David Zinman To Replace Esa-Pekka Salonen 5/13-16

David Zinman will conduct the New York Philharmonic in programs May 13–16, 2009, replacing Esa-Pekka Salonen, who has withdrawn due to back trouble. Mr. Zinman will lead the Rush Hour Concert on Wednesday, May 13, at 6:45 p.m., which will now comprise Mussorgsky’s Night on Bald Mountain and Shostakovich’s Violin Concerto No. 1, with Christian Tetzlaff as soloist. On Thursday, May 14, at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday, May 16, at 8:00 p.m., he will conduct the Mussorgsky and Shostakovich works, concluding with the previously announced Sibelius Symphony No. 5. On Friday, May 15, at 8:00 p.m., the stories behind the Sibelius symphony will be explored during a multimedia Inside the Music program, narrated by Gerard McBurney, followed by a complete performance of the work conducted by Mr. Zinman.

Related Events:

Pre-Concert Talk Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Paul Moravec will introduce the May 14 and 16 programs one hour before each performance. Tickets are $5 in addition to the concert ticket. Attendance is limited to 90 people. (There are no pre-concert talks for Rush Hour Concerts or Inside the Music.) For more information, visit: nyphil.org or call (212) 875-565.

National Radio Broadcast The May 14–16 program will be broadcast the week of May 25, 2009,* on The New York Philharmonic This Week, a radio concert series syndicated nationally to more than 295 stations by the WFMT Radio Network. The 52-week series, hosted by WFMT’s Kerry Frumkin, 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 96.3 FM WQXR on Thursdays at 9:00 p.m.

*Check local listings for broadcast and program information.

David Zinman is in his 14th season as music director of the Tonhalle Orchestra in Zurich, following many years as a regular guest conductor there. In 1998 he completed his 13-year tenure as music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and became music director of the Aspen Music Festival and School, where he also is program director of the recently formed American Academy of Conducting at Aspen. He has toured widely with both the Tonhalle and Baltimore Symphony Orchestras in Europe, North America, and the Far East, including in such music centers as Berlin, Vienna, Frankfurt, London, Munich, Paris, and Milan.

David Zinman made his American conducting debut with The Philadelphia Orchestra in 1967, and has since led many of the world's leading orchestras. His 2008–09 season engagements include the Chicago Symphony, National Symphony, Philadelphia, and St. Louis Symphony orchestras, as well as, in Europe, the Berlin Philharmonic, Leipzig Gewandhaus, and Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Mr. Zinman has served as music director of the Rochester Philharmonic (1974–85), Rotterdam Philharmonic (1979–82), and Netherlands Chamber Orchestra (1964–77); he was artistic director of the Minnesota Orchestra's Viennese Sommerfest from 1994 to 1996. As guest conductor, he has regularly led the Boston and Chicago Symphony Orchestras, New York Philharmonic, and The Philadelphia and Cleveland Orchestras, and has appeared regularly at the Blossom, Hollywood Bowl, Mostly Mozart, Ravinia, Saratoga, and Tanglewood music festivals. He conducts and records frequently with major European orchestras.

Mr. Zinman's discography of more than 90 recordings has earned numerous international honors, including five Grammy Awards, two Grand Prix du Disque awards, two Edison Prizes, the Deutsche Schallplattenpreis, and a Gramophone Award. With the Tonhalle, he has recorded the complete Beethoven symphonies and concertos and the complete Strauss tone poems; he is in the process of completing a cycle of the Mahler symphonies.

Born in 1936, David Zinman graduated from Oberlin Conservatory and pursued advanced work in composition at the University of Minnesota. Conducting studies at the Boston Symphony's Tanglewood Music Center brought him to the attention of Pierre Monteux, who guided his musical development and gave him his first important conducting opportunities with the London Symphony Orchestra and at the 1963 Holland Festival. Mr. Zinman last conducted the New York Philharmonic in May 2006.

Violinist Christian Tetzlaff is known for performances and recordings of a broad spectrum of the repertoire, ranging from Bach’s unaccompanied sonatas and partitas to 19th-century masterworks by Mendelssohn, Beethoven, and Brahms, and from 20th- century concertos by Bartók, Berg, and Shostakovich to world premieres of contemporary works. He has appeared with the orchestras of New York, Chicago, Cleveland, Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Toronto, among many others, and with major European ensembles including the Berlin, Vienna, and Rotterdam philharmonic orchestras, London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, and Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw. He also collaborates frequently with distinguished artists in chamber music performances and is the founder of the Tetzlaff Quartet.

Highlights of Christian Tetzlaff’s 2008–09 North American season include appearances with The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra at Carnegie Hall; the Cleveland and Philadelphia Orchestras; the Cincinnati and Houston Symphony Orchestras; and the Toronto Symphony, where he performed the North American premiere of Mark-Anthony Turnage’s Violin Concerto, Mambo, Blues and Tarantella, written specifically for him. He also gave all-Bach recitals in five U.S. cities; performed with pianist Leif Ove Andsnes in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Vancouver, Boston, Princeton, and New York; and played with the Tetzlaff Quartet, which made its North American debut in Washington, D.C., Atlanta, and New York.

