Mostly Mozart Festival 2015 Week Three Highlights Announced

The third week of Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival, August 11 through 16, features 11 events comprising orchestral performances, late-night recitals, contemporary music, a lecture, and the U.S. stage premiere ofWritten on Skin, a highly-acclaimed opera by George Benjamin, this summer's Composer-in-Residence and the centerpiece of the Festival's focus on his music.

Written on Skin-which receives its first staging in the U.S. with performances on August 11, 13 and 15 at the David H. Koch Theater-was hailed as a modern masterpiece after its premiere at the Aix-en-Provence Festival in 2012. The Mostly Mozart Festival production is the first in a series of operas to be presented as part of a new artistic partnership between Lincoln Center and the New York Philharmonic to stage new works not yet seen in New York. Philharmonic Music Director Alan Gilbert leads the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, for which the music was written and which performed the music at the premiere and subsequent productions. As with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, soprano Barbara Hannigan's role was developed specifically for her by Benjamin. All of these artists, including the full cast, will make the Festival debuts in these performances.

With text by Martin Crimp, who collaborated with Benjamin on the chamber opera Into the Little Hill, Written on Skin is inspired by a 13th-century story by Occitan poet Guillem de Cabestany about a rich and powerful landowner in the Provence region of France who commissions a young artist to write a book about his riches and status. The landowner, referred to as "The Protector" in the piece and portrayed by Christopher Purves, invites The Boy (Tim Mead) to stay with him and his wife, Agnès (Barbara Hannigan), so that he might further celebrate his property and legacy. Agnès becomes drawn to the boy, and an affair ensues, with shocking consequences for all parties. Erotic and visceral, Written on Skin is a tale of submission, desire, and liberation.

In his striking score, Benjamin showcases a diverse range of instruments, including a glass harmonica, pebbles, viola da gamba, tabla, and mandolins. The opera features a cast of five, including three Angels who double as the Boy, Agnès's sister Marie (Victoria Simmonds), and Marie's husband John (Robert Murray). The Angels themselves serve to frame the story as a sort of cautionary tale. Crimp also uses a self-narrating device with all of the characters to remind the audience that both the present and the past exist in the piece. This production, directed by Katie Mitchell, further explores the connection between the three main characters and the Angels as interplay between our world and days gone by.

A post-performance discussion will follow the August 11 and 13 performances. George Benjamin and Alan Gilbert will speak on August 11, and George Benjamin on August 13. Moderator and further participants to be announced.

Mostly Mozart continues its exploration of George Benjamin's music with further performances featuring this summer's Artists-in-Residence, the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), returning for their fifth summer in this capacity. On August 13, ICE is accompanied by pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard for a late-night recital at the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse focused on the music of Dai Fujikura, a former student of Benjamin's. ICE and Aimard join forces once more on August 16 at Alice Tully Hall for a concert version of Benjamin's first opera Into the Little Hill, a dark "lyric tale" based on the famous Pied Piper of Hamelin story.Into the Little Hill, also a collaboration between Benjamin and Martin Crimp, features a unique arrangement with two singers (soprano and mezzo-soprano) performing all the parts, joined by an ensemble with unusual instrumentation including bass flute, basset horns, cimbalom, mandolin and banjo, among others. The composer himself will conduct this concert performance of Into the Little Hill, marking his Mostly Mozart Festival debut. Joining Benjamin are members of ICE and two singers who each play multiple roles making their Festival debuts: soprano Hila Plitmann and mezzo-soprano Susan Bickley. The program also features two other works by composers who influenced Benjamin: Messiaen's Oiseaux exotiques and Ligeti's Piano Concerto, featuring pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard.

Separate from the Festival's focus on the music of George Benjamin, the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra performs two concert series at Avery Fisher Hall. Renée and Robert Belfer Music Director Louis Langrée conducts a varied program of music by Mozart, Bach, and Schubert on August 11 and 12, with esteemed baritone Matthias Goerne, who returns to theFestival for the first time in 17 years. Goerne will sing Bach's "Ich habe genug," Cantata BWV 82, alongside two symphonic masterpieces by Mozart, Symphony No. 25, K.183, and Symphony No. 40, K.550. Updating previously released information, Goerne will also sing three Schubert songs with the Orchestra, including "Erlkönig" (orchestrated by Max Reger). Charlie Albright, a 2014 Avery Fisher Career Grant Recipient, performs music by Chopin and Beethoven in a pre-concert recital before both Festival Orchestra performances.

Romanian-born conductor Cristian Macelaru will make his Festival debut in performances with the Festival Orchestra on August 14 and 15. Macelaru, currently the Conductor-in-Residence of the Philadelphia Orchestra, leads Mozart's Symphony No. 39, K.543, and is joined by pianist Lars Vogt for a performance of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 4. Vogt will perform works by Schubert and Beethoven at a solo late-night recital on August 14. Both of these concerts will feature a pre-concert recital by two members of the Festival Orchestra (Jon Manasse, clarinet, and Ilya Finkelshteyn, cello) with pianist Jon Nakamatsu, performing Brahms's Clarinet Trio in A minor, Op. 114.

