fe Opera.

Born in London in 1971, Mr. Adès studied piano and composition at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and read music at King's College, Cambridge. Between 1993 and 1995 he was Composer in Association with the Hallé Orchestra, which resulted in his writing The Origin of the Harp (1994) and These Premises Are Alarmed for the opening of the Bridgewater Hall in 1996. Asyla (1997) was a Feeney Trust commission for Sir Simon Rattle and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, who toured it together and performed it at Symphony Hall in August 1998 in Sir Simon's last concert as music director. The conductor subsequently programmed Asyla in his opening concert as music director of the Berlin Philharmonic in September 2002.

Artist and filmmaker Tal Rosner made his name through radical interpretations of musical compositions. Since 2005 he has been collaborating with musicians, combining multiple layers of sound and visuals to create a new language of classical/contemporary music videos. His independent experimental films Doppelganger (2005) and Without You (2008) have been screened at prestigious film festivals and venues, including Clermont-Ferrand (France), Rotterdam, Netherlands, Tribeca (New York City), the international Onedotzero festival, and Tate Modern in London.

Born in Jerusalem in 1978, Mr. Rosner won the 2008 BAFTA for Best Title Sequence for the Channel 4 television series Skins, and is currently developing the title sequences for the fifth season of the series. His work continues to cross over into the worlds of music, art, and performance/theater. His video for Esa-Pekka Salonen's Lachen Verlernt (2009), with violinist Jennifer Koh, had its live performance premiere in Oberlin in October 2009 and is being followed by a U.S. tour throughout the 2010-11 season. In 2010 he was commissioned to create the onstage video projections for a unique production of I Was Looking at the Ceiling and Then I Saw the Sky, a 1995 musical/opera composed by John Adams. Mr. Rosner is currently creating the film and animation elements for a new ballet production for Sadler's Wells, The Most Incredible Thing, which will open in the spring of 2011. The full-length dance work features music by the Pet Shop Boys and direction/choreography by Javier De Frutos.

Repertoire

In the summer of 1788, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed his last three symphonies - among them the Symphony No. 40 - in only two months, a feat impressive not only for the astonishing speed of composition but also for the unparalleled quality of the finished works. Even more miraculous is that the three symphonies were not written in the best of circumstances: by early 1788 Mozart was in serious financial difficulty and had entered on the long, steady decline of his fortunes that culminated in his death, at age 35, three years later. The Symphony No. 40 has variously been characterized as both light and buoyant and dark and tragic, but it has always been universally admired and treasured as a masterful, deeply compelling work.

In late 1833, the poet Friedrich Rückert suddenly lost two of his young children to scarlet fever. In response to this devastating experience, he began writing a series of poems he called Kindertotenlieder (Songs on the Death of Children), five of which would be set by Gustav Mahler between 1901 and 1904, forming his own cycle of Kindertotenlieder. In a profoundly tragic twist, Mahler's work became even more painfully poignant four years later, when the composer's own daughter died of scarlet fever and diphtheria. The Philharmonic first performed Kindertotenlieder in January 1910, with baritone Ludwig Wuellner, conducted by the composer, and most recently, in November 2005 Dresden, Germany, on Part II of the Philharmonic's 75th Anniversary European Tour, with contralto Anna Larsson, conducted by Lorin Maazel.

In Seven Days was composed by Thomas Adès in 2008 as a multimedia collaboration with video artist Tal Rosner, with the subtitle, -Concerto for Piano with Moving Image.?
It was commissioned by the Southbank Centre in London and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Association, and following its U.K. and U.S. premieres at the Royal FestivAl Hall in London and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, the work began a three-year world tour in the autumn of 2009, which includes performances with the New York Philharmonic and in Zurich's Tonhalle and Cologne.

As Mr. Adès's kaleidoscopic score is performed by orchestra and piano soloist, Tal Rosner's equally kaleidoscopic synchronized imagery is projected onto six large screens overhead. The work, which the composer terms a -video-ballet in seven movements,? follows the story of creation:
1. Chaos - Light - Dark 2. Separation of the waters into sea and sky 3. Land - Grass - Trees 4. Stars, Sun, Moon 5 Creatures of sea and sky 6. Creatures of the land 7. Contemplation

According to the composer, the story unfolds as a set of variations, reflecting its two-part structure: Days 1, 2, and 3 are reflected in Days 4, 5, and 6. In Day 7, the theme is presented in its simplest form. The visuals also tell the story in an abstract way, using footage and photographs from the two places equally responsible for the work's commission: the Royal FestivAl Hall, London, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, and their immediate surroundings. These performances represent the New York Premiere of In Seven Days.

Credit Suisse is the Global Sponsor of the New York Philharmonic.

Major support provided by the Francis Goelet Fund.

Programs of the New York Philharmonic 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.