Mr. Tetzlaff's recordings include concertos ranging from Haydn to Bartók; an album of 20th-century sonatas by Janácek, Debussy, Ravel, and Nielsen with Mr. Andsnes; the complete works for violin and orchestra of Jean Sibelius with the Danish National Radio Orchestra and Thomas Dausgaard; a Grammy-nominated album of Bartók’s Violin Sonatas Nos. 1 and 2 with Mr. Andsnes, and the Bartók Sonata for Solo Violin, among others. His most recent releases feature the Bach Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin on the Musical Heritage and Haenssler labels; the Brahms and Joachim Violin Concertos with the Danish Radio Orchestra and Thomas Dausgaard for Virgin Classics; and Berg’s Chamber Concerto for Piano, Violin, and 13 Wind Instruments, with pianist Mitsuko Uchida and The Ensemble Intercontemporain led by Pierre Boulez on Decca.

Gerard McBurney is artistic programming advisor of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and creative director of Beyond the Score®. A native of Cambridge, England, he studied in England and at the Moscow Conservatory before returning to London, where he worked for many years as a composer, arranger, broadcaster, teacher, and writer.

In addition to his original compositions, Mr. McBurney has reconstructed lost and forgotten works by Shostakovich, and has published widely in the field of Russian and Soviet music. For 20 years he created and presented programs on BBC Radio 3, and he has written and researched nearly 30 television documentaries. McBurney was a lecturer at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and also has acted as advisor and collaborator with many orchestras and presenters, including Lincoln Center, the Emerson Quartet, the Hallé Orchestra, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Mr. McBurney was the narrator and director of Inside the Music at the New York Philharmonic on December 14, 2007, for an exploration of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 4. Andrey Boreyko conducted the Orchestra in a complete performance of the work.

Repertoire:

Night on Bald Mountain by Modest Mussorgsky was originally titled St. John’s Night on the Bare Mountain, referring to a traditional belief that a Witches’ Sabbath is held annually on St. John’s Night (June 24) on Mount Triglav, near Kiev. The work was left uncompleted at the composer’s death and was subsequently edited and revised by his friend, Rimsky-Korsakov. Mussorgsky’s own description of the piece refers to a “subterranean din of supernatural voices” and a Black Mass glorifying the god Chernobog, who appears as a black goat. Finally, the sound of a village church bell “disperses the Spirits of Darkness.” The work was first performed by the New York Philharmonic on February 26, 1920, conducted by Josef Stransky, and, most recently, on a Summertime Classics program in July 2005, conducted by Bramwell Tovey.

Dmitri Shostakovich composed his Violin Concerto No. 1 for David Oistrakh, one of the great violinists of the 20th century. This brilliant, dramatic work was written in 1947 and 1948, and during its composition Shostakovich was denounced by the Soviet authorities for musical “formalism.” As a result, the concerto was not premiered until 1955, two years after Stalin’s death. The New York Philharmonic first performed the work in December 1955, conducted by Dimitri Mitropoulos, with Mr. Oistrakh as soloist, and most recently, in April 2007, conducted by Sakari Oramo with Lisa Batiashvili as soloist.

Jean Sibelius completed the first version of the first movement of his Symphony No. 5 in 1915, just after the end of World War I, which may explain much of the work’s somber mood, although the composer insisted that it had no thematic agenda. Unlike many of his pieces, which offer programmatic tours of windswept Finnish countryside or of Sibelius’s inner turmoil, the Fifth Symphony is abstract. Still, the symphony moves from a profound melancholy through agitation to serenity, and concludes with a majestic finale. Wrapping up his many revisions on the piece, Sibelius wrote, “The whole, if I may say so, [is] a vital climax to the end. Triumphal.” The first New York Philharmonic performance of Sibelius’s Symphony No. 5 took place in November 1921 led by Josef Stransky; the most recent performance was in January 2006, in Newark, New Jersey, led by Music Director Lorin Maazel.

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

Generous support of the Rush Hour Concert is provided by the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation.

This Inside the Music concert is presented by Mr. and Mrs. Toos N. Daruvala.

Generous support for Inside the Music is provided by the Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation.

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.

Single tickets for the Rush Hour Concerts are $26 to $72. Tickets for the May 14 and 16 concerts are $30 to $109. Tickets for Inside the Music are $26 to $72. Tickets for Pre-Concert Talks are $5, and for Open Rehearsals, $16. All tickets may be purchased online at nyphil.org or by calling (212) 875-5656, 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. daily. Tickets may also be purchased at the Avery Fisher Hall Box Office, 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 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.]

New York Philharmonic Avery Fisher Hall Rush Hour Concert Wednesday, May 13, 2009, 6:45 p.m. Open Rehearsal — 9:45 a.m. David Zinman, conductor Christian Tetzlaff, violin Mussorgsky/Rimsky-Korsakov Night on Bald Mountain Shostakovich Violin Concerto No. 1 New York Philharmonic Avery Fisher Hall Thursday, May 14, 2009, 7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 16, 2009, 8:00 p.m. Pre-Concert Talk (one hour before each concert) with Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Paul Moravec David Zinman, conductor Christian Tetzlaff, violin Mussorgsky/Rimsky-Korsakov Night on Bald Mountain Shostakovich Violin Concerto No. 1 Sibelius Symphony No 5. 

New York Philharmonic Inside the Music Avery Fisher Hall Friday, May 15, 2009, 8:00 p.m. David Zinman, conductor Gerard McBurney, narrator Sibelius Symphony No. 5