Complementing the live performances during the Festival is a special panel discussion, "Listening to Mozart," which will take place on August 15 at 4:00 p.m. at the Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse. Three prominent Mozart scholars will discuss the interaction between Mozart's music and its listeners, with a special focus on what we can learn from his singers and his operas. "Listening to Mozart" is presented in association with the Mozart Society of America, and will feature moderator Bruce Alan Brown with guests Paul Corneilson, Edmund J. Goehring, and Laurel E. Zeiss.

Tickets for Mostly Mozart Festival 2015 can be purchased online at MostlyMozart.org, by phone via CenterCharge at 212-721-6500, or by visiting the Avery Fisher Hall or Alice Tully Hall box offices at Broadway and 65th St.

About the Mostly Mozart Festival

Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival-America's first indoor summer music festival-was launched as an experiment in 1966. Called Midsummer Serenades: A Mozart Festival, its first two seasons were devoted exclusively to the music of Mozart. Now a New York institution, Mostly Mozart continues to broaden its focus to include works by Mozart's predecessors, contemporaries, and related successors. In addition to concerts by the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, Mostly Mozart now includes concerts by the world's outstanding period-instrument ensembles, chamber orchestras and ensembles, and acclaimed soloists, as well as opera productions, dance, film, late-night performances, and visual art installations. Contemporary music has become an essential part of the festival, embodied in annual artists-in-residence including Osvaldo Golijov, John Adams, Kaija Saariaho, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, and the International Contemporary Ensemble. Among the many artists and ensembles who have had long associations with the festival are Joshua Bell, Christian Tetzlaff, Itzhak Perlman, Emanuel Ax, Garrick Ohlsson, Stephen Hough, Osmo Vänskä, the Emerson String Quartet, Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and the Mark Morris Dance Group.

The Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra is the resident orchestra of the Mostly Mozart Festival, and is the only chamber orchestra in the U.S. dedicated to the music of the Classical period. Since 2002 Louis Langrée has been the Orchestra's music director, and since 2005 the Orchestra's Avery Fisher Hall home has been transformed each summer into an appropriately intimate venue for its performances. Over the years, the Orchestra has toured to such notable festivals and venues as Ravinia, Great Woods, Tanglewood, Bunkamura in Tokyo, and the Kennedy Center. Conductors who made their New York debuts leading the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra include Jérémie Rhorer, Edward Gardner, Lionel Bringuier, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Charles Dutoit, Leonard Slatkin, David Zinman, and Edo de Waart. Mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli, flutist James Galway, soprano Elly Ameling, and pianist Mitsuko Uchida all made their U.S. debuts with the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra.

ABOUT LINCOLN CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (LCPA) serves three primary roles: presenter of artistic programming, national leader in arts and education and community relations, and manager of the Lincoln Center campus. A presenter of more than 3,000 free and ticketed events, performances, tours, and educational activities annually, LCPA offers 15 series, festivals, and programs including American Songbook, Avery Fisher Artist Program, Great Performers, Lincoln Center Festival, Lincoln Center Out of Doors, Midsummer Night Swing, Martin E. Segal Awards, Meet the Artist, Mostly Mozart Festival, and the White Light Festival, as well as the Emmy Award-winning Live From Lincoln Center, which airs nationally on PBS. As manager of the Lincoln Center campus, LCPA provides support and services for the Lincoln Center complex and 11 resident organizations: The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, The Film Society of Lincoln Center, Jazz at Lincoln Center, The Juilliard School, Lincoln Center Theater, The Metropolitan Opera, New York City Ballet, New York Philharmonic, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, School of American Ballet, and Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. For more information: aboutlincolncenter.org

Lincoln Center is committed to providing and improving accessibility for people with disabilities. For information, call the Department of Programs and Services for People with Disabilities at 212.875.5375.

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The Mostly Mozart Festival is made possible by Sarah Billinghurst Solomon and Howard Solomon, Rita E. and Gustave M. Hauser, Chris and Bruce Crawford, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, Inc., Charles E. Culpeper Foundation, S.H. and Helen R. Scheuer Family Foundation, and Friends of Mostly Mozart.

Public support is provided by the New York State Council on the Arts.

The Mostly Mozart Festival presentation of Written on Skin is made possible in part by major support from Sarah Billinghurst Solomon and Howard Solomon.

MetLife is the National Sponsor of Lincoln Center

United Airlines is a Supporter of Lincoln Center

WABC-TV is a Supporter of Lincoln Center

"Summer at Lincoln Center" is supported by Diet Pepsi.

Time Out New York is a Media Partner of Summer at Lincoln Center